Alan

Happy Birthday Joseph. Has dad started your little horse yet. ? You know you want one.

The blue lathe shown above is a 5" double height bed Drummond, circa 1912. The saddle and it's cross slide run on the lower bed ways, while the tailstock runs on the upper bed. More information here. "double-height bed"

Another little update after another delay. Too many things to do. Who said retired people have plenty of spare time. The hood catches which started off as 3/16" diameter car brake pad pins. An alloy sleeve pressed on, drilled 1/16" for a short piece of wire, then the domed head turned off. 1/2" ID alloy box section was pop rivited to the inside of the hood after drilling for the pins. A nut and bolt held it in place while drilling for the rivits. Another 1/16" hole was drilled for the retaining R clip after careful measurement to make sure it was in the correct place. It was. More measurement and head scratching then the excess was cut from the pins and the ends chamfered. When closing the hood the pins slide down slightly angled plates before popping into holes near the base. These plates can be seen on this earlier photo of the dash panel. The pins are sprung into place by springs, what else, taken from AA size battery boxes. These were inserted into the alloy box first, then compressed with special tool which I carefully designed then made, allowing room for the pin to pass through. OK, a piece of scrap alloy with a slot filed in it did the job. It was a pig of a job to hold the compressed spring, hold the pin steady, and insert the R clip, while trying avoid it pinging off into the distance. If the R clip had been long enough to protude outside the alloy box it would have been easier. The clip can be seen to the left, the rivits to the right. A washer between the clip and spring would have been better but I gave up trying to fit one. Kept going awol. The parts almost ready to be fitted. Works as intended although just as easy to pull the bottom corners of the hood out slightly which releases the pins.

I think KNOW it would be too. Winches, rollers, lots of muscle power. A lot easier at John's.

Both the Drummond and Harrison are big and heavy Nigel. The Harrison looks the better option as more modern, but I don't know what price etc. I think the Showmans friend Steve might have more info. I don't have his or the owners phone numbers.

A few more bits, large and small, lurking in and around the various sheds near where the Selig lathe came from. Added with permission of the owner. A large Drummond lathe about 6 foot long. No idea of the model, plus a hefty looking Harrison. Forgot to check the swing of these two. Not much room to get good photo's. A wood turning lathe, band saw, and hidden under the blue tarps a wood planer. Can't remember what the green machine in front of it is. A surface grinder and what we think is some sort of guillotine or maybe metal bender. This has a double ended V shaped blade which slides sideways. Pillar drill and wood mortiser. Lots of assorted wood planes and a nice boxed Record 405 multi plane. I think the owner said there were more of these, or similar, stored away. And finally three large stationary engines. A Bamford and two of which I have forgotten the make. Some of the larger machinery look as if they were installed first, then the sheds build around them. Lots more smaller bits and pieces scattered everywhere. If anyone interested in any of the above, just shout.

Happy Birthday Angus.

The Brinley from John's had a Brinley sticker on it Chris. It was the one you found under the Morris Minor bonnet at the back corner of the workshop shed. Photo's of it on here somewhere.

Correct Norm. I have one too. Same make but slightly different to yours. Mine came from John's and is missing the rubber.

Thanks all. Would never have thought of that. Because of all the lathes and machinery in the sheds, I assumed that it was some sort of workshop measuring or setting device, but can see it's use now. The only guns I have handled were toy pop guns in my not so old days.

Found while digging around in the shed after collecting the Selig lathe. Just over 3" long. The small knob moves the end section sideways. The larger knob raises or lowers. Not much movement of both sections. This was the only part in a small box although it is obviously part of a kit. No name or numbers.

Up and running by January. No chance. About 4 foot long. Brought all the treadle parts home but would motorize it. Still need to finish the Drummond round bed which is well on the way. Plus a few alterations to Half a Horse after it's first runs at Beddenden.

Found recently by the Showman and friend Steve Dibnah in a shed and now residing in my garage. A 4" x 24" Selig Sonnenthal Lathe. From information found on the WWW, these were made from 1880 to 1910, so this young man is at least 108 years old. A future project which will need a bit of work. Just had a quick look so far and found all parts move without effort. No rust as it was well protected by a covering of sawdust. Complete with cast legs and treadle assembly, a pile of 17 change wheels plus more on the lathe and various other parts. A few photo's after returning home. Don't know what the weight of everything was, but the car didn't bounce much. And a few of the various parts. And the lathe on the garage floor, for now.

Happy Birthday Andrew. Have a good one.

Looks like I have deleted the photo's I had. No sign of them anywhere. Found them now while looking for something else, as usual.

Looks familier Chris. From John's ?. Remember the winch in the small shed next to the house. Similar to Iain's orange painted one. I'll have a dig through my photo's.

Santa Norm. He was practicing for next Xmas and thought it was a strange looking house chimney. He was stuck at the bottom.

