The Craftmans Shop > New from Old

Rebirth of a 6 Foot Flail Mower

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awemawson:
I grabbed a few minutes before lunch and squashed the rest of the flappy plates. Had to wack them with a sledge hammer to get them roughly flat to go in the press. They must be very much tougher than mild steel as they are hard as anything. Pleasing result though  :ddb:

awemawson:
So hanging around waiting for cottage guests to arrive, I may as well undo the 'skid pivot' bolts - these are M20 HT bolts that the skid & roller assembly pivots on to set the height of cut - skids need to come off to remove the rear roller and as the pivot bolts are uppermost at the moment they may as well come off. Gloves on so as to be ready for handshakes when people arrive.

Well no, not quite so easy  :bang: These bolts have been soaking with 'Plus Gas' for a couple of weeks but really didn't want to come off - eventually the left hand one unbolted with a long tube on a breaker bar, but even with heat the right hand one resisted my not inconsiderable mass on said bar.

Time to bring out the big guns - nice big hydraulic nut splitter (these nuts are 30 mm a/f) - nut cracked with a satisfying 'ping' and then unscrewed leaving a nice clean thread on the bolt - except where the skid has been pivoting and worn a big land. So will need replacing anyway.

I've no doubt if I'd wheeled in the oxy-acetylene and got it glowing it would have come off, but it's a heavy old big bottle rig  :palm:

So when time permits I can bring the fork lift in and re-position the flail to unbolt the adjustment end of the skids (skid has a single bolt and 10 mm thick side of flail has multiple places the bolt can go - again M20.

awemawson:
A bit more dismantling this morning. First I needed to roll her over to get at the roller and the skid mounts.

Now this is the first time I've got it in a position where i can turn the roller for inspection - as expected the one dent visible as she was sitting is not the only one, and probably if I can source a suitable bit of heavy wall tube (135 mm o/d by 2 metres x at least 3 mm wall) I'll make a new one.

One 'good thing' is that oil has leaked from the gear box as it's been sitting in the wrong attitude, so at least it means there WAS oil in the box so it stands a chance of having survived  :lol:

awemawson:
So first thing to do is unbolt the skids to release the roller and it's bearings - again 20 mm bolts unbelievably tight. Again I got out the nut splitter, but this time the nut won and the thread on the hydraulic nut splitter stripped  :bang: - another thing to mend.

This meant I had to bring out the oxy-acetylene - so rather than move the full size cylinders I transferred the cutting torch to the Portapak which made short work of loosening the nuts.

awemawson:
So with the skids off and the knackered bearing assemblies off, the roller was free to remove - oh boy are the shafts worn  :bugeye:

This confirms me in my belief I'll make a new roller.

The bearings are a standard RHP item but seem to have had a grease seal of some sort mounted on the 'inner' face of the skid - the shafts are so worn it's difficult to see what was there originally.

... so it's one step forwards and one back - but that's always the way with a refurbishment  :lol:

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