The Workshop Progress Thread 2019

Engineering porn, great photos, keep up the good work and posts, much appreciated.

Pete

Howard; a couple of pics of the cobbler automaton would be nice.

George.

Sadly, was so obsessed with sorting it out that took no pictures. Should have, if only to show the damage and bodges, (likely to make matters worse ), previously present.

Would guess, from the telephone number on the baseboard, that it was pretty old (020 code)

Basically, a geared shaded pole motor drove a multilobe cam. The follower is on a lever which pivots on the left frame. The lever carries three screwed rods, with ball joint ends, which run vertically upwards. The undamaged one nods the head, the two that needed straightening and adjusting operate the right arm, wielding the hammer, and the outer one, a bell crank which drives a horizontal rod at shoulder level, which causes the left hand to sweep to and fro across the shoe on the "anvil".

The fact that the two rods had been bent in compression implied some fairly large forces, (hence the original motor ran, but did not drive the output shaft ).

The cam had been fitted inside out, making the grubscrews inaccessible, which explained why it was loose on the shaft! When fitted with the hub outwards, the cam was running out. It was secured to an arbor, in the lathe and checked with a DTI. The DTi was moved away to allow gentle persuasion, or levering, at appropriate points, until it ran reasonably true again, (1mm+ reduced to less than 0.2mm ) At least the cam now stayed in the groove in the ball bearing follower. Having dispensed with the pack of washers, a solid spacer was turned up to align the follower with the cam.

Adjusting the rods took time, because to make any adjustment meant removing a ball joint, giving it one turn and refitting, before checking the effect of the adjustment.

Once operating satisfactorily, the back was fitted; which promptly stalled the motor! The ball joint on the outer rod fouled. The rod was refitted with the ball joints inboard, but a foul still remained. This was cleared by drilliing a hole in the plastic back, and steadily carving bits away, to extend it, until the foul cleared.

From its state, the shirt was even older than the ones that i wear in the workshop; and that's saying something!

The new owners seemed impressed with my description of the "as received" condition, the repairs,and the "after" operation, that they gave a bigger donation to Club funds than I had expected.

So everyone was happy!

Howard

Not my idea, Mr Tredenick from Australia, as featured in MEW Feb 19. How to stop the jaw lifting on your Record drilling vice. Only took an hour or so

Edited By duncan webster on 21/03/2019 15:50:36

In my last post on the progress of Stew Hart's Overcrank design I had made the valve eccentrics (and the eccentric straps) which had to be fitted to the crankshaft centre section before assembling the shaft. I then thought that making up the shaft would naturally be the next operation. When I came to cut the 12mm dia bar to length for the main part I found that the exact length depended on the width of the flywheel and the output pulley hubs. Sooo the next task was to obtain a flywheel casting from Stuart Models and machine it and make a pulley and, while I was at it, a pulley for the governer belt.

Then I assembled the crankshaft using my usual Loctite method but since this was a twin cylinder engine I also pinned the webs. The pins are fitted through the webs from one end, go through both the "big end" and the shaft section but stop short of protruding from the other end of the web.

And here is an assembly shot of the crankshaft in position before I had cut out the redundant pieces between the webs.

Next up I get to fit the laser cut crank return rods

Jim

had a try at getting the I F Allman engine going over the weekend and it's nearly there. A few fine tweaks to the gas flow to the actual engine and the position of the burner to get the timing spot on should have it firing a bit more often which should result in some longer runs.

Duncan Thanks for the tip, will give that a go.

Jason I love that engine, just to give an idea of the size, what diameter is the fly wheel?

10.5" dia and very heavy due to the thick section rim.

But what a beauty she is, nice one Jason.

Getting ready for a repetition job, thought a rear toolpost for my little lathe might help, so here it is, not quite finished, needs another tee nut making to hold it down, but grand dad duties call.

The new shed/workshop is finally erected, I've been aiming for a better set up since we got here last October.
8' x 10' from ShedsAhead of Port Talbot who did the installation.
Because of the slope and underlying limestone it sits on 18 4"x4" piles.

