Stuff you have fixed today

[DAPPH]

There used to be aerosol ignition sealer sprays available that did similar to stop HT sparks tracking along damp surfaces, especially inside the old distributor caps and plug lead shrouds . My old ancient Triumph Herald 1250 (??) was given a spray every fortnight for two harsh winters when I lived in Germany .


I like the hand brake cable solution , my Citroen BX19GTI ate hand brake cables at £ 60 ish a pop each in a garage for some unknow reason ( Back in 1989 when I was only able to use one arm for a few years )

 

[bricol]

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Got rid of the silly air release brass screw valve that was under the machine ..I'm too wrecked to try and bend to the floor to find it , then fiddle with numb fingers to open the well rounded smooth ex -knurled tube .. plus it was leaking any way. Did this by buying five suitable BSP elbows a month ago , 3 mtrs of 8mm copper gas pipe plus a gas tap an nut and five olives for the pipe and a roll of PTFE tape for sealing crap threads . First task was to bend two foot of copper tube into a gentle curve and using the blow lamp gently trickled melted scrap lead sheet ( almost five ounces ) in the heated pipe . A quick annealing plunge into cold water then slipped the pipe into a bit of old hose pipe to give it some protection , bent the hose and pipe to get a quality fit to the elbow and bent it to anchor to the information plate . Used a heat gun & a heavy washing up liquid lubricant to warm the hose pipe to take it off the now perfectly bent tube , it came off like a wet dream

Adjusted the length to suit the locations allowing for the gas tap then cut the hosepipe four inches shorter to allow a bit of free pipe . Putting the hose back on was a done once the pipe was secured to the union under the tank and like taking it off the hose putting it back it was well warmed and lubed , put on from the free ( where the tap was to go ) end , gently twisting and pushing it as I warmed it up , it went on like the previous dream . fitted the tap and tail exhaust tube then cable tied it securely to the data plate bridge adding a bit of split heated hose around the tap to reduce vibration damage in times future .

Unless you have got another drain somewhere, I am a bit bemused why you have taken the drain to a point nearly as high as the top of the tank?

 

[MattF]

Unless you have got another drain somewhere, I am a bit bemused why you have taken the drain to a point nearly as high as the top of the tank?

Mobility issues? The air in the tank should theoretically force the water out regardless of the hoses outlet end height.

 

[bricol]

Mobility issues? The air in the tank should theoretically force the water out regardless of the hoses outlet end height.

It won't fully drain it though. I leave mine open when not in use. Various auto drain kits available to over-come issues with access - I have a couple, but so far not managed to remember to fit them

 

[indykid]

It won't fully drain it though. I leave mine open when not in use. Various auto drain kits available to over-come issues with access - I have a couple, but so far not managed to remember to fit them

If you crack the valve with half a bar of air in the receiver and let it purge until it blows air, it's cleared as much water as it ever would under gravity.

I'm intrigued by how Dapph intends to catch said water though unless you plan to just blow it at the wall.

 

[DAPPH]

Unless you have got another drain somewhere, I am a bit bemused why you have taken the drain to a point nearly as high as the top of the tank?

Water gets pushed into the lower tube via the union , opening the tap sees it pushed out by the tanks 5cuft 120 psi air pressure . Even tipping the cylinder back and fort gently to bring any remaining moisture to the elbow does not appear to bring in any more water once the initial drain down has taken place to 21 psi after that nothing comes out . Recharging straight away letting it stand for 5 min then draining gives up no noticeable water.

 

[DAPPH]

If you crack the valve with half a bar of air in the receiver and let it purge until it blows air, it's cleared as much water as it ever would under gravity.

I'm intrigued by how Dapph intends to catch said water though unless you plan to just blow it at the wall.

If it's in place under the welding bench I'll be using a 1,2 mtr length of hose pipe over the vent tube to send it oputside . If it's been taken out from under the bench I'll let it go where ever the compressor is standing. I put a five long heavy duty yellow soft artic power cable on the compressor specifically for this event .

 

[DAPPH]

The

Unless you have got another drain somewhere, I am a bit bemused why you have taken the drain to a point nearly as high as the top of the tank?

The gap under the compressor tank is about 50 mm high . I didn't think an auto drain vent would fit without being continually & easily smacked on rough floor undulations etc. , so went the way I know would work easily every time .

 

[Barking Mat]

Another work in progress.

Old and new.

 

[ajlelectronics]

Well progressing anyway. It is a Marconi RC690 transceiver as fitted to Granada Mk2 Police cars of the 70s. First time playing with one, but I have got it transmitting and possibly receiving, although I need to wait for a signal generator to appear tomorrow, before I can prove that. 146.450 @ 20W and receive should be somewhere in the 153MHz area.

Already covering 142-156, it will be ideal to convert to 2m FM if I can only find any information. Unlike Pye equivalents, there appears to be little in the way of deep technical stuff around.

 

[indy4x]

Daughter has a 2012 Mazda 3 Sport

Phone call yesterday 'Dad, why is my EML on' Determined that the car was running fine so told her I'dhave a look when she gets home

Fast forward to yesterdayevening, loads of randomish faults logged but nothing to shout about so cleared codes and EML stayed off

Then this morning, phone call to say the car won't turn over after stopping at the local petrol station

By the time I'd got there it was running again.

Swapped vehicles and I took her car home and it was 50:50 whether it would turn over when pressing the start button

Checked the voltages on both batteries and all looked healthy, did the same when trying to crank it over and still looked healthy

Starting to think maybe starter motor but just in case, cleaned all the battery terminals and major earth's even though they looked OK

Did several journeys with it today and all working as it should. As a bonus, the stop start not available warning thays been there for 12 months has has also gone away

 

[ajlelectronics]

although I need to wait for a signal generator to appear tomorrow, before I can prove that.

