Rangie Posted July 13, 2023 Share Posted July 13, 2023 Discreet and unobtrusive, no-one would give it a second glance 😁 Alec. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Bill Posted July 16, 2023 Share Posted July 16, 2023 (edited) There was another reason for going through the 'stores'. The story goes like this: Tim has wired the screws holding the half-shafts in. The next job was to fit the transmission brake drums to the half shafts. Dad had sorted these long ago. Awkward things to fit but they went on OK. Dad had sorted the brake bands as reported some time ago and these had to be wangled in. All went well although there was some damage to paint work. In the left of this shot, you can see the support bracket with its fancy blue spring. We then got on with the other side but found that the support bracket was too short and wouldn't fit. Easy. Go and get a spare one from stores. We had a hunt around but could not find one. Tim went through the photos and came up with this one of a chassis we scrapped in 2004. As you can see, there was one there then! We have been through everywhere but no luck. That was the prompt which made us turn out the caravan! Anyway, the short one would have to do and I have made up a packer for it. On closer inspection, it can be seen that the bracket has been broken off and welded but lost half an inch of length in the process. We have a solution but it is severely irksome to know that you have something somewhere and not be able to find it! Steve 🙂 Edited July 16, 2023 by Old Bill 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
john1950 Posted July 16, 2023 Share Posted July 16, 2023 You will find it when you are not looking for it. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
QL Driver Posted July 16, 2023 Share Posted July 16, 2023 14 hours ago, Old Bill said: Tim has wired the screws holding the half-shafts in. This is very picky, I know, but isn’t the wire routed such that tightening actually loosens the screws? Some alternative approaches here: http://www.mtfca.com/discus/messages/29/48566.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G8RPI Posted July 18, 2023 Share Posted July 18, 2023 QL beat me to it. Tim needs some wire locking tips 😀 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Bill Posted July 18, 2023 Share Posted July 18, 2023 You learn something new every day, which is what this website is all about. Thank you chaps! Steve 🙂 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Bill Posted July 26, 2023 Share Posted July 26, 2023 Well, Tim has done it again and found yet another gas generator! I must let him tell the story. In the mean time, I have pulled it down and given it a bit of a clean up. Genuine WD! The bottom was bowed so I think it must have been frosted at some time. One of the wing nuts was missing. A rummage in the stores and I had one in stock. What good fortune! Now to lift the guts out. They look a bit poorly. I had to get the wing nuts hot to get them to free off. The carbide basket has had it. However, we don't plan to use the generator so we have just cleaned it up and reassembled it as a project for another day. It took some wire brushing to get the calcium oxide out. One of the wing nuts just would not let go. I was afraid of breaking the casting so I cut the rivet off so that I could hold it in the vice and get it really hot. Success and a new rivet. Once I had freed everything and given the bits their first clean Tim took the lot away for finish painting. Another piece ready to fit! Steve 🙂 13 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Bill Posted July 27, 2023 Share Posted July 27, 2023 With the lorry making good progress, we have turned our thoughts to the wings. We are fortunate to have two although they have seen better days. Interestingly, they are both left hand with differing styles of bracket. There must be a story there! I took the best one and bolted it up to a dummy side member. I then clamped it to the bench for a good measure so that I could draw it. This was taken from the top of a step ladder so that I could get a square-on pic. We took personal recommendation for someone to make them up for us and this is the result. He was as good as his word and delivery was under three weeks. We had to have a trial fit! Dad has been cleaning them up and has given them a coat of primer to stop the rust getting in. Now I must resurrect the brackets! Steve 🙂 14 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rootes75 Posted July 31, 2023 Share Posted July 31, 2023 Superb job. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Bill Posted August 6, 2023 Share Posted August 6, 2023 (edited) Yes, we are very pleased with them. I will have to look at the brackets shortly but in the mean time, we have been playing with the seat box. We did a trial assembly. And then dropped the fuel tank into place. This was surprisingly awkward to do by hand but the chain block made life easy. The hold-down straps were checked for length and the ends riveted on. And the tank successfully secured. Then we set the length for the fuel tap rod which I have since made up. And a trial fit on the chassis. On either side are foot-boards which slope up to the bulkhead board. We have one salvageable original which Dad has cleaned up and painted. Dad has had a replacement for the other side cut and folded and this is in the paint shop as well. We had no bulkhead brackets so Dad had these made