[Thad E Ginathom]

It looks huge!

Originally Posted by Jeroen

So I had two options, get a bigger lathe, or get a different knurling tool. My wife veto-ed the first options ...

Never mind: the big-lathe time will come.

[Jeroen]

Yesterday (Saturday) was a vey nice pleasant, summer day, here in the Netherlands. Sunny, 23-24oC. Perfect day for a nice long Spider drive.

TomTom has a nice selection of interesting routes on their website. You can simply download them and via MyDrive app it pops into your own TomTom device and off you go!

https://www.tomtom.com/en_gb/roadtrips/

Usually, I put my own routes together, but sometimes it is just easy and convenient to use somebody else.



This route would take me around the Veluwe. It took about 30 minutes cross country to pick up the route. The Veluwe is the largest woodland area in the Netherlands. It is very different from what most would consider a typical Dutch landscape.



Make for a bit of different scenery from our own stomping grounds.

As I was driving through various little villages a sign saying something along the way of “vintage industrial” caught my eye. Pulled over and had a look. Nice Vintage Industrial Brocante is the best way to describe it.

Of course, I had to buy something; another addition to my little museum collection. Cool little multimeter. It came with the manual still intact and some notes from the previous owner!.





I had to stop along the route for a quick repair. One of my indicator lights stopped working. I noticed the indicator light on the dashboard blinking at double the normal speed, and so was the aural indicator. Which usually means a bulb has blown. On many cars it is set up this way. An indicator bulb blows, the indicated blinker speed and aural signal doubles!

So I stopped to investigate: I must admit I had this problem not too long ago, during another drive. Same thing again. I check the bulb which is fine, check and clean everything, looks fine, but still does not work. Get out a multimeter and check for voltage, nothing!



A bit more fiddling and all of a sudden the indicator worked again. But I don’t know why. It must be some wire or connector with a bad connection. So I do need to check it out back home.

Stopped at a very pleasant cafe along the route and had what was advertised on the menu as a Veluwe Salad. Not sure what makes this salad particularly Veluwe, but it was tasty.



I do need to figure out why the Spider is using so much oil. Tomorrow it is going back to Goos as it is still leaking a bit of oil. But I believe this is tranny-oil, by the smell of it. More work to be done I guess.

A very nice and pleasant drive. Perfect weather, all by myself. Stopping here and there to admire the view, have a coffee etc.

When I got home a few more tools had arrived, so this morning I am doing a bit more work on my Steam Engine.



I am trying to finish the cilinder cap. I will need to drill and tap M2 into the cilinder! Later we will be taking the Jaguar for a nice spin. We will be visiting Willemstad, walk around a bit, look at the marina and the little town and have lunch. I am hoping for mussels!

Jeroen

[Jeroen]

So we had a nice tour in the Jaguar and walked around Willemstad for about 1,5 hour. Very pretty little “vesting” (fortified) town. Some marina’s and I love looking at boats.




And yes, we did have mussels for lunch.



Back home some more work on the steam engine. I finished the cilinder cap.
Looks good!



Fits pretty good as well! This required drilling 1.6mm holes into the cilinder and threading it with M2 taps. Went pretty smoothly!



Jeroen

[Jeroen]

I took the Spider to Goos this morning. Lets see what he can find with regards to the oil leaking.

Goos always gives me a free loaner to get home again. It is an old one, but as you would expect from an Alfa Specialist, it is an Alfa.

A 146, 1.6 T-Spark. Lovely little car! A real pleasure to drive, quite nippy and very precise steering. This car is well over 15 years old, 140K on the clock but still looks very good



The interior looks good and as always Alfa Dashboard look smashing with proper dials. Red LEDs galore, but that was how it was then.



Jeroen

[Jeroen]

My son Luc is coming around next week Wednesday so we can service his Golf GTI mk4. He has the week off and I will take the day off.

It has been almost two years since we gave his car a service, so it is time. He doesn’t drive it much.

I spend some time last night going through our Haynes manual figuring out what we should be doing. Any job that needs doing properly, needs a bit of research, unless you have done it a billion times. Even then, it never hurts to check the manual. I also look up and write down the various torque values, minimum thickness of the disc/pads etc. So we have all of that ready at hand.

-Change oil and oil filter
-Check air filter. (According to VW it should last last 4 years / 40K) we will see
-Flush brake fluid
-Check disc brakes and pads. Some time ago, Luc noticed the brake fluid reservoir needed topping up. No leaks, so I suspect the pads, possibly the discs are worn.

And we will be doing some regular checking of various things, belts, greasing etc.

As some of you will recall, we had a problem with the speedometer on this car. Still not fixed. I have given it some more thought and there are a few simple things I want to check.

I also checked with my garage owner Johan if he has a proper VAG diagnostic kit. Which he has not, but as usual he knows somebody who does in the next village. I might give them a call. I know with the VAG diagnostic I can check the actual signals to/from the speed sensor and that might give a better clue as to what is going on, then just the TDC / error codes I can read with my own OBD analyser.

Some more work on the steam engine. I drilled some holes into the frame, used a reamer and made the cylinder pivot fit. It fits neatly, no play, turns well. And it looks like the cylinder sits really tight and snug against the frame plate. Blew some air into it and it looks as if it seals really well!





You can see the two holes I drilled and threaded on top of the frame by mistake. Have not decided what I will do. One very tricky bit will be to measure out and drill the inlet and outlet port, so if anything I want to try that out on this part, before I decide I really need to redo it all from scratch.

