meadowfield

thanks guys,
 
here's a video
 
 

thanks guys,
 
here's a video
 
 

Looks good Norm

thanks guys,
 
here's a video
 
 

thanks guys,
 
here's a video
 
 

thanks guys,
 
here's a video
 
 

The C-121, Black Horse, started to refuse to run right after standing all night in the cold at the HVC rally. Would only run on half choke. Managed to get it to where it was on display with it's stable mates.
  When the rally ended and I eventually found the time to load up, it refused to start at all. With some help it was pushed up onto the trailer. Back home and rolled off and put away.
  The following morning I decided to investigate, as I wasn't due back at the rally site till after lunch, (1 day rally. 5 days work.) to collect the cattle trailer loaded  with rally equipment., to take back to the farm.
  Good spark from the plug but plug dry. Disconnected pump from carb and a good flow through the pump. Removing float bowl from carb revealed bits of black dirt in there. So off with carb and cleaned out the jets. In line filter look clean so I drained the fuel tank. Some dirt was evident in the fuel, so I removed the tap. I then poured fuel into the tank to flush it out.
  After putting everything back together, the engine fired up straight away. I then tuned the carb and now he Black Horse runs as normal.
 I suspect the bouncing of the trailer disturb some bits of dirt. Hopefully all will be back to normal, but if it happens again I will take the tank out for a thorough clean and also replace the fuel lines in case the are starting to deteriorate inside

Been a while since I posted a project, this has been in my head for years and I did the axles early last year...
 

 
Left over axles make good bogies.
 

 

 
Been stalled for a few months until a few weeks ago a tracked barrow skip turned up on that site.
 

 
So so that set the juices flowing
 

 
Building a frame
 

 

 
Sprung drawbar
 


 
 

 
 

All ready for the Hethersgill Vintage Rally on Sunday. Been helping set up today and more to do tomorrow.
 
 
 
 

Been a while since I posted a project, this has been in my head for years and I did the axles early last year...
 

 
Left over axles make good bogies.
 

 

 
Been stalled for a few months until a few weeks ago a tracked barrow skip turned up on that site.
 

 
So so that set the juices flowing
 

 
Building a frame
 

 

 
Sprung drawbar
 


 
 

 
 

Been a while since I posted a project, this has been in my head for years and I did the axles early last year...
 

 
Left over axles make good bogies.
 

 

 
Been stalled for a few months until a few weeks ago a tracked barrow skip turned up on that site.
 

 
So so that set the juices flowing
 

 
Building a frame
 

 

 
Sprung drawbar
 


 
 

 
 

Been a while since I posted a project, this has been in my head for years and I did the axles early last year...
 

 
Left over axles make good bogies.
 

 

 
Been stalled for a few months until a few weeks ago a tracked barrow skip turned up on that site.
 

 
So so that set the juices flowing
 

 
Building a frame
 

 

 
Sprung drawbar
 


 
 

 
 

Been a while since I posted a project, this has been in my head for years and I did the axles early last year...
 

 
Left over axles make good bogies.
 

 

 
Been stalled for a few months until a few weeks ago a tracked barrow skip turned up on that site.
 

 
So so that set the juices flowing
 

 
Building a frame
 

 

 
Sprung drawbar
 


 
 

 
 

Been a while since I posted a project, this has been in my head for years and I did the axles early last year...
 

 
Left over axles make good bogies.
 

 

 
Been stalled for a few months until a few weeks ago a tracked barrow skip turned up on that site.
 

 
So so that set the juices flowing
 

 
Building a frame
 

 

 
Sprung drawbar
 


 
 

 
 

Been a while since I posted a project, this has been in my head for years and I did the axles early last year...
 

 
Left over axles make good bogies.
 

 

 
Been stalled for a few months until a few weeks ago a tracked barrow skip turned up on that site.
 

 
So so that set the juices flowing
 

 
Building a frame
 

 

 
Sprung drawbar
 


 
 

 
 

Spent many happy years cutting the grass on a 25. Think we got it when I was about 8 and it ran faultlessly for another 8 until we upgraded.
 
I think my brother bought one out of pure nostalgia a few years back

Afternoon all, After a few busy months I finally had the chance to make a start on the massey! The aim is to get it running for a show late in July.
 
Heres some before photos in case you forgot
 

 

 

 

 
First job was to get the front up on some axle stands, remove the hood and front wheels. The steering needs some work as everything is very worn.
 

 

 

 
it needs some serious degreasing as well so the engine was next to come out, it also helps to have the engine on a bench as it will need a partial strip down.
 

 

 

 
here you can see just how worn the axle is, it is a very lightweight casting and unfortunately it is a bit twisted.
 

 
Next I made a new bush for the axle, should work just fine.
 

 
after a bit of cleaning up. the original paint is in excellent condition, just a shame someone painted over it.
 

 

 
These are going to require some attention at some point.
 

 
On closer inspection, one of the engine mount holes has cracked, just visible above, now welded up.
 

 
The idler pulley and steering column was removed and then everything given a good clean. 
 

 
For a 56 year old machine, i'm surprised nothing is rusted solid, didn't even have to use any heat. 
 
 
Next job when i'm home next is to replace the bearing in the idler pulley and sort out the worn steering components.

No Norm, I would not dare to do a blind 2 stroke cylinder with large transfer ports. Don't have the gear.
It should be done properly on a machine that limits the oscillating travel of the rotating (multi) stones at the right point and that the stones can't catch on the ports.
It should only really be done when the bore can be measured accurately to fit new rings so end clearance is minimal.
This bore surprisingly only had staining with no rust pitting or scoring, despite the engine being locked solid until my releasing fluid did the job and freed it up.
Thought I had a pic of the cleaned up bore, but can only find this one from after removing the cylinder-
 

 
I was really quite impressed with the smoothness of the cleaned up bore and struggled to find any wear lips or tram lines. I think the low skirt piston ring served to maintain even bore wear and prevented piston slap wear. The single replacement ring will have to bed in as is, but will be assisted with increase of Petroil ratio and 40 weight oil instead of 30 wt.
 
