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WW1 Dennis truck find


Great War truck

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Thanks for the positive feedback guys. We could stitch or weld the lid, but luckily we have two spares. One of them has been left upside down in the mud and is a little corroded (most of the writing has gone), while the other one might be cracked as well. Will keep you updated.

 

Tim

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Yes. We have done something similar with the toolbox lid for the Peerless. In fact thinking about it Steve made a new lid for his Thornycroft gearbox. He didnt have an original so he made a pattern first. Did a nice job. I will upload some photos of how far he has got with the J sometime.

 

Tim (too)

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Some more photos of my Bank holiday weekend. We started to dismantle the donor gearbox. As the first two bolts came free thick black oil started dropping out. All looking very promising:

 

DSCN8298.jpg

 

As the cover came off, even more oil came out. Luckily the drip tray was to hand:

 

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The nuts on the next cover were in a state, but we managed to use a dremmel (marvelous tool) to cut slots in them and then turn them with the benefit of a hammer and a punch. You can see that one of them sheered off. Then lots more oil and a little water came out.

 

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Next we had to get the nuts off that hold the brake shoes in place. These were a little rusty and tight.

 

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But they did in the end give way.

 

After that we were suprised to see that the shoes came off without (too) much trouble.

 

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After that it was a case of unbolting and removing the UJ. This did not seem to take very long as i only turned my back for a moment and Steve and Tony had it done. The benefits of being submerged in good sticky oil i suppose. :

 

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Then the brake drum was removed, again without too much bother.

 

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it just needs a good tidy up and a skim on the lathe to make a good surface for the brake shoes to work on.

Edited by Great War truck
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  • 4 weeks later...

After we had freed up the donor gearbox we checked to see if anything would still turn. This clip is on HMVFTV but i thought it would be relevant to have a link to it here.

 

http://www.hmvftv.com/watch/cd194a4b1e6992063e94/WW1-Dennis-gearbox-partially-dismantled

 

Please ignore my confused daughters voice saying "what are you doing". She says that a lot, and who can blame her.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Thanks. The video adds an extra dimension to it all. In the meantime, Father has been busy painting up the gearbox:

 

DSCN8587.jpg

 

Which is looking quite good now.

 

Steve has been spinning in brass the oil filler breather cover for the gear box. Here is the breather showing the hole drilled off centre:

 

DSCN8864.jpg

Edited by Great War truck
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Thanks Tim. Must learn how to post pics!

 

Just thought you might be interested to see some metal spinning. This process is not common in the home workshop but I read about it and thought it worth a try. Now I can do it, it has proved its worth on many occasions.

 

The first pic shows the wooden block or 'chuck' as it is known over which I am about to push that disc of brass. The brass has been lubricated with soap as grease tends to fly off at speed which, in this case, was about 1400rpm. The second and third pics show me pushing it over using a piece of polished and hardened silver steel set into an ash handle about the size of a baseball bat. The great length of handle is required to generate the large forces needed for the process although in this instance the job is quite small. The brass work-hardens during the process so it is annealed again by heating to red heat and quenching, just the same as with copper. After about four annealings, the brass has been pushed down hard on the chuck and can be trimmed and polished up with emery. The final job was to rivet it onto the casting.

 

One more job done on the road to completion!

 

Steve

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In the sixties had to go to Birmingham to pick up a load of copper hot water cylinders, they were not all finished and so I sat watching them being made. The tops and bottoms where spun by a similar method, and a very big long wooden lever was used, the tops/bottoms were rolled on to the cylinder in another shop so I missed that bit, but the whole thing was very fast.

 

Must be a very satisfying skill to have acquired Steve, and what a nice sunny workshop!

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Watching an expert spinning is quite fascinating and there are a good couple of clips on Youtube. My efforts have produced satisfactory results but I am by no means fast at it. The whole process is a bit hard on the lathe too, as it puts fairly severe side loads on the bearings and, as you can see, I only have a modest Myford Super 7.

 

The pics were taken through my workshop window at about 5pm. Good for pictures but actually quite blinding at times. Normally I run on three strip lights placed on each wall and an anglepoise on the bench

 

I am always amazed to find that some of you chaps carry out restorations without a lathe. Goodness knows how you do it as I would be completely lost without mine!

