Just Between You, Me, and the Bingo Card: Life Lessons from the Assisted Living Facility

Need a fuel tank for the incoming engine project. Internet has failed to find a neat antique looking brass tank of any shape.
So I have a collection of old oil cans, and this might become a fuel tank, unless it can be resurrected, then it will be put to use oiling the mains instead.

I had a suspicion that this one was brass when I picked it up. It and the others have been sitting in a wooden fruit crate, under my canoe, outside, for the last two decades.

Not pictured are the checkball and it's spring. They didn't make an appearance until I drained the cleaning pan, thankfully I screened it. Otherwise it would have been disappointing.

No pics of the internal pieces, the fumes had me at this point.





If I had a buffing wheel and some jewelers rouge, I could really make it pop. But I don't.


Pump mechanism was clogged solid, used some piano wire, a little banging on the table and 180psi to clear it out. I guess it's going into service as an oil can.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Bs4i_FPtPk

Guess I'll select another. The rest aren't as cool though.

 

I have no idea what I’m watching but the 11/22, 11/30, 12/4 and 12/7 videos were a great 5.5 mins of my life.

Can’t wait to see what the adjusted YouTube algorithm produces now.

 

Thrust culture. The world revolves around it.

 

Thrust culture. It continues the line.

 

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/h-o-trains-i-got-a-bunch.819172/#post-29377684

I know you like trains, so I thought this might be of interest to you also.

 

Found this while looking for cart ideas. Need 4 tiny cast iron wheels and I'm in business.
Olds Type G. Built in 1904, weighing in at 5,300lbs, 794.4 CID (13 liters).
18hp.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9G4d2UDWrJo
Now I'm looking for a real one that runs, or maybe just needs cleaned up, like a 1hp to 3hp size.

 

Little engine started running like shit. Literally took the entire thing apart for a good cleaning and cleaned the valves as well as the intake was sticking a bit. Surprised the coating has held up so well to a spark plug and tiny explosions.

Still ran like shit. Turns out it needed fresh batteries. Literally spent hours on this yesterday.

Playing around with different governor springs. The idea is to get it to run as slow as possible, reducing firing and getting longer, cooler run times.
The pair on the left are stock. Next to them a pair from ACE that were just a bit longer. A pair of fat ones that had decent results and some pirated shit from RC transmitters. Varying results but wasn't getting that fine tune.


Then figured this out.

By using two longer springs and then a short one between them I was able to get what i wanted. By slightly angling the longer ones I can change the tension on the center spring.
Also added 4 tiny brass bushings between the screw and spring for a touch more weight so they throw a bit slower.
This is the slowest I can get it to run, which is roughly guestimated at half of what it was.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXz0uMISgIs
Adds a bit more entertainment.

 

Mini steam engine. Minutes of pure entertainment.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfiobMnbRRM

 

Still has more horsepower than my Prius.

 

Straight from Jin (Enginediy.com) in China. He made the little blue hit and miss engine too. 12 days across the Pacific, thru customs, to my door. The holiday specials are hard to pass up.
2nd order from him, very impressed with how the packing was done for both orders.
So impressed with the product and packaging, I placed another order today. I don't expect it to make it before Christmas, but it might.

3 layers of this until the body was reached.



Legit brass bearings. I guess they felt the need to install one with the gear, prolly to make sure it gets timed correctly.

 

Picked up a very expensive piece of rosewood. Won't be buying lunch today.
Hoping to cut it up and make a thing without wasting it. It's very heavy and will help stabilize the engine when running.

 

You going to run a mini washing machine on these or maybe a water pump

 

I was thinking maybe a saw mill.

 

All the pieces are bagged and labeled as to what they are. Nice bags too, not the typical chinese bags that melt in your hands. They will be saved for LEGO leftovers.
Really not that much here to assemble. Engine block is temporarily mounted to a wooden block for assembly. And yes I beveled the edges because it just felt right to do so.

First thing is to file off the ragged edges on the crank counter balance lobes. There is enough room for the con rod to clear, but not by much. So to prevent scratches in the rod and cuts on my fingers, it needs to be smoothed.

 

Ridges be gone.

Main bearings. They have a little hole that aligns with the oiler cups, and the inside has groovy little rings in it to spread said oil. I squeezed a bit in thru the hole on the preinstalled bearing, and lubed the hell out of the other one.

Connecting rod bearings. The little guys are notched so they don't spin. The rod cap was preinstalled and the screws were tight! Made me think it needed to be aligned the same way and equally as tight. So I marked the "bottom" of the rod and cap to keep it aligned. Guessing these must be oiled before and during each run. Maybe it depends on how much oil the piston slings back on it.



Timing gear and pushrod cam for the exhaust stroke. Notice the two sets of timing marks.

And installed you can only see the one dot as it's now reversed. The gear on the crank has the corresponding double dots for alignment.
This one uses a point contact system to fire the spark plug. Very cool. This is fully closed, still a tiny gap between the contacts.

And fully open. I think they may need to touch when closed, but I'll cross that bridge later. In operation it may have enough spring to make the momentary contact.

 

Was hoping for some cross hatch on the bore.
It does have a nice rounded edge to make it easier on the O-ring.

Main bearing caps. Screws are not labeled, but bagged by amount and length needed, 4 for this, 6 for the head, and a whole bunch of the same size for the rest.

So the tolerance on this one is much tighter than the other one. The blue one is a bit sloppy and has a large O-ring to make up for it. This one was snug from the start. Machined by Kawasaki and the other by Harley Davidson apparently.

Mopped up the excess and deposited it back in the rear of the cylinder.

Timing aligned.

Hole in the bearing aligned with the oil cup/main cap. The caps are handed.

oil cups.

It's a work of art.

 

Nice split locking collar for the flywheels.

The part of the wheel that says "MUSA" and has the added material is actually part of the counterweight system. It aligns straight with the lobes on the crank shaft. You can see them in the background. I know this only because of the wealth of internet knowledge that was gleaned beforehand.


The groove holds 3 BB's for the governor thingy.

Focused on everything but the BB's.


They were a very snug fit.

Then I did it over as i forgot to install the flywheel with it.

 

Measuring rod

Slides between the governor and the gear in the drawn back position, then tighten the brass collar and it leaves just the right amount of space.


Pushrod. This gave me a bit of trouble. It slides thru the guide fine but did not quite line up with it's counterpart with the threads. It resulted in being bound up. Spent an hour last night with a tiny round file, then hit it again this morning for about 20 minutes and was able to free it up and it slides smooth with no play.


Governor arm, in the "hit" position.

"miss" position.

and the leever holds the arm back defeating the governor so it will run like hell.

 

Head.



Rocker arm.

Valve tappet, adjustable for clearance. so damn tiny. Extra nut for when you drop the other on the garage floor and it's gone forever.

eyeballed at .01-.02mm of clearance. Just a touch of play.