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1908 Dennis Truck


BenHawkins

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I do hope the Napier engine can turn up as well. Lets all keep looking.

 

By messing up my steel order it did mean we had this afternoon free to check the engine fits correctly in the chassis.

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It was extremely rewarding to simply slot the 1/2" BSW bolts through the existing holes as if the engine has always been there!

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 1 month later...

I made the pins for the universal joint at the same time as those for the 1914 Dennis. I have now also made the four bushes; these will have to wait to get hardened.

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At the NEC car show this weekend John Dennis very kindly presented me with a copy of the test record for engine 4222.

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At 50 BHP and 0.75 pints per HP per hour I should be able to consume 37.5 pints per hour. I should not be able to consume more that 25 pounds worth of petrol in an hour (at current prices)!

 

The test date of 8/2/1911 supports the engine originally being fitted to a Liverpool Salvage Corps tender. I am 50% sure it is this one:

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  • 3 weeks later...

New universal joint castings, one of the few parts common to both Dennis projects.

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Whenever I have had 10 minutes to fill I have been welding laser cut profiles together to make the bonnet rest that fits on the dash. The dimensions are partly from general arrangement drawings and partly from photos so I have left it a little bit taller so I can adjust the height to suit.

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Little jobs like this seem to be creeping in again now I have an engine.

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  • 4 weeks later...

There were a few small jobs I wanted to look at on the engine.

 

Two of the cam followers were missing from the engine. I happened to be in the loft so brought down this pattern I made for the 60hp White and Poppe engine several years ago. The sleeve can be made from one of these castings so I will get some more cast next time I visit the foundry.

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I gave the pistons a bit of a scrub in oil; there only appears to be surface rust which is easily removed and there are no signs of cracks.

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The piston rings also cleaned up quite well and look in good condition apart from this one. The gudgeon pins were in a margarine tub that has had water in it at some point. Three are probably acceptable but I am not too sure about this one.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I didn't think any of this model made it into service during WWI but this photo shows one in France.

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I have cleaned up the clutch release mechanism; the mounting holes will need a little bit of adjustment to get the bolts to line up with those in the chassis properly.

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The next part to clean up was the clutch release bearing; this has been put in place to keep it safe.

IMG_3386s.jpg

 

There was a thick layer of green paint on the oil tank. Before stripping the paint I emptied some nice clean oil from the tank but there was also a thick layer of sediment so I put some paraffin in along with three ball bearings and gave it a gentle shake to remove the worst of it.

The fixing straps seem to line up quite nicely with the original holes in the chassis.

The bottom has fallen out of the filter (shown on the chassis rail) so this requires soldering back into place.

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It looks like unsoldering the end plate will be required to remove the dents from the top of the tank.

 

The fan mounting bracket has also been blasted and primed.

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The inlet manifold looks much better without the green paint. My assumption is that the small pipe was used with a shutter to allow air into the manifold.

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  • 2 weeks later...

The starting handle was a bit twisted so it was warmed up to straighten it out, then blasted and painted.

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I removed the cover from the timing gears. The drawing for one of them has survived and states 3.25 module but does not explicitly state the pressure angle so I had this gauge cut (in the form of a 20PA rack) in the last batch of laser cutting and it appears to mesh properly.

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The cam shaft gears have 60 teeth (obviously that means the crankshaft gear has 30 teeth). The missing water pump drive gear should mesh with the exhaust cam gear but I do not have any drawings for this. Luckily the distance between the two shafts should be fairly easy to measure accurately and it appears the gear should be a fairly close fit in the hole it has to pass through in the casting.

 

Just using a steel rule the centre distance looks to be around 122mm and the diameter it has to fit through is 56.5mm. The Pitch Circle Diameter for the 60t gear should be 60*3.25 (number of teeth * module) so 195mm and that appears to be the case when measured with a steel rule.

 

The PCD of the water pump gear should then be about 122*2-195 = 49mm (twice the centre distance - PCD of the cam gear). Then to work out the number of teeth the PCD is divided by the module 49/3.25 = 15.077 teeth; as I can't easily have a gear with that number of teeth I guess my measurement is slightly out and it should really be 15 teeth giving a PCD of 48.75 (actual centre distance should be closer to 121.875mm).

 

The overall diameter of the gear would then be (teeth+2)*module or 17*3.25 = 55.25 so it would fit through the hole in the casting. Of course as a 15 tooth gear the pump will be rotating at twice the crankshaft RPM.

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The overall diameter of the gear would then be (teeth+2)*module or 17*3.25 = 55.25 so it would fit through the hole in the casting. Of course as a 15 tooth gear the pump will be rotating at twice the crankshaft RPM.

 

You will need a little bit of backlash allowance too, though time and miles in the meshing gear might have added plenty of that.

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You will need a little bit of backlash allowance too, though time and miles in the meshing gear might have added plenty of that.

 

Agreed, but I am not too sure where that clearance was designed in. I thought that I would turn a piece of bar to the bore size of the timing case and stepped down to the dedendum circle and then trial fit it to make sure there is clearance before drawing the gear.

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  • 1 month later...

I was sent this photo of some Carter Paterson vehicles recently and it shows them carrying radiator badges.

attachment.php?attachmentid=125028&stc=1

 

So I have found this one. It is in fairly nice condition but there is a little damage to the enamel. Perhaps I need to look into the process of restoring the enamel.

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As I was visiting the foundry I have had the missing cam follower sleeves cast for the engine. No rush to machine these but another part in progress.