up at the same time. So now we get to the bulkhead and this is where I would value your assistance please. This is what we received with the first batch of bits. It is made of tongue-and-grooved boards with a vertical doubler on the front face to hold it together. The bottom two boards have been on the lorry for some time in the past but the top ones are recent replacements. The horizontal boards are a puzzle to me as I have found no photos with them oviously showing, except this one. This is a still from a Hitchcock movie called 'The Skin Game'. Note that there are no vertical boards on the front face so how are they held together? Britich military lorries more commonly show this arrangement with what apears to be a 12" board vertically on each side with another across the top. How are these held together? But then you get the American lorries which have no visible joints at all. This one is new from 'The Brill Mfg Co' Could they have a steel panel on the front? This photo suggests not as the bolts are clearly coach bolts, sinking slightly into the surface. Just for a bit of variety, this WD charabanc appears to have vertical boards. Finally, this WD charabanc looks like it has a bulkhead of slightly de-laminating plywood! The question really is how did they put these bulkheads together and how should I do it? Getting super-wide boards in a stable material these days is going to be very expensive if it is at all possible. I have seen no evidence of boards on the back at 90° tying narrow planks together. Do you think it would be acceptable for me to use a good-quality plywood sheet? There is a metal edge moulding bent around the periphery so you would never see the laminations. We also have precedence in that the Autocar had a plywood board on the inside of the front panel so it was in use then. At the moment, I can't decide how to do it but I can say that they weren't done only one way. Unfortunately, there isn't a known original to copy. I should value your opinions! Steve 🙂 Edited August 6, 2023 by Old Bill 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Asciidv Posted August 6, 2023 Share Posted August 6, 2023 Even though they might of had plywood back in the day, I still think using it would be a bit of a cheat no matter how well executed it was done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Posted August 6, 2023 Share Posted August 6, 2023 The modern approach would be biscuits and glue. What might they have used? Tongue and groove? Dowels? Most pict Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Posted August 6, 2023 Share Posted August 6, 2023 Not sure what happened there... I was trying to type most pictures show a metal beading strip running across the top and down both sides. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andypugh Posted August 7, 2023 Share Posted August 7, 2023 16 hours ago, Asciidv said: Even though they might of had plywood back in the day, I still think using it would be a bit of a cheat no matter how well executed it was done. From Wikipedia " One can thus presume that rotary lathe plywood manufacturing was an established process in France in the 1860s. Plywood was introduced into the United States in 1865[7] and industrial production there started shortly after. In 1928, the first standard-sized 4 ft by 8 ft (1.22 m by 2.44 m) plywood sheets were introduced in the United States for use as a general building material.[4]" It seems quite likely that some manufacturers might have used plywood as a convenient (or even high-tech) material for the bulkhead when others were still using glued boards. There is probably a lot of Ash being felled at the moment, if you want wide boards. I got some 20" wide oak boards (via an ebay ad) from https://www.worldofwoodsuffolk.com/ a couple of years ago. I don't think that getting wide boards is difficult if you are able to process them yourself. It's getting then in a sawn, planed state that is less easy, and possibly is best approached in as two steps: 1) Find the wood 2) Bribe the owner of a wide planer/thicknesser. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flandersflyer Posted August 7, 2023 Share Posted August 7, 2023 6 hours ago, andypugh said: From Wikipedia " One can thus presume that rotary lathe plywood manufacturing was an established process in France in the 1860s. Plywood was introduced into the United States in 1865[7] and industrial production there started shortly after. In 1928, the first standard-sized 4 ft by 8 ft (1.22 m by 2.44 m) plywood sheets were introduced in the United States for use as a general building material.[4]" It seems quite likely that some manufacturers might have used plywood as a convenient (or even high-tech) material for the bulkhead when others were still using glued boards. There is probably a lot of Ash being felled at the moment, if you want wide boards. I got some 20" wide oak boards (via an ebay ad) from https://www.worldofwoodsuffolk.com/ a couple of years ago. I don't think that getting wide boards is difficult if you are able to process them yourself. It's getting then in a sawn, planed state that is less easy, and possibly is best approached in as two steps: 1) Find the wood 2) Bribe the owner of a wide planer/thicknesser. I'd get em unplaned and oversized.. Then let em settle for a bit in a dry corner before planing, thicknessing and matching... ☹🇬🇧 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andypugh Posted August 7, 2023 Share Posted August 7, 2023 32 minutes ago, flandersflyer said: Then let em settle for a bit in a dry corner before planing, thicknessing and matching... The planks I got from worldofwood had been sticked and air drying for a while. They haven't moved much since being installed as windowsills (very thick walls need very deep windowsills) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
