dgrev

Good improvisation with the anti-whip device.

Thanks Gordon. Learning goes on, never know when some stray fact (such as the details you give above) will come in useful. Regards Doug

Gordon. Thanks for the explanation, now we know why theirs is broken yet the one in the Banfield one isn't. Regards Doug (Australia).

I too was wondering how you were going to tackle that job.

You have replaced the obvious candidates. Now time to think outside the box. What about the battery? Do you have a wiring short somewhere? You say you have no wiring shorts, but where are you measuring the 50A with the clamp meter? Have you checked that the generator and regulator are correctly matched? If they are not, you can get max rate charge. Have you verified the wiring between gen and reg is correct?

Bad meter?

Hello all, I wanted an instruction tag for the standard push pull light switch. NB: This is NOT the mail bag sized paper tag which gave instructions on how to wire in a 4 position switch when replacing the earlier 3 position switch. This is the swing tag that details the function of the push pull light switch. It had printing on one side and was blank on the other. Many thanks to Brett B. (G503 - Bart1015) for sending me an original tag to use as a template, I set out to replicate it. It turned out to be a huge amount of work as the original tag font appears to be something obsolete. I have struck this issue also with WW2 stencil fonts. Case in point being the font used by the Australian Army for the ARN (Australian vehicle Registration Number) on my jeep. In the end, I had to replicate the font pixel by pixel, just as with my ARN, not fun as the computer monitor seems to suck your eyes out! My wife managed to source me a woven paper/fabric material, expensive stuff and you only get 4 x A4 sheets per pack . The bonus being that this is a rip resistant product: unlike the genuine which was very easily torn. The next problem being that the red fibre washer was a non-standard (modern world) inner and outer diameter. Which I had to replicate from A4 card sheet. The rivet posed yet another problem as there is nothing available with an ultra small diameter lip, I managed to source an acceptable substitute. Lastly, the wire, this too took some sourcing. The original is rather thin. I sprayed the tag material after printing with Krylon and also the washers, prior to assembly, to provide some water resistance. Brett measured the original wire for me and reported it as 10 inches. When installed this leaves the tag swinging very low. So I looped the wire over the light switch such that the tag hangs only about 1/2" below the light switch, much less likely to get torn off as I get in and out of the jeep. See photo. Regards Doug, with thanks to Brett B.

So lets assume the holes were drilled at random, which considering that someone would normally set the job up in a drill press with the flat side down, really doesn't make any sense.

An engineer with a vendetta against mold makers/foundaries?

I too would like some, little chance of it though. That price was huge. My Dad started on 2 pounds per week in 1948 (New Zealand money - which wasn't that different from UK pounds). So call it 1/2 week's gross pay per spark plug. I have no idea what inflation was like between when that ad was printed and 1948.

Terry, you got that correct.

Effectively it is costing you double for anything in the UK given the GB£ to NZ$ exchange rate at the moment. I recall paying AU$2.56 per GB£1 back 20 to 30 years ago. That hurt! (Keeping in mind that the advertised exchange rate is never what you actually get charged by the time the fees are included, what a scam is this currency game.)

Latest CMV mag has a comment about it, but very carefully worded to tread a fine line of neutrality.

Could it be some sort of die mark from a grip knurl on the machine that formed the rings? Rather than have any function after manufacture?

Yeah, exactly as I expected. Unfortunately. Unless you can go through small claims or consumer affairs, you may just have to write it off. Such a shame it has come to this.

So what is their response if you are unable, unavailable or unwilling to attend the next W&P? Bad luck, you don't get a refund?

Please let us know what the popular choice is when it happens?

Something similar happened out here last year but for other reasons. "Formal" gatherings were not allowed due to all the constraints under Covid (which varied almost weekly, sometimes daily). But the camping grounds, caravan parks and motels etc were open for business outside of the lockdown period. You were allowed to go on holidays and if you happened to do so at the same location as your friends then that was not mentioned in the restrictions as long as you didn't "gather" in numbers that exceeded the indoor or arena density limits..... For a certain part of the year however, we were locked down and you weren't allowed to do anything except buy food, effectively. When you really think about it, what is the purpose of the Beltring event for most people? 1) Going to see the vehicles. 2) The dealers and their wares aka the "swap meet". All the fluff, such as stage shows, bars etc and dare I say it the re-enactors are what differentiate it from a regular vehicle show and swap meet and there to attract the public through the gate and thus bring in the money. It is the fluff that seems to be what justifies all the expense now that it is nothing more than a business. For all the criticism he got, Rex did appear to be an enthusiast first and looking to cover costs and maybe make a profit 2nd. When we were there, we attended none of fluff as by the end of the day in 1999 and 2000 we were too stuffed from the full day of vehicle activity and walking the enourmous swap meet to do anything other than sit around at our base camp and enjoy the company of friends over a nice BBQ in the evening. Should, and I know it is probably an outside chance, a new Beltring (note I didn't say W&P) arise from the ashes Phoenix like, it would be a very good opportunity to get back to basics and thus dramatically shrug off all the fluff and thus premium fees that come with it.

