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Puma / Dorman 6LE / MacFarlane B46B / 110 kVA Generator Resurrection

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awemawson:
So today's job was to steam clean the engine and chassis, but first a bit of preparation was needed.

A/ Remove exhaust flexy and silencer and blank off the exhaust manifold.

B/ Remove starter motor (the terminal post for the solenoid needs drilling out and re-threading) and blank off it's mounting hole

C/ Wrap the outer end of the main alternator in plastic and tape to stop splashes getting in

D/ Remove the rest of the wiring and associated trunking from the engine.

(The blanking pieces were made from 6 mm steel only because there happened to be an off cut on the plasma table)

Then it was a case of fork lifting it into the rear farm yard, putting it on blocks and dowsing it in 'Gunk'. While the gunk was soaking into the muck I dug out the big steam cleaner and set it up. Then set too with extremely hot water.

Once steam cleaned it didn't look too bad - still loads of flaking paint to deal with but less than before. It then got a second 'Gunking' and steam cleaning to get any bits that I had previously missed.

awemawson:
The removable covers for things like the air intake filters I will sand blast in the cabinet blaster and paint as separate items.

Next I removed the remnants of the canvas 'air duct' that had lead hot air from the radiator and fan to the outside world. The canvas had just been cut off and what remained was trapped by 1" wide steel strips retained by self tapping screws that were the devil of a job to remove.

Once that was off I then removed the fan & fan belt mesh cover - I needed to be able to remove the fan belts to measure up for replacements. Again the mesh will be painted as a separate item. The three fan belts are surprisingly narrow - probably originally 3/8" 58.25 " long from the 1972 build date. They are being replaced by 9.7 mm x  1483 mm modern ones - I think that there is enough adjustment to accommodate the slight variance.

While this was going on, the new paint arrived. :thumbup:

I had a go with wire brushes to start the task of getting rid of the rest of the flaking paint. It's not going to be a 'back to bare metal job' as that would take far too long, just get rid of the loose stuff. It's an immensely tiring job and I'm now whacked  :bugeye:

awemawson:
I thought that I'd have one last try with the starter motor terminal with the seized grub screw. It was at the point that the D shapes either side of the screwdriver slot were shearing off. I was sure that if I could heat it up it would unscrew - but it's mounted on (inflammable) paxolin and is adjacent to the main terminals that are also mounted in a plastic insulation.

So how to heat it safely.? I hit on the idea of drilling a shallow hole in a rod such that it would just fit onto the body of the terminal post. I then heated the end of this rod to red heat and pressed it briefly onto the post. Rapid application of a screw driver and out she came - success   :clap: So that's one more job off the list.

One oddity that I noticed when steam cleaning: Each cylinder head stud has a cross drilling in the head such that the stud can be seen from the outside world. I can only conjecture that this would allow you to cross drill a seized stud allowing the head to come off, and leave enough stud in the block to weld onto and unscrew. It may be for some other totally different reason, but it's the first time I've seen it on a cylinder head, in fact the only time I've seen this sort of thing was on a wooden boat with a timber keel with a  lead ballast keel bolted  on, and cross drillings were used to put the nuts on the bolts !

awemawson:
The charge alternator bearings arrived yesterday so today I re-assembled the alternator - all went well until I realised that I'd left a spacer off - Plonker ! - didn't take too long to take it apart and put the spacer in, and now it spins beautifully on its new bearings. The rear cover was pretty knocked about so it got grit blasted and given a coat of zinc rich primer.

Having got that pesky grub screw out from the starter motor terminal block I wanted to replace it, but what thread? Almost 2 BA but bigger than 4 BA and not metric - what the heck is it? Turns out that it's 8-32 UNC that nice common size! However the gods were smiling on me as it turned out that I have a whole box of them - OK they are Hex socket ones but that's OK. So starter motor cover replaced and it's ready for a lick of paint before re-installing.

Today electrical parts have started arriving. I've sourced an old style Contactum metal single phase consumer unit. I've previously used an identical one with it's innards stripped out, to house 3 phase MCB's and an Isolator so I know that it will take Wylex 3 phase MCBs and I also have a Contactum 30 mA RCD on order so this box will take the low current 3 phase from the main alternator via the RCB and a 6 amp MCB to feed the front panel metering, so at least it is a bit safer than the previous unfused and non RCD'd arrangement.

Also the three new fan belts have arrived and seem to be correct I won't know for sure until the charge alternator is re-fitted.

I spent some time investigating the various sensors and switches on the engine. On the oil feed there is what I presume to be a simple pressure switch, it's open circuit - OK it may well close on pressure but if it doesn't it's a commodity item and easily changed. On the housing for the spigot for the water hose leading to the top of the radiator there is what may be either a temperature switch or possibly an analogue sender - I can't unscrew it yet as it's below the water line, but I will when I drain and fill with anti-freeze (memo to self - order some!). Then on the water / oil heat exchanger that is bolted to the engine there is a tubular heater element  marked 220-250 Volt which is obviously a 'winter warmer' to aid starting, however it is currently open circuit. Its fixing flange nut measures 42.82 mm AF and try as I might I cannot get it unscrewed using large adjustables, and I don't want to ruin the rather thin flange. I may end up cutting a ring spanner on the plasma table, but of course until the engine is drained I can't completely remove it anyway.

The mounting plate for the fuel solenoid must have taken a knock at some time in it's life as it was bent rather Z shaped. I removed it, squashed it flat on the 60 ton press, grit blasted it and gave it a coat of zinc rich paint.

After that it was a case of more paint scraping to try and remove the flaking bits - I can see this could go on for days, but I have to be realistic and say enough is enough and hope the new paint glues down what I've missed  :lol:

awemawson:
I have to go visit a friend in his nursing home this afternoon so I was packing up early, but as I was washing my hands it dawned on me - I've drawn up a hexagonal spanner in Autocad before for some project - it just needs the right scale applying and I don't have to start from scratch  :clap:

Turns out that is was a 55.5 mm spanner, so applying a scale factor of 0.77477 gave me a 43 mm spanner that fits nicely. A quick trial and I've undone it one 'flat' - daren't go further or I'll let the water out!

Did I ever say that I LOVE my plasma table  :lol:

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