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Just spent a lovely weekend at Wiston steam rally, here's a few photos of stuff I liked and some general view shots so you can see the size of the show Here's a few more and into Saturday night at the beer tent.

The axle bearings from the Bolens were used plus the front axle mounting bracket which was hack sawed from the frame, cut in two, excess removed, slotted and drilled to take the bearings. The extra holes were for possible height adjustment at a later date. Easier to do now than later. These were pop riveted to the box section ready for welding later. The front axle was then given a lot of thought. The full size is a cast, tapered in two directions, webbed unit. Something simpler was needed. A piece of thick walled 1" square was used with tube king pin mounts. A test piece was cut to gauge the angle required, followed by marking, cutting, bending, filing and drilling the main components. Small infill pieces were inserted to give the weld something to bite on. The axle mount was made up of 3/16" plate fastened to chassis box section cross members, with 1/2" bore bushes. The pivot is an old Austin 7 king pin. All a bit on the beefy side but just materials to hand. I should say that ALMOST all the materials used in the entire build were saved during the clear out at John's. Also, as I do not have proper machining facility's, most of the work was done by hand. Hand drill, hack saw, jig saw, files etc. I do have a small Unimat 3 model makers lathe which was used for some of the lighter machining jobs. Also an old Drummond round bed which is in need of work and a chuck adapter. Guess where this came from. I also adapted an old Picador drill press to take a larger hand drill. This wasn't too satisfactory, side play and too fast for the larger drill bits. These were more suitable for wood, not metal. Photo's later. The next few photo's show the chassis and axle mounted on a board ready for welding. The rear axle mounting plates drop into slots in the board. The two dark coloured angles are temporary and just to help keep things square.

Last weekend Paul and Wendy popped in to see us and we decided to get some tractors out for Paul to try. I managed to capture some video of the five we used which I have posted on Joseph's YouTube channel. The D160 was misbehaving not helped by me forgetting to turn the fuel on. Hopefully we will get a little time today to do a bit of work on it. Iain

And some more including my vehicle of the show, a really nicely restored Ford Transit Mark 1 drop side pickup...

Thanks Richard. I was going to wait until the next installment but now that you have mentioned it I should point out that most of the welding was done by an ex workmate. I do not have a welder and did not think it worth buying one for the little welding I was likely to do. Saying that though, there have been other little bits needed at intervals which Mr Showman did during one of his RARE visits to John's place. Thanks Chris. The last time I used a welder was years ago, and that was on big heavy lumps of metal. PM to follow later Richard.

Alan, I am really pleased you have started a threat on this, it is great to see the detail. Fantastic workmanship, I know I have said this to you directly but stated here for the record. I can't believe how well you have captured the details of a D in this model. Iain

I can't believe what my brother brought back from the local car boot sale this morning, an Orline (Edit: actually a CARBRA) hedge trimmer with an O&R model 20A engine!! I don't think I've seen a model 20A engine on a hedge trimmer before and the it's first 20A I've seen in the UK (apart from on a chainsaw I have, but that was imported from the US). It has been repainted at some point in the past, but the back of the engine housing still has the some of the original white paint on it though. The engine is a model 20A type 333, seems they riveted the model & serial number plates to the 20A engines instead of using the cylinder plate that gets lost on the later 13A/B engines. David

Last year on my annual trip down south, one of the things I returned with was this Billy Goat. There is a thread on it in Pedestrian machines. As you can see I'd been having a bit of a play with it. Today I dug it out of it's hiding place had more of a play with it. First I amputated it's back legs wheels. I then found these two pieces of scrap, plus the jaw plates removed from my Saxon trailer. They became this towing attachment for the front of the Billy Goat. Next job was a rear towing attachment. A length of 1"x1". Another of 1"x2". A couple of U bolts. Tow ball plus a spare spacer and I had this. At end of play this is how things look. There's still more to do and one or two alterations but so far so good. All made from scrap lying around, so zero cost. No Billy Goats were harmed and if needs be can be put back as was. To be continued.........

As some will already know, the Showman and I have been clearing a friend's land of his large collection of various garden tractors, horticultural machinery, workshop equipment and whatever else you can think of. Nearly 2 :1/2 years later the end is in sight. As friend John is having to sell up and move soon due to ill health, my Roper tractor which was stored on his land has now moved on to a new home. As I have very little room at home to work and store in, mainly a single car size garage which is already half full of stuff, thoughts turned to something small to build which could be transported in the back of my Meriva car. Small enough to fit in the car, but hopefully big enough to ride on, but if not towing a trailer which I can sit on and operate the tractor by remote steering etc. Various options were looked at, thought about and discarded due to too many compound curves etc. Then, after studying photo's of the D-series Wheel Horse which has very few awkward curves a plot was hatched. During the clear out lots of "might be handy one day" bits and pieces were kept. One of the few tractors which remained, unloved and unwanted, was this Bolens ride on mower. It was eventually stripped of useful parts, gearbox, axle / diff assembly, wheels and various other bits before the remains were left to be dumped much later. Also found among the junk in John's barn was the bottom end of a small engine which was later found to be a 65cc BSA 4 stroke. After further hunting by the Showman other parts were found in various locations in the barn loft. Enough parts to build a complete engine with spares left over. Engine just roughly assembled in this photo. John never stored related parts together and in one place. We think this was his anti theft device. Find a few parts, no good without the others, so leave alone. Appears to have worked as we have found on various occasions. Tri rib tires Chris. To be continued.

A very good show in deepest West Sussex visited today. Horticultural machines were with the stationary engines (separate section next year ?). Here's some photos... And some more including some bloke in a red t shirt who looks vaguely familiar...

Has anyone ever had any experience with these, they are relatively new and use a magnetic field to create the heat. They look good as no flames are produced making it safer, also heating a bolt red hot it seconds They are pricey but look worth it if anyone has had any experience with these I would like to know your thoughts. There are a few videos online if you want to take a look, just search "heat induction tool" Harry

Just been looking at a few videos. The safety factor is an interesting point and applying direct heat to the bolt itself without damaging or distorting the surrounding areas appeals to me greatly. I am assuming that you could save a lot of time using this tool which would obviously speed the job up no end. However the price at the moment is the only negative point I got about this product. Hopefully over time the product will be become more widely available and thus cheaper? Have you got a trade card so you might be able to get it a tad cheaper? Be interesting to see others views on this.

Thing is, they only heat the area you want, not the surrounding area like with a torch.

Thought of you Alan when i saw it. it was remote control and took the old boy four years to build it

Very pricey just to get a bolt undone, how often would you use it ? I just use my propane torch it's always worked for me Harry

Your welcome to buy that Mig I have from Johns as I been offered another one Thats a good way to hold the parts in place....... Nails You should call this project WH Pony. Thats half a horse is it not???

So that's where the pheasant chicken plucker got. Anglia van for me Paul. Had one with a GT Cortina 1500 stage two engine in. Proverbial s**t of a blanket job.

That's rather nice David, a lucky find then !! So they are about...

Clearly a methodical mind at work. Most impressed Alan. I'm sure your welding is also way superior to mine . I'm sure there are many people here with machines that could produce/turn up anything for you that you aren't able to.......... Should you need any, just drop us/me a PM.

Hi All, David, I got the mount machined up, still need some end plates made up(waiting on material), have trial fitted to the hull. Cheers Andrew