8_10 Brass Cleaner Posted August 7, 2023 Share Posted August 7, 2023 It might sound daft, but I found scaffold boards a good source of wide planks. All graded, good stuff, so it shouldnt split, though not hardwood. Plenty of meat for planing to thickness too. I think they were well over 1 inch I guess they are 9-10inch or so wide. I made the steps for my living van out of ones bought new at B&Q. They were not cheap, but they were off the shelf, easy peasy to find. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andypugh Posted August 7, 2023 Share Posted August 7, 2023 I was talking to someone earlier who has a large maple tree that was felled a couple of years ago. He reckoned that would make some decent planks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mammoth Posted August 7, 2023 Share Posted August 7, 2023 first pic - if you look at drivers left hand it looks like boards are backed by angle iron which curves around from top to sides. My 1920's Brockway has relatively thin flat metal scuttle and relies on internal verticals for bracing, so would assume those in the pics were using metal faced board with the metal wrapped around the edges. Phil Dixon's A10 (civilian) Albion used plywood for scuttle which was determined to be original. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barney Posted August 8, 2023 Share Posted August 8, 2023 I brought some kiln dried 4x2" from a builders merchants, twisted all over the shop after only a few weeks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Bill Posted August 13, 2023 Share Posted August 13, 2023 Thank you everyone for all of your thoughts. I am certain that none of them were steel faced and also that the most common arrangement was the three very wide boards. I still can't see how they were put together though, as there is no evidence of any backing boards to lap the joints. If they just T&G and then glued them, how stable would they be? I can see the boards warping all over the place in time. The whole panel is 4' square and only 3/4" thick so it could be a real problem. Plywood would make the job so simple! I am still in two minds. Steve 🙂 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gordon_M Posted August 13, 2023 Share Posted August 13, 2023 More research Steve. You'd be unhappy if you did it one way and evidence to the contrary was out there somewhere. I'm not convinced sheet metal wasn't used. Coachbolt heads will pull just fine into sheet metal if it is thin enough. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MatchFuzee Posted August 13, 2023 Share Posted August 13, 2023 Searching 'woods that don't warp' gives a selection of woods but redwood comes up top in a number of sites with cedar being the next best. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Citroman Posted August 16, 2023 Share Posted August 16, 2023 On several of the old pictures you see vertical lines, could there be flat iron bars let in the wood and flattend with putty and painted over? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Bill Posted August 16, 2023 Share Posted August 16, 2023 I hadn't thought of that one. I am going to have a closer look at the two original planks we have and have a word with our chippy to see what he can do for us. It is becoming an imminent requirement! I have been giving the exhaust pipe some thought recently. Dad cleaned up and painted the manifold some time ago and it is currently loosely hung on the engine. The pipe itself is the next obvious part. We have an original which is salvageable. It has had some interesting repairs in the past. This is a bronze fire hose coupling! A sheet steel patch has been wrapped around the end. That is due for some attention but another day. The other end is also looking a bit ragged. It was a flare on the tube end, trapped by the cast flange. Dad gave it a clean but it has seen better days and needs replacing. It could do with a chunk of steel clamped around the 3" dia tube but I didn't have anything big enough in stock and so settled for a piece of 5/16" plate with some timber to back it up. My efforts at trepanning the centre did not go well! Once I had bored the hole and given it a radius, I drilled a 3" hole in a piece of timber and cut it in half. I squared up the end of the tube and normalised it by heating to red hot and allowing it to air-cool. Hopefully that relieved some of the stresses and reduced the chance of it cracking further. I clamped the flanging block around it. Then it was just a case of tapping the tube outwards a little at a time . Ten minutes later it was done! I am very pleased with the outcome although one crack which was already in it did extend. That can be welded up another day. A perfect fit (more by luck than judgement!). The last step is to replace the other end. Dad has picked up a piece of tube so I will trim the end back and he can have it welded on. It will be nice to fit that and get it off the floor! Steve 🙂 12 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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