 

Steve

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Watching an expert spinning is quite fascinating and there are a good couple of clips on Youtube. My efforts have produced satisfactory results but I am by no means fast at it. The whole process is a bit hard on the lathe too, as it puts fairly severe side loads on the bearings and, as you can see, I only have a modest Myford Super 7.

 

The pics were taken through my workshop window at about 5pm. Good for pictures but actually quite blinding at times. Normally I run on three strip lights placed on each wall and an anglepoise on the bench

 

I am always amazed to find that some of you chaps carry out restorations without a lathe. Goodness knows how you do it as I would be completely lost without mine!

 

Steve

 

I did think whilst looking at that shot that it was quite a strain on a Myford. Suppose not too bad on the softer metals, kept annealed like you did. Got a lathe myself but only used on a few jobs on the 101 and Ward so far but invaluable when you need it. Haven't tried metal spinning YET!

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  • 3 weeks later...

Time to add some more photos of what we have been doing. Nothing very exciting really, but when tackling these old beasts there is a great deal of the mundane to do. In these pictures we are still dismantling the donor gearbox to get the insides for a rebuilt shell. There is a great deal of head scratching involved as you try and work out how some bits have to come apart. Father has been making odd tools to aid in this as you will see from these next photos. After this job has been finished we will probably never have to use them again.

 

A collar to go around the shaft so we can pull it out:

 

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The shaft now extracted:

 

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Pulling out a bearing

 

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Shaft and bearing now out

 

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Puller on a spider. We had to get it rather hot

 

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Another collar to pull out the shaft and bearing

 

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All looking very nice

 

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A second empty box at last.

 

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Now we can start cleaning everything up to put back together in our other box.

 

Tim (too)

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  • 1 month later...

Sorry. Some more dismantling to do yet. Just to let you know that we have not been resting (well Father has not thats for sure), this is what has been happening in his own words.

 

Decided to dismantle the push-rods from Gearbox 1 and leave those from Gearbox 2 as that is the actual Gearbox works that we are going to use. Just thought that I would preserve those for the time being.

 

Nothing is ever straight forward and I assumed that the end casting must have been a push fit into the tube. But I find that both tube and casting are threaded and the 3/16" cross pin was put in afterwards to lock it. Obvious, I suppose, really!

 

Anyhow, some heat got the bits apart after I had knocked the pin out - but I find that the thread is peculiar - I cannot identify it. It is 16TPI and the outside diameter of the mail thread is about .808". Obviously I can match the thread in the tube by screw-cutting it - but it is an odd-ball.

 

And with the casting screwed to the tube, then that stops my idea of locating the casting last of all on the shaft so that the groove for the pinch-bolt on the Fork can be put in as a "best guess" before hand. I guess it must have said on the original drawing where that groove should be located.

 

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A bit further along, Father says:

 

Just the thread to be put in the first one and the groove for the Pinch Bolt. Really not quite sure how to do that and get it in the right place!

 

I have started on the second one as well - they will both have to be slightly bored out to 3/4" at the end for threading and I shall probably do them both at the same time - rather than finish off the first one now!

 

The series of 4 holes are at different distances from one another - and I thought first of all that some one was told to slap four holes in the shaft and they were put in "anywhere". But I did check on the other gearbox and found that they were at the same distances apart as well - so that is where they have gone on the replacement!

 

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However, Steve had further thoughts:

 

The four holes are to stop it being hydraulically locked when you try to change gear. They give a way in and out for the oil as the tube moves over the shaft which acts like a piston.

 

As far as getting the pinch bolt slot at the right angle is concerned, I suggest that you clamp a bolt/piece of bar in the old slot and then angle the change rod until the bolt is vertical. If you can hold it in the machine vice, to do this, you can use your protractor to measure the angle of the end casting to the table. Then it is just a case of setting the new one in the vice twisted until the casting is at the same angle to match the protractor. You will get within a degree which will be quite good enough.

 

As for me, well i will be pleased when it is finished, it is under the floor and i dont keep banging my shins on it.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Are you tempted to modernize the sealing of the gearbox with a few strategically placed O rings to help retain oil?

I can see a lot escaping between those selector rods and the brass bushes unless there's good seal on the retaining plate.

 

More great work by the way, but that's what we've come to expect now!

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