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Made a bit more progress today. You may of noticed that the rear wheels look like they are off a golf trolley or similar. Looking at the brochure I noticed that they looked very similar to Landmaster Wheels so I purchased a set off ebay and painted them up. They have been in store for a few years, so today I dug them out and am going to have to give the tyres a clean up, but apart from that they are nearly ready to fit.

Hi, ive now obtained a single wheel for the front by buying a scrap machine. To free the engine off shouldn't be to bad as the cylinder head unbolts on these early engines. Once removed I would then fill the barrel with freeing oil for a few weeks before trying to move the piston either by tapping down or by trying a bit of gentle pressure on the flywheel nut.

I knew you would! Lol. Are you going to have to smuggle it into the spare bedroom once finished?

Even though the two engines are made by different companies all parts are totally interchangeable, and identical in every way.In fact wackerneuson still use a slightly modified version of this engine today called the WM80.

Thanks pat, as I said I've resurrected this project to mainly give me practice at spraying again. Am particuarly aware that with having a bonnet the Sachs gem is going to have a bigger surface area than most to show up the flaws. The deadline for the Sachs is October but I've also got to get another one finished before then as well,plus a very busy full time job, plus a family life, plus.... Got to admit this Hako is making a nice change to the sheer enormity of a gem.

My Wacker plate and trench rammer use the same engine.

This morning after checking the forecast for the coming week I went to my worked and sprayed the top coat. This will be left to dry for a few days. In the meantime I will start painting all the black bits. I purposely am not going to go over the top, as I would like to put this machine to work, once its finished.

The basic machine with the engine removed looked pretty grotty, but after a hot wash this came up surprisingly well. Next several applications of paint stripper followed. Then I applied a few coats of a new primmer (as stated above I wanted to see how it worked with the Howard Orange.)

The engine on these machines are a JLO two stroke. As ive said before on here this engine design was purchased by the construction company Wacker, so a good friend of mine, who is a retired Wacker service engineer said he would rebuild it for me. I took this plus another old short motor I had lying around up to him. Even though the seller claimed it was running when put away in the shed (where have we heard that before?) it still needed a crankcase half, piston rings, seals, bearings and a set of points, all courtesy of Wackers scrap bin many years ago when they decided to make the engine obsolete! It has now had a full clean up. Ive also dug through my sheds and found an as new cylinder head so will be fitting this over the next few days.

This is a project that ive been doing on and off for a few years. Anyway, over the last few days I have dug it back out due mainly to the fact that I haven't picked up a spray gun in 6 months and wanted to have a bit of a practice session before I sprayed my Sachs diesel Gem. I was also unsure how my new batch of primmer would react to Vapormatic Howard Orange. Well im pleased to report that it worked a treat. The history behind these machines is that by 1960 Howard had been increasingly frustrated with losing out sales to what they termed "Scratchers". Their solution was to start import the Hako Combinette, as a direct competitor to machines like the Wolesy Merrytiller. The problem was by the time Howard had put their mark up on the price, these rotadiggers (note how they didn't call them Rotavator's)were just too expensive to be competitive. After about a year to 18mths the project was dropped,making suvivours quite hard to come by. This example turned up on good ol' ebay in 2013. I placed a low bid on it and won.

Spent another couple of hours on the bonnet, yet still it needs more work! I hate filling!!!

If it's any interest to anybody I've given my website a minor facelift. It now includes a dating guide for Howard Gems. www.howardgem.webs.com

If its any interest ive managed to book the nearby Travelodge for only £32 a night over this weekend.

They look a really nice little thing. Can they pump much water?

Last night I put a bit of work into rubbing down the fuel tank and the bonnet. The fuel tank should now just need another coat of primmer, but the bonnet is going to be a fair few hours yet!

Its proving a challenge. Just hope it dry up before I'm ready to put top coat on it.

Thank you. Its suprising how much more work the bonnet and under tray is creating. Ive spent the last two days dodging rain, wind and even snow, trying to get the paint stripped off the machine. Here it is, looking quite bad at the moment, mainly due to a flash of rust caused by the hot washer. Tommorrow this will be gone over with a wire brush. The engine has purposely been left for the time being. This will be scotch clothed then etch primed.

Surely the jap 2a is a four stroke? Isn't what's pictured an O? The recoil pictured looks the same as fitted to my Teles Tiger Saw.

Would an aftermarket electronic ignition replace the missing points? I seem to recall a brown atom worked on a Villiers but I may have that wrong? the blue atom was definatley the one for kohlers.

Bonnet has now been sprayed with filler primmer. As expected quite a few areas needing further attention showed up. After being allowed to set for a few days, this will be guide coated and given a layer of stopper. Tonight before I left work I gave the old girl a very thourgh pressure wash ready for stripping the paint off in the morning if its not too cold/wet.

Making good progress. It can be frustrating when you have to wait for other people to do jobs for you. Ive been trying to get a cast gearbox welded up for about 4 years now. Its sat on the one blokes bench for two of those years when he promised it to me in a fortnight!!!

A bit more progress today. Heres the bonnet with its 3rd (and hopefully last ) skim of filler. I also managed to get the fuel tank stripped as it finally stopped raining for about 3 hours, plus I gave the fan housing a rub down and spray with etch primmer.

The tanks come up well. Certainley better than when I posted it to you.

Just received my pass back for this show. Who else is attending?

Looks good. A little tip I've found with these Villiers tanks is if you bare metal where the cap seal goes it stops the paint being lifted by petrol seepage around the neck.