Live and learn as they say

A few more parts to be made: Main bearing, nut for on the cylinder pivot and the most important and most difficult part: the piston!

I am very pleased and impressed by all the advise I am getting on the modelforum. All in Dutch I am afraid. You will recall somebody supplied me with all the necessary materials at no cost. Yesterday, somebody else send me a 6mm reamer which I was missing and could not fine online. Very friendly and helpful.

Jeroen

[Jeroen]

Look what the mail man just brought.

A knurling tool in the correct size for my lathe:



As mentioned I was also expecting an enveloppe with one reamer in it from my friendly model forum member. A whole hefty box showed up. Look at this!

A sizeable collection reamers, drills and cutting bits. Some brand new by the looks of it!



I also just got a call from Goos about my Spider. Ready to be picked up. The leak was on the transmission housing. They used a special sealant to seal the two halves. For some reason something must have gone wrong, because it was leaking. So they had to remove the transmission, open it up, clean, reseal and put it back in again. I am glad they found something and I am pretty sure they will have sorted it properly this time.

So I will be picking it up first thing tomorrow morning

Jeroen

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

You can see the two holes I drilled and threaded on top of the frame by mistake.

The mistake holes are drilled and threaded, right? If you cannot live with them, here is one idea...

Get (or make!) a couple of brass screws/stud and screw them into the holes. Cut flush and polish.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

The mistake holes are drilled and threaded, right? If you cannot live with them, here is one idea...

Get (or make!) a couple of brass screws/stud and screw them into the holes. Cut flush and polish.

I am thinking along the same lines. Fact is that the design calls for the steam (air) inlet to be on top of the frame and the outlet at the back. So I would have to made an inlet on the top anyway, but it would have been just one hole/threaded only 2-3mm of the centreline. I might still be able to use these two holes. Probably requires a bit more drilling under an angle to accommodate for inlet and outlet ports in the frame. We will see.

I still need to make the main bearing, the nut for the cylinder pivot and the most important (and most difficult) part the complete piston assembly.

Once I have everything ready I will do a trial assembly and see if I can still use the frame and make it work. No hurry!

Picked up my Spider from Goos this morning. All fixed, (well you never know with these old cars, so fingers crossed!)

Jeroen

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

Get (or make!) a couple of brass screws/stud and screw them into the holes. Cut flush and polish.

Originally Posted by Jeroen

I am thinking along the same lines.

On second thoughts, I don't think it would be quite this simple. Can one make that thread cross-section disappear and remain disappeared?

So my next idea takes a bit more work. Drill out and ream a little way into the threaded hole. Let the screw be like a stud down in the threaded part of the hole, but a tight-fitting pin at the top.

Cylinder filling round hole: no worries about thread helix and its weak point where it tapers to nothing.

(Just using your holes to exercise my mind here! Please comment on my thinking.)

Bottom line is that it would be just amazing to finish your project, without recent practice, and have zero parts go for scrap

[Sutripta]

^^^
Need to see the full manufacturing drawings, and see whether the two tapped holes interfere anywhere.

Sutripta

[Jeroen]

All the drawings are here:

http://www.steves-workshop.co.uk/ste...impleoscil.htm


The drawing of the frame:

http://www.steves-workshop.co.uk/dra...rame_large.jpg

I do not think my two holes are deeper than then where the inlet / outlet ports would be on the frame. It that works out I can rework the frame (I think).

I am working on the bearing as we speak. I like to have that ready, because with that I can do a first fitting of all major components and get a feel for the movement of the cilinder on the frame!

Jeroen

[Sutripta]

^^^
The steam input if more than 4 mm will break into the (misplaced) mounting tapped holes.
You can shift the steam input to the middle, drill and plug a gallery from the side, the gallery feeding the steam port to the cylinder. Slightly difficult because we take depth 3 times dia as the limit of accurate work using jobbers drills.

Talk with your modelling/ machining buddies.

Sutripta

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

Bottom line is that it would be just amazing to finish your project, without recent practice, and have zero parts go for scrap

Scratch the zero scrap parts. One bearing into the scrap bin. And if was almost finished too!

Although I am still not happy with the internal finish I get with the reamer. I drill these holes very carefully, centre and then 3mm, 5mm, 5.9mm and a 6mm reamer. Reamer at very low RPM, lots of cutting oil, one fluent motion in. Stop, blow air and hand turn the chuck reverse and pull it back out. Still doesn’t look very good. Dimension is spot on, just poor finish.

Originally Posted by Sutripta

^^^
The steam input if more than 4 mm will break into the (misplaced) mounting tapped holes.
You can shift the steam input to the middle, drill and plug a gallery from the side, the gallery feeding the steam port to the cylinder. Slightly difficult because we take depth 3 times dia as the limit of accurate work using jobbers drills.

Thanks, I will see how this goes.

Jeroen

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

Scratch the zero scrap parts. One bearing into the scrap bin. And if was almost finished too!

What kind of a workshop doesn't have a scrap bin

[AlphaKilo]

Nice WW2 memories!

@Thad-E-Ginathom/@Jeroen: Was it normal back in those days to have a junior (Non-Commissioned officer) pilot the aircraft?

From the memoir Board put up for the crew, I see that the Flight Sergeant was the Pilot and the officer with the rank of Squadron Leader was Tail Gunner (I guess "Staartschutter" means tail gunner right?). Strange! Also, there is no second pilot. I believed the Lancasters and such big bombers always had two pilots, flight engineer, navigator and bomb dispenser along with couple of gunners.

Waiting to see the final output of your hobby project. Best of luck with the fiddling.