Next the power and light, then the benches. I've been saving the old kitchen units and worktops for this job.

I've been machining up a few more bits for the mill engine I posted in the KX-3 thread that will make up the bearing housings.

Then heated them up with a bit of flux and silver solder thrown in for good measure

And after a 40 min soak in brick cleaner the solder looks to have flowed OK. Just need to file the two curved webs to shape now.

Machined the cylinder for my (air-cooled) Farm Boy hit n miss

Rod

Yesterday i made a split pulley to drive the mill engine's governor, was happy that it held on the 10mm PGMS shaft for final turning and crowning of the face. 40mm OD and M2 temporary fixings, just a bit of filing to round off the flange around the bolts to do.

Well, after posting in my Intro that I'm starting with a mill and will get to a lathe as time / finances / swmbo allows,
A very nice man, not far from me PM'd me and said I could have his old lathe if I wanted it.
Gawd, how I agonised about not actually biting his arm off for the offer and being polite . . . (i.e. not actually running him down in my rush to take up his kind offer)
So went to see the nice man, looked at lathe, went home, agonised about taking such a nice bit of kit.
Went back to see him, was plain about what I'd seen such items go for, he still seemed happy enough, didn't look like he'd lost his marbles, was in fact the very epitome of a nice helpful chap.
So, I bunged him a tab to distract him and piled all I could fit in the back of the motor and did a runner

With new toys in garage just mocking me for my limited abilities (I've worked with hi tech machined tools all my working life in the oilfield and never knew how little I knew 'till I started to bodge bits of metal myself)
So, You choob is my friend, many and varied are the video's I've been watching, going from "DON'T EVER, EVER, EVER, leave a chuck key in"
To setting tool height, rpm, doc, feed rate . . .
And have made my first useful (I'd say "commissioned" but it was a wheeze dreamed up over whisky at a gliding club during a comp a couple of weeks ago) piece.
Which, much to my amazement, actually works.

Knobs (the bronze thingies) they are used to pull a recessed nut out to allow wing extensions to engage on the glider.
So, in reality they are a bit of bronze spun down to look pretty and tapped M5 on the end, but hey, it's a start.
The regulation nut on a bit of oversize bar required additional tooling / motor / VFD / Yet more video's / More change gears from myford-stuff, and it too worked (work in this context being a bit grandiose)

Still on a very steep learning curve, but have yet to break any tools, all my injuries so far have been "band aid" sized, I'm learning how to get the swarf out of my socks before trudging round the house, all in all, so far so good.

The two most heavily used items in the garage so far seem to be the (selection of now) brushes and shop vacum . .
It's amazing where swarf can get to !

My confidence is rising to where I may yet have a go at something useful and complex . . slowly (with back up's hidden . . )

Finally admitted defeat at being able to get my Forest based engine to run as a flame licker. I had always thought that if it would not run that I could convert it to a poppet valve engine much like the Jowitt I made a few years ago. In the end I decided on a cam and follower operated spool valve as I had not made an engine with a spool valve before. Still needs a tidy up and the plumbing sorted out but seems to run at a nice steady pace.

Sorry about the few seconds of compressor noise at about 40 secs in.

I remember one from when I was a boy. He looked like a bearded Magwitch.

Neil

Started a new project, 5"g Lion. These are the boiler parts ready for the dreaded silver soldering, I'm tackling the boiler first as that is the biggest challenge for me, if I can achieve this then I can finish the engine.

I'm generally following the LBSC drawings but using photo's I took of the full size engine in the Liverpool City museum to add detail.

Nigel

I have a vague recollection (and it's no more than that) that there is a problem with the LBSC design valve gear for Lion. If I were you I'd contact OLCO who have a list of errors and hopefully solutions

OLCO

Thanks Duncan. Your recollection is correct, I have an ME article 21st Dec 1973 that gives corrections to the 5"g valve gear.

Nigel