A concept that also seems to have escaped the new "owner" of W&P is that in the past, attendees could have a home base so to speak at the show. This is how it was for us in 1999 and 2000. British friends had a caravan on site and us foreigners all gravitated to it for the 4 days we were at the show. It gave us somewhere to have a break, have a cup of tea, ditch purchases for safe keeping (instead of having to carry them around all day) and so on. One of our group brought a vehicle over from the continent, he could leave it at the caravan safely and did not have to load it and take it the 1/2 hour back and forth to his accommodation every day. Then that sort of thing became frowned upon by the previous owner, restrictions on camping, restrictions (and fees) on civilian "vehicles" after lots of pressure from the vocal purists. Our friends moved on to the Overlord Show and never returned to W&P because of the degraded enjoyment that W&P had now become. The fun police (purists) got their way, our friends voted with their feet. Seemingly a lot of others did too. Richard, you would be aware of similar restrictions (that have now been lifted) that were imposed at our biggest MV event here in Oz. It certainly made the decision for me not to attend with a vehicle. People often lose sight of the fact that what is popular sells and makes for success. Issuing edicts, milking people for perceived advantages etc works in the short term, but once sufficient people start a counter trend, then it can be a very long road to recover the success and revenue that the former popularity once brought. In the case of W&P they appear to think they can maintain their revenue by large price increases on a smaller pool of attendees. In my experience, that is not a good idea unless you are after the well to do and "elite". I am told, but have no way to verify, that the current ownership is re-enactment focused, where as the previous ownership was more vehicle focused. The way the show has gone, would appear to support this observation. The former ownership spent large amounts of money providing free transport for the heavy end of our hobby. Yes, he had a huge outlay, but he knew that tanks etc attract enthusiasts and even the public. Whereas fields of jeeps and Land Rovers do not (for the record, I own both tanks and jeeps). The size and success of W&P back in those days speaks for itself.

I attended Beltring in 1999 and 2000. It was well worth the trip from the other side of the world. Being that it is now not what it once was, what is the next biggest show and how does it compare size wise to the Beltring of old? eg. 25%, 50% etc?

I had to give way to 6 cars yesterday, a rare event here. Having been to the UK, I well know that distance is magnified by the amount of traffic and how close together the towns are, you can't travel for hours at 100km/h the way we do.

Steve 190 miles is a very long journey in England. Incentive to move closer? 😉 My journey is 1km - the advantage of living in a town in Oz rather than a city. Regards Doug

Steve. Don't know if others will agree with me here, but here goes. As I suggested a long way back, get an oxy welding tip rather than the large cutting tip. Heat the bearing outside to inside in a straight line, moving the tip in and out fairly quickly. A welding tip will give you much better access to the back of the bearing than the cutting tip ever would. This will give you a localised "line" that is quite hot and will cause expansion - not a lot, only say 10 thou, which should be enough to get the bearing to move. You would have the puller on the bearing and under tension whilst heating. The advantage being the heat is localised, controlled and you are not heating the mass of the bearing. Regards Doug (the Aussie one).

Mammoth - your comments are spot on about getting gas in Oz. The yearly B__ bottle hire fees are exorbitant. It was costing me more in hire than gas consumption. In the end I handed back the bottles and walked away. Scrunt. The privateer brand available to me in Broken Hill is $400 each to "buy" Oxy and Acetylene bottles. You then "swap" the bottles and pay the gas fee. The problem being you are then locked into that brand. If they do a B__ with their prices, you cannot swap the bottles with another brand. Or if the only shop that sells them shuts, no more gas and proud ownership of useless bottles. To my knowledge Hobbyweld is not available here. Of the regulars we have only BOC and Liquid Air (or whatever they call themselves now) - with a really weird looking blue trigger type valve on their bottles. Drat!

Wow, 4 attempts at "Submit Reply" before the message went through. Wonder why? I started trying to send the previous message yesterday.