expeatfarmer

is that long enough !!!!

Great photos Norman. Glad you don't have any of me at the awards I got all of a fluster and a big lump in my throat ( what a wuss ). I certainly would not have made it without your help. I might have been the front man but there are a number of people who really deserve a thank you for helping to make it happen. Anthony and Laura for helping with inspiration sorting key parts such as MERL and Trevor and a super effort to bring 4 machines to fill the gaps, Rhys and Carlo ( aka Rhys's Dad) helping to set up and take down the backdrops and banners. Trevor Hopkins for the absolutely amazing display of leaflets and literature ditto Joe Paget for the boards on the back display. Neil and Paula for the effort involved in bringing along the spares and Welsh cakes, The staff of the Museum of English Rural Life for the archives and videos,my wife Janet for making up all the name badges, the seat for my ITW and putting up with grumpy me when things went wrong,and suggesting the absent machines photos. Alistair for bringing along that lovely two furrow plough which he forgot to put on my trailer along with the other plough, Anne for baking some lovely 80th cup cakes and the sponges featuring Alistair. Lastly and by no means least I would like to thank every single person who dug out their MG and brought it along some with superb effort Ashley and Ian Dennis were still refurbishing their lovely MG2's the night before they left from Truro I am amazed that the paint was dry. I am so glad that so many people were inspired to dig them out and bring them along to make a superb celebration of these wonderful machines. I do hope that all the overseas owners of machines that sent me photos are pleased with the results it was fantastic to show machines in Australia, New Zealand ., South Africa, U.S.A. Canada, Ireland and distant parts of U.K. A special moment for me was meeting up with David and Jean Gant and their sons Kevin and Barry, they brought along a gorgeous ex BR I.T.W complete with rail man's torch. David and Jean have been Ransome's enthusiasts for many many years and between them they have a superb collection of 13 machines. David went blind some years ago and yet he still gets involved in machine restoration and embarrassingly for me takes great delight in his son's reading out to him my postings about my projects. So enthusiastic are they all as a family that Jean showed me a photo album of a recent event where they had had a family picnic in the shed with all the Ransomes machines up and running round about them. A pleasure and a privilege to meet such lovely people as it has been with everyone who brought along a machine. I have been asked if we could repeat the exercise at Newark Show in November, I am up for it let me know if you are !

Malvern was the first time I had seen this machine in the flesh and I have to say that it is absolutely superb the attention to detail and the effort involved in building it is amazing and to think that Rhys is a lad of 20 years old it is superb positively restores my faith in the youth of today. Well done Rhys you should be very proud of yourself. When are you going to deliver it to me !!!!!

Stuart Cox another Ransomes enthusiast kindly copied an article from an old magazine detailing a collector in Godalming that had a skimmer in complete order along with a dumper, his name was Dave Smith does anyone know him? Skimmer performed well at Malvern engine started very well until I took it off the wagon last night when the fuel pump packed up, my own silly fault as it seemed to work ok I left it alone when I fitted the engine. Stripped it down today to find it was full of crud that must have been disturbed during transport. Sorted it now and just about to refit so that I can start moving stuff around the garage.

Winning the award at Tractor World was the icing on the cake for 137 but the most important thing was that the man who asked me to restore it (Ted Pratt ) was absolutely delighted. When I started unloading today I noticed that the tracks are taking paint off the body sides, before it gets any worse I am going to re set the tracks to wide position and sort the paint so back in the workshop.

Certainly plenty of Bruno smoke over the last few weeks. ITW fired first pull on the handle this morning , instantly ran on the starter with little smoke. I would have persisted with the manual start but knackered my back yesterday so thought I would save it for Malvern. Nice seat fits a treat.

Cinderella is now ready for the ball along with the six others. had to evict a stowaway today when cleaning 137 one of the track frame support tubes was packed solid with peanuts obviously the mouse was going to self cater at Malvern!!

Better fortune today, Whitlock proved to be a pig to start after I fixed the fuel leak and then I remembered that it likes heat to start from freezing but you have to turn the heat off before you turn it over otherwise it wants to run backwards. Fixed up carb on the digger and it now ticks over nicely. 137 fired up after a few goes but it was below freezing. Brought it into garage for some touch up and a clean up. The ITW has been extremely difficult to start from cold and very smokey. I managed to find a brand new injection pump,injector, reed valve and governor all new old stock. Decided to bite the bullet late this afternoon and changed everything, my theory being that if I changed all the influencing parts for new then I was not leaving any unknown's in the set up. Guess what ! it worked runs much better much less smoke and dare I say it I started it on the crank handle not once but twice WOW ! I kept thinking how unpopular I would be at Malvern churning away on the starter and filling the place with smoke so took the gamble.

I hope to leave home around mid day Thursday, 255 miles approx so reckon on 6 hours with stops. Main hold up point is leaving M6 to join M5 make sure you get over to the left in good time as vehicles often stupidly use the hard shoulder to sneak up on the junction.

Three on my trailer and four on a beaver tail plus trailer.

Certainly is !

Digger is sorted just needs to clean up the carb, fuel bowl had water in it. Lovely seat fits a treat.

