Great War truck

That looks great fun, especially for the kids. Tim

Do you think it is this one: An Aveling and Porter steam sapper of 1873, of which a number were sold to the French Army. Tim

Is it the same dimensions as ours? If so do let us know how much the quote is for. Thanks Tim

I am interested. Dont be downhearted by a lack of comments. sometimes people dont know what to say. British reserve and all that.

Those are French soldiers for sure and the building in the background looks like Les Invalides. There is still a large french army barracks behind Les Invalides. I am not sure when the French started using steam traction engines. Hang on, i will do some research. Tim

If you are feeling keen, here is a video clip of the worm turning. The highlight of entertainment - so i told my wife. She did not comment, so obviously overwhelmed with it all.

The rebuilding of the differential has now been completed. It all turns very smoothly with no backlash which is very pleasing. The next step is to put it into the lorry. So we have to move the buildup of junk in and around the lorry. Pull it all the way out. Then using the chain block on the RSJ above the garage door we should be able to drop it in. It will be a big exercise so it will need all of us to be there. No date is fixed for it yet.

Now that would be something. Sadly it is not quite so exciting, but still very interesting to the likes of us. I think i have a picture of it in use. Must go and have a look for it now. Tim

2012! At this rate they will be ready for 2010. What a wonderful job you are doing.

You will of course all know what this is then:

Tony and Steve had a go at reassembling the differential wheel. That all went OK after a bit of thought on how to approach it. The fun bit was in working out how to fill it with oil as it has no fill plug! In the end, they just poured it into the case before fitting the other half and relied on the thickness of the oil to limit the leakage rate. Our nice new bearings are are all on and protected and we plan to fit it all back into the casting tomorrow to put them out of harms way. Plan now is to get the whole lot back in the axle over Christmas.

I would recommend Redhill Bearings (01444 400900). Chris Godward (ChrisG) posts on here and he is very knowledgable and was a great help to us. I am sure that he will know the answer.

Interesting. I have not seen these modifications before. Do you have any more?

Thanks for that Alex. I dont think we will be able to get photos of this casting process as it is all done in a bit of a hazardous environment and i cant imagine they would appreciate us being there to take photos. But Steve can no doubt explain the process if he has a moment. The good news is that Steve and Tony visited the foundry today and they were very happy with his patterns and will do a cast shortly. Steve in the meantime will start on the next patterns. Over the weekend they started reassembling the diff. The bearings went on beautifully (thanks Chris) as did the new coupling, after a little easing with a file. Once the worm shaft was back together, they tipped the differential housing on end and simply dropped the whole assembly into it. A bit of waggling and a final thump with the mallet and it was home. It is now all bolted up, turns freely and awaits the completion of the wheel assembly.

I had noticed that too. Also mashed potato powder goes up like a flare. Brilliant entertainment.

The new half shaft turned up on Friday. It is a lovely job and very quick. Less than two weeks from order to delivery and the company have been very nice to deal with too. It cost £373, so good job we already had one.

Hi Ken Delighted to see that you have found this forum. Would you like to post some pictures of your Quad as it was and as it is now. All the best Tim

Hmmm. I wonder what business will be like for them over the next few weeks.

Yes, you got it right Steve. It is the moment the guns fell silent at 11:00 on the 11th day of the 11th Month. That particular strip of recording represents just 6 seconds of time. Good guess though Richard.

You dont have the Mars bar yet. It is still in Jacks warm palm. Good guess on the disc, but not right. Please try again.

Crikey Richard, that was quick. Yes, quite correct. But to win a Mars bar (from Jacks Christmas variety pack) I need a bit more information. What is relevant about that particular recording.

What is this and what is it showing (no jokes about my last trip to the hospital please).

Steve has sent me an update and some more photos of his pattern making. The first three patterns are now complete. This one you have seen before but it is now painted and hopefully will produce the inlet side cover. This is the simplest of the lot. The next one is for the actual rotor and has both a plug and a core box. The core box should produce a piece of sand which can be fitted into the cavity left by the plug allowing the bronze to form both the top and bottom of the rotor and the vanes as well. The result should look like this This is the main mounting bracket It is the most challenging one to date and requires three core boxes this time The intention is that the main plug is moulded leaving the flanges in the cope and drag (top and bottom mould boxes) and a tapered square hole in between. Two rectangular cores are made and dropped in and the third cylinderical core is laid in the centre. He has tried to make the pattern foolproof by planing off the corners of the pattern and adding wedges into the corners of the core boxes. This should prevent the cores from being put in the wrong way around. It is the moment of truth on Monday as we are off to the foundry to see what they say. Wish us luck!

Hi Doug Thats interesting. I have not come across any pictures of water tanks like you describe. Can you post any more information or a photo of it? I would have thought that a roof would be fairly important to stop water sloshing out. The only pictures i have of water tanks in the US Army of WW1 period are truck mounted on FWD's, Quads and Packards, but i would think that earlier ones would have been horsedrawn. Tim

I borrowed the Brixmis book. Brilliant i thought. Currently reading the WW1 book "East Africa by Motor Lorry". A superb book and i have come across a couple of pictures of Autocars like ours in use (ours was restored with an East Africa pattern GS lorry body), which is always nice to see. Tim