I was not happy with my attempts to clean the crank case out as much as possible without splitting the cases.
After several attempts to remove the drive sprocket from the Crank, I gave up.
It is worn, but serviceable for now and I could not position it in my 12 ton press to apply correct force properly without risk of strain or damage to it.
So I split the cases which showed the cleaning limit lines-
 

 
Just as well I split them, as the oil galleries to the Crank bushings were solidly blocked with carbon, as well as the surfaces .
Armed with a few old toothbrushes etc, it all cleaned up nicely and very smooth shiny surfaces at the contact points.
Next pic shows that this engine was designed to run with the cylinder vertically.
The recessed valleys each side above the shaft bushings collect and channel oil to the galleries for lubrication.
They can't do that so well when it's in a horizontal plane. The other point is that the crank case drain plug is rendered useless!.
Another observation is the design of a separate lubrication facility where oil is passed into the crankcase via a hollow mounting stud or bolt, you can see the recess around the bolt hole in lower left and right positions of the case halves in the pic below-
 

 The separate oil system is not used on this application, so uses premixed petrol and oil (petroil).
I checked the crankshaft end float before splitting the cases (0.0055" or 0.15mm), it's well within limits, so I measured the old washer (gasket) thickness and cut out a new one.
Quality brown paper was used with a thickness of 0.0045". Thought I'd stick to tradition and use shellac to dress the washer/gasket and bolted up the cases.
Left to set overnight, tweaked the bolts and checked the end float and got 0.006" . Real happy with that, so gave it some oil in the important bits.
 
Now that it was all clean, I could check the wear limits of the crank bushings. up, down, left and right movement on both sides using about 20 ft lbs (27.12 Nm) pressure.
Flywheel side was good with only around 0.005" in all points. Drive side was a bit excessive on the chain strain line (0.010") , but good up down and right.
Just as well as only option would be to make new one(s)......no thanks!.
 
Established the type of bronze I needed and ordered some PB104................................... TB Cont'd                                             .  
 
 
     

We were caught out by the snow last year and had to rush around getting the snow blade out of storage. Joseph wanted us to be prepared this year just in case we get snow. He had made a video of the preparation
 
 
 

Have a look at my Bendy build on the other channel... I build one from scratch

Trying to organise another wheel horse round up, but other than family and Norm I’ve had no interest. A few years ago I managed to get 36 together!
Have wheel horses had their day? Do I call this the final meet?

We were sold this and told it was a 1958 rj-58 but then told it may be s 1961 model can any one help? I’m in the uk and looking for parts to restore 

Hi Richard, hope your keeping well..
Robot Wars eh... It's been a long time since I last watched it... Is it still going?
The last time I heard anything about Craig Charles he was/is doing a Funk and Soul music show on BBC 6 Music!
 
Not that I have anything against a bit of Funk you understand 
 
It would be cool to catch up with you again Richard, no rush whenever is good for you
 
 
Now for a fun video
 
The stripdown should of taken a day at the most, but when everything is being video'd using my Camera Panning Jig Thingy, one day gets stretched to five!
 
 
 
 
With the frame stripped down I could make a start on the final welding.. Well, almost
 
The last couple of bit's of "made out of a cheap office desk" Quadzilla frame were bugging me..
The only problem was important bits such as front suspension lower mounts and front diff mounts are made out of one big plate that's welded to the Quadzilla frame.. And it's kinda important to make sure these mounts stay in the same place.
 
So after a lot of bracing including something to hold the said plate in the right place, the lower front got the chop!
 

 
 
Would you look at the rust in that!
 

 
 
At some point during the build the bit of tube that these two bit's of desk are attached to was welded in not quite where it should of been.. In other words it looked pished but wasn't noticable until everything had been stripped from the frame!
 

 
 
Cleaning the suspension plate of the left over bit's of rusty desk took a while, here's the plate bolted back on where it should be..
 

 
 
A bit of space to fill to connect everything back up again..
 

 
 
A lot of new thick wall tube has gone back in the front, but I forgot to take any photo's yesterday..

Look up KAB P2 seats on that auction site, lots of wheel horses used that model seat and we’ve always got them at a reasonable price. 

Still bits and pieces to do on the tractor but have also been working on the trailer.  Wanted this to be as compact as possible but still big enough to sit in comfort.  The chassis started life as a transport frame for motor cycles, shipped in part assembled form to a dealer near where I worked.  This was altered to a trolley using wheely bin wheels with a storage box and frame on top so that I could move large model boats from the car to lakeside at the various locations we sailed at.  Most lakes did not have access for cars, only footpaths.  The trolley frame is shown below minus it's towing handle.
 

 
This now out of use frame was cut down and used for my sit on trailer.  A new axle was made from box section and 16mm bar bolted together and to the frame, using pneumatic wheels instead of the solid tires used for the boat trolley. 
 

 
The seat mount was made up from scrap ply with alloy sheet outer panels.  The edges were trimmed with alloy angle, more scrap salvaged when clearing my friends land.

 
The sit on part of the seat is actually the backrest part of a seat I bought on eBay.  The seat section looked too big when fitted so went into storage.  Short lengths of studding were fitted into the already welded in mounting nuts and just drop into holes in the box top.  Hope this makes sense.
 

 
The now proper backrest, complete with it's Wheel Horse motif, was kindly donated by Chris the Showman, and is mounted on doubled up lengths of alloy angle.