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CP.JPG

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The next part to clean up was the clutch release bearing; this has been put in place to keep it safe.

attachment.php?attachmentid=122858&stc=1

 

There was a thick layer of green paint on the oil tank. Before stripping the paint I emptied some nice clean oil from the tank but there was also a thick layer of sediment so I put some paraffin in along with three ball bearings and gave it a gentle shake to remove the worst of it.

The fixing straps seem to line up quite nicely with the original holes in the chassis.

The bottom has fallen out of the filter (shown on the chassis rail) so this requires soldering back into place.

attachment.php?attachmentid=122857&stc=1

It looks like unsoldering the end plate will be required to remove the dents from the top of the tank.

The fan mounting bracket has also been blasted and primed.

attachment.php?attachmentid=122859&stc=1

 

The inlet manifold looks much better without the green paint. My assumption is that the small pipe was used with a shutter to allow air into the manifold.

attachment.php?attachmentid=122860&stc=1

 

try pumping it full of water first with a plumbers pipework pressure tester

 

see if it pushes them dents out...

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  • 2 months later...
  • 2 months later...

This weekend was another pilgrimage to Beaulieu auto jumble. It is one of the few UK events that reliably has parts for Edwardian vehicles.

 

I am not sure how difficult the W&P engine will be to start so decided to buy this "easy starter". It is a small can you fill with petrol and using the plunger you can inject petrol into the inlet manifold. This means you do not need to get sufficient air velocity through the carb when cranking to get the carburettor to work properly.

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The engine is also fitted with the remains of a distributor for trembler coil ignition. There was a four cylinder Thomson Bennett trembler coil box at Beaulieu but with a price tag of 650 pounds I did not come home with it. I am not really sure if the distributor fitted just switched the low tension (requiring such a box with four coils) or if it in fact distributed the high tension and therefore only required one trembler coil. Can anyone identify the distributor, confirm how it works and/or provide any details on the missing parts?

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Another challenge for you all is to identify this cylinder block I brought back from Beaulieu! As you may have noticed I really like engines with separate T head cylinders. This one currently measures 86.6mm bore but may well have had a re-bore at some point. It came from a French seller and I thought it looked like some of the Aster engines I have seen in early magazines. If that is the case it would have to be a re-bored J (81mm) cylinder and the engine code would have been ??JS (S for separate cylinders). Perhaps the start of an Edwardian car project ;)

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  • 2 weeks later...

The large water jacket over the top of the cylinder and the manifolds exiting at 45 degrees are unusual for a T heat engine. Looking through various early literature I found this from early 1904:

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They appear to have made them with a variety of bore sizes and number of cylinders, including 85mm which would be a good fit for the cylinder block I brought back from Beaulieu. One a few hundred more parts required for this veteran car project.

 

I have scraped the green paint off the metal parts of the centre from the distributor on the W&P engine.

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Checking with a multi-meter the top (steel) commutator is connected to the spindle and the lower (brass) commutator is insulated from the spindle. The brass commutator only has one vertical segment and has some wear evident from a brush of some description. This appears to be designed to work with a single trembler coil, the top commutator switching the low voltage circuit and the lower commutator directing the high voltage to the correct spark plug. The insulators seem to be made from vulcanised fibre.

 

The picture below appears to be the standard White and Poppe manufactured contact breaker and would have been used with four trembler coils.

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But Dennis appear to have fitted this distributor, which appears to have terminals to match the centre above. I don't know if it was their own design or bought from another manufacturer.

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  • 1 month later...

Working on my 1914 Dennis has depleted my stocks of Whitworth coach bolts so I was pleased to visit the garage of a local retired ironmonger and come back with a few boxes. I still hope a horse drawn van will turn up to fit to the chassis (as was done originally) but if not these will certainly help to build the body.

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  • 8 months later...

At the end of last month we pushed this project out of the garage so it could swap places with the nearly finished 1914 Dennis.

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And once it was moved into the workshop it was a good opportunity to loosely fit a few more parts to the engine.

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The list of tasks on the 1914 Dennis is now quite short so I am looking forward to getting stuck into this one again. 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Yes, the engine looks great now it is placed together. I am really looking forward to getting stuck into the rebuild.

 

I think the "Black Maria" is a 30cwt model and fitted with KT block tyres. The buttoned seat back looks quite comfortable. I have one of those back axles in stock!

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A small amount of progress this week. I have purchased a set of ten spark plugs. As the engine has dual ignition the set of ten gives me two spares. The rusty plugs currently fitted are mostly Lodge but I think this set of Champion 5 com plugs would look appropriate.

IMG_4494s.thumb.jpg.ed5b29c819063717c2cf82843910bbb1.jpg

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  • 1 month later...

The holes in the chassis for mounting the body are clearance for 1/2 bolts. I didn't have any long 1/2" coach bolts so when I saw a box of 36 for sale at 50p each I bought the lot and have started blasting and painting them ready to use.

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When Carter Paterson bought this chassis they did not have a Dennis built body but instead chose to take the wheels and axles off one of their horse drawn vans and mount it on the chassis rails. This leads to an uneven spacing of the bearers as there were two spaced fairly far apart at the back that carried the springs and three towards the front that carried the fore-carriage. I have seen a couple of really nice examples of these "London Vans" for sale but they would be too good to break up. I have now placed an advert to see if any rough examples survive but with wheels etc. beyond repair.

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