It turned up just after 10AM but what a load of junk! It wouldn't have been so bad if it had at least got some output, but it's dead Jim. The pips you see are actually solder joints, the front panel being a PCB!

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0C88RLHTY/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

There don't seem to be any decent secondhand RF generators around currently so I might have to see what I can build. All I want to do is to check the receive frequencies and maybe the sensitivity.

 

[Pete.]

I 'fixed' my 1 Ton engine hoist to make it more useful for me. I bought it to move my equipment about and lift it on and off pallets which I move about with my pallet truck but it has 2 major drawbacks:

1. the legs are not wide enough apart to go around even a 800mm wide euro pallet.
2. If I do get a machine on the hook I cannot put it down on the floor because it lands on the legs of the hoist first.

So I needed to widen the legs a bit. I did this by cutting a 30 degree notch in the outside edge and bending them to put a 30 deg bend outwards. in each leg.



Now this made the legs splay out miles too wide so I cut an opposite notch only 20 degrees 200mm from the first and then bent the legs back in.



The result of this is I can now get the hoist legs either side of a 800x1000 euro pallet far enough so that the hook is well over the pallet. I can also now drop the machine straight onto the floor (so long as it;s not more than 8-900mm wide) instead of it landing on the legs of the hoist as before.



It's not much use as an engine hoist any more as it's very wide at the castors so would be hard to get under a car but since I have no plans to do that it's no issue to me.

 

[Ian X]

Fixed a five years old Aldi hairdryer, motor bearings seized and on the way out, injected a magimix of superlube grease and moly paste. Time spent repairing about 35 minutes, time before it squealed then died again, about 3 minutes. You know when you spin the motor by hand and it makes that short zzzzz sound that its a lost cause.

 

[Jelly_Sheffield]

A fix within a fix.

I think we can all agree that's pretty wallered out.

Ages ago I ordered a new anvil taking care to get the specific part number as there's a bewildering array of variants.

I have had a bit of a stressful day and figured a quick fix in my lunch-hour would be a nice way to feel like I was back on top.

So off I go, only to discover that the anvil that had turned up was:
- too wide on the front bearing surface stopping it from dropping into the hammer mechanism,
- too long at the rear bearing surface, stopping the hammers from aligning with the anvil,

At this point I was about to get very frustrated and try to order another when I realised "There's a bloody lathe behind you!".

Some turning later:

At this point I greased it up and reassembled, to discover it was also too long at the front bearing surface causing it to bind against the casing.

So a bit more measuring, back to the lathe, and it finally fitted correctly, deburr all the new edges, slather more moly grease on, and reassemble.

Quick test, appears to work perfectly, much better.

I have saved the old anvil just in case this doesn't work out long term so I have a reference.

 

[Jelly_Sheffield]

A fix within a fix.

View attachment 475129
I think we can all agree that's pretty wallered out.

Ages ago I ordered a new anvil taking care to get the specific part number as there's a bewildering array of variants.

I have had a bit of a stressful day and figured a quick fix in my lunch-hour would be a nice way to feel like I was back on top.

So off I go, only to discover that the anvil that had turned up was:
- too wide on the front bearing surface stopping it from dropping into the hammer mechanism,
- too long at the rear bearing surface, stopping the hammers from aligning with the anvil,

At this point I was about to get very frustrated and try to order another when I realised "There's a bloody lathe behind you!".

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Some turning later:

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At this point I greased it up and reassembled, to discover it was also too long at the front bearing surface causing it to bind against the casing.

So a bit more measuring, back to the lathe, and it finally fitted correctly, deburr all the new edges, slather more moly grease on, and reassemble.

Quick test, appears to work perfectly, much better.

I have saved the old anvil just in case this doesn't work out long term so I have a reference.

Tested a bit more thoroughly tonight.

It needs a full rebuild kit, putting fresh moly grease in earlier acted as a nice grey telltale for all the areas where the o-rings and gaskets are allowing air blow-by, which is the trigger, and the right-hand side of the main joint in the casing.

This said, even with the leaks it's a big upgrade on my Makita in terms of power.

I will have to remember to be careful about using it to tighten anything, it will strip an M12 thread soon as look it, not bad for a really battered example of a 20 year old design that needs some long overdue TLC.

 

[RaceDiagnostics]

A bit of cutting, welding and threading and the companion set is know 7cm shorter all round. Big brownie points from my Mrs.

 

[Blobber]

Mounted the free 65 inch TV on a cheapy chinese wall bracket in the workshop, the pictures not good enough to have it in the house and its too big! should be able to get some work stuff and security cameras on it at some point, maybe even a bit of daytime telly!

 

[Melvyn Best]

Mounted the free 65 inch TV on a cheapy chinese wall bracket in the workshop, the pictures not good enough to have it in the house and its too big! should be able to get some work stuff and security cameras on it at some point, maybe even a bit of daytime telly!
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Can’t think of anything worse than loose women when I’m trying to work!

 

[Jelly_Sheffield]

Can’t think of anything worse than loose women when I’m trying to work!

Reruns of something vaguely interesting on "Dave"...

You can think you're treating it as background noise, but suddenly get to "a good bit" and loose 15 minutes just watching the TV before you clock on that you've just paused to watch.

This is one of many reasons I prefer audiobooks, podcasts, and "The Wireless", as you can still engage with it whilst being effective at doing something else at the same time...

I usually put my 3M Bluetooth ear defenders on when I go into the workshop and listen to something interesting whilst working.