And ditto from me. Thanks Kevin, Ethan and everyone involved. A great show.

I think Alan liked this little homemade tractor. I did Chris, I did, a LOT. Didn't know you were spying on me with your camera though.

Looks too good to use.

Thanks Ewan.

Ditto. Except I will be leaving at second light tomorrow morning. Get the kettle on Chris.

Looks like you have plenty of room to play Scott. Me, no room to swing a cat.

Turning brakes. I was undecided on these. Should I fit them, or not. OK, I'll make a start. Bent up a pair from alloy using photo's and guesswork as a size guide. The levers ? were from 1/8" x 1/4" brass drilled and tapped 8BA. Each lever was made in two parts as attempts to bend as per the full size resulted in a break. Brass too hard. Should have tried heating up first. These levers are probably a bit narrow, 3/8" would have been better but nothing in stock. It was then decided to leave them for now and carry on with other bits and pieces. Lots of bits and pieces later, Iain slf-uk my head information provider, sent me photo's and measurements of the assembly so a restart was made. My original guesstimated alloy pedals were correct in height and the inside of the bent up lips, much to my surprise, but 1/4" short in length. This 1/4" is the model size measurement. Two new pedals were made and the horizontal brass section extended using a piece of plastic for quickness. A test assembly. All these parts were held together with 8BA countersunk bolts. Looks a bit messy on the photo's but all hidden later. A few holes were drilled in the wrong place, but not seen when finished. The pivot bar is brass tube with a plastic insert and a 3mm threaded rod. All bits which just happened to fit together without much work. The lower ends of the uprights were drilled and tapped to suit the rod and the tube notched to take the inner upright. Easier than making the tube in sections as per the full size, and as these pedals won't be working, a bit stronger. The locking bar was also fixed in position. The notch in the tube was later filled and blended in. Various other areas had the same treatment to tidy things up. The brake pull rods! were from alloy angle , bolted to the underside of the footrest for extra strength with the nearly visible end trimmed down. I had to alter my original footrest support and lay it flat with the alloy angles notched to clear, but as usual after doing all this a better and simpler solution popped up in my head, but leaving as it is. Photo below is before cutting notches for support clearance. The full size has a steel bar running diagonally under the footrest, from the outer end of the pivot tube to the chassis frame, which helps support the tube. I made up a short alloy bracket which is bolted to the support angle in front of the pedals, and to the front underside of the footrest. Not really visible without effort. Hope all this makes sense. Grip tape was added to the pedals which finished them off as well as hiding all the bolt heads. The footrests also had a covering of the same. This self adhesive tape was listed on eBay as carpet gripper tape. Similar stuff also used for skate boards. I wanted to use ribbed rubber but nothing suitable found. All too thick. The next photo's show various stages of test fits. I could have left the cranked ends straight on the brake rods ! by moving them closer together, but had previously drilled the footrest and didn't want to waste the holes. Photo below. The pins connecting the rods to the uprights were made from a bolt, turned down and drilled, then cut to length. The split pins are 1mm diameter. The threaded end was screwed into the alloy rods after tapping and held with a dab of lock tight. A fiddly job inserting the split pins, especially the inner one resulting in chipped paint, now touched up. Might have been easier before fitting to the tractor. Not too happy with the appearance of these split pins. Need tidying up and the loop made smaller. A job for another time. A few more photo's of the various parts, mounting brackets, footrest support etc plus the unit finally fitted.

Headlights continued. The mount was from alloy sheet. White border painted on. Will look better with a decal fitted. The two holes were the first attempt at mounting the headlights via a bolt through the original painted reflector. After scrapping this idea holes were cut using a large washer as a guide. Easier than expected using a very fine saw but had to take care not to damage the paint too much. Should have thought of plan 2 before painting. Next are the lights with plastic retaining rings held onto the rim with very small self tappers. These three photo's show the lights fitted, then the rings painted. Also showing the bulbs which are just a push fit. These appear to look cross eyed on the front view. As said previously, these lights were worked on over approx one year on and off, trying different idea's etc. The next photo's show hub caps which were quick and simple and were only made / altered recently. Jumping the gun a bit here but not to worry. Looking around for something suitable the cap from a deoderant bottle was found to be a good fit over the wheel hubs. Black plastic which was painted white. The end didn't have a sharp edge which would have made painting the red easy so plastic discs were cut and fitted using small expanding rivets which I had a stock of. Three more bottles were obtained which gave the required four. The result, better looking wheel hubs and a nicer smelling wife. OOP's, shouldn't have said that. The discs mounted on a rod ready for painting. The four stages and the rivets. Front and rear wheels with caps. The fronts were a nice push fit but the rears wouldn't go over the hub weld without stretching resulting in chipped paint. A few spots of glue cured this.