What a frustrating day today. The ITW took ages to start, the Whitlock loader has a major diesel leak behind the engine cowling ( fuel pump banjo) 137 decided to play silly beggars and not start and then to cap it all the digger dozer decided to shear the key that drives the hydraulic pump in addition to which it is running badly. Thanks to Norman who was busy washing off machines and helping to sort the keyway all back on track again but knackered my back and feeling very grumpy. Only good thing for the day is that my wife janet has stitched up a beautiful leather cloth seat cover for the ITW which I am about to staple on. had to leave the Whitlock and ITW outside as it is now freezing and I have not the energy to fanny about getting them started. With my luck it will be pouring with rain in the morning.

Machine is mobile and running Neil is going to bring most of the parts he has found for me to display alongside the machine.

Yes steered by your feet which some people seem to have no control over !!!!!

Somebody was heading into the garage with head held high I shouted to him to duck so what did he do ? Stamped on the brakes and swerved to the left heading for the garage wall and all between him and it ! Being a man of iron he let go the brakes and eventually shut the throttle coming to an ignominious stop amongst power packs , compressors and Petrol engines people want to pay me money for. No damage done and no skin lost so all's well !

I was not going to mention your near beheading Norman but as you have!!!! Managed to get all 7 running by 7pm tonight the MG5 had not been touched since July and just needed a bit of love and a mag clean. On target for Malvern!!! Tittyvating starts on Monday !

Skimmer now finished as much as it is going to be before Malvern. Changed the condenser yesterday fired up first pull on the handle from cold. Took it for a spin around the garden Stormin will post the photos. Considering the extra track length it steers really well even on concrete. Flat out in first gear is so slow at 25ft per minute top gear is 1 mph but it would climb the side of a house or push it over. Glad I fitted an electrical stop you feel very vulnerable sitting up on top but not as scary as the Whitlock. The ITW is hard to start when cold, I am sure it is a case of finding the optimum settings for choke heat and throttle. MG40N starts first go from cold with no heat, Whitlock needed a few turns and heat but has not been run for about 4 months. Digger fired first turn of the starter and started after a couple of goes. Old thumper 137 starts like a dream the blast off the exhaust is amazing you can feel it at the far end of the garage. MG5 let me down, no spark so guess the mag is damp or the points stuck just about to have a fiddle.

The oil filler cap is 21/2" od and 2" id. The slots are 1/4" wide.

Up and running today, fired first pull but as with 137 would not run until I turned it over with my petrol drill starter and then it ran well, not able to get a good slow tick over and still wont re start on the handle. I am going to fit another condenser in the morning as when I tested the spark with a tell tale it was firing well on no compression but no spark on compression. The condenser fitted was a NOS one but I now have some brand new ones so hope that makes the difference. This engine is in superb condition and has more compression than any of my others. Once I had it running I put it into gear only to find that the gear lever is marked up back to front reverse is forwards which caused me to just about demolish a trestle I had at the back of the machine fortunately I managed to stop it before too much damage was done. I guess that when the Ford engine and gearbox were fitted the engine turned over the opposite way to the Ransomes. I have now blanked out the markings and made up some new markers. I am going to fit an electrical stop switch at the driving point as I think that if anything goes wrong when you are sat up there on Norman's beautifully fitted seat you would be in trouble even though it only does 1 mile an hour flat out in third it would not stop even if it hit a wall it would climb up it or demolish it. One part I am missing which would be good to have before Malvern is an oil filler cap, in the engine close up you can see the four slot location, I have scoured the usual sources but not been able to find one, if anyone has a spare that may be suitable please give me a call.

Engine mounted today, timed up magneto and fitted carb, two of the manifold blots needed to be tapped oversize. I was going to retain the marine throttle lever meantime but the amount of travel is far too much for the 356 carb so looked out a long cable that will fit an original Ransomes throttle lever. Norman has fitted up the seat frame adjusters using the spare frame and slides from the Turf Trak, needs a bit more fiddling though as I dont want to change too much from original.

Repaired and strengthened the engine bay floor today using heavy angle iron and 3mm plate. I cut the plate to the ford gearbox cut out using a plasma cutter, welded in the plate and then ground the welds flush. Just given it a rough coat of primer to stop it rusting. Drill the engine bolt holes in the morning and then fit the engine. Waiting for my professional seat fitter to arrive and fit the new skimmer seat. Had a test sit yesterday definitely not a job you could do with a kilt on !!! Would have been nice to restore the body side plates but at this stage I dont know if Ransomes cut them away when fitting the auger orv if it was done later so no point until I have some more bits.

Planning a massed start up on Friday so crank handles better not be doomed!

All back together again thanks to Stormin, even have the new seat fitted so no wet bottom any more! Not tried again with fitting the loader, factory tell me to bodge up the rear mounts with angle iron but that also means re making the clamps and moving the pump back so will modify front pick up mounts instead so that it all fits properly.

With a bit of encouragement from Norman and Rhys we managed to dismantle the stiff cable cleaned it up on the wire wheel loads of copper slip and it was good as new, removed the gear change slide from the gearbox and made sure that was free now all working as it should. Rhys re assembled the brakes so all we need now is the engine mounting plate and engine in.