MadModder

Well it's been working for a long time, but the flail mower has failed

Young lady driving it for me says the the rear roller isn't rolling. Well no it isn't as the right hand stub axle has parted from the roller - ten year of fatigue on the weld I expect. Much bending and distortion  - all a bit of a mess

  [ You are not allowed to view this attachment ]  

  [ You are not allowed to view this attachment ]  

It's possible that the spool that forms the stub axle is reusable if not bent - and the tube certainly is but both will need major clean ups before re-welding

I removed the right and left hand trailing skids to make access easier then tried removing the right hand bearing - no chance - firmly stuck - heat - hydraulic pullers - big hammers - no avail - need it on the bench to introduce it to an angle grinder.

In the end it only took one 4.5" disk - surprising as it's very hard steel:

  [ You are not allowed to view this attachment ]  

  [ You are not allowed to view this attachment ]  

  [ You are not allowed to view this attachment ]  

This leaves the skid that got bent in the original failure and even more when I tried removing the bearing from the shaft !

  [ You are not allowed to view this attachment ]  

Bent skid introduced to 60 ton press a few times in judicially placed places and it's somewhat better (but not perfect) - but after all they ARE self aligning bearings 

  [ You are not allowed to view this attachment ]  

Putting the stub axle between centres on the lathe it seems to have survived without bending so I will re-use it

  [ You are not allowed to view this attachment ]  

Replacement two mounting hole (130 mm spacing) RHP self aligning bearing housing with 1-1/4 insert ordered from Bearing Boys (?80 !) so update when it arrives.

This is what I got for the last few days

  [ You are not allowed to view this attachment ]  

yes i am getting it also.
Ron

Retrol SE-03 Steam Engine Plant & GF-01 Miniature Workshop working under live steam and drilling some wood.

I went around the base leveling feet a couple more times, to get things dialed in. All the while wondering if this was a gigantic waste of tine. The more I dug into it, the wonkier the base was looking.

I thought the bottom side of my base was flat, but it's actually concave, in both the E-W and the N-S directions. The bottom of the sides are fairly flat compared to the center. And tops of the East, South, and West sides are fairly flat. The top of the North side has a noticeable hump in it. The base itself is not a consistent thickness. The West side is 0.2mm thicker on the North side than it is on the South, the East side has a similar taper. The South side is 0.2mm thicker on the East side than it is on the West. The North side is 0.2mm thicker on the East side than it is on the West. Which makes the NE corner 0.4mm thicker than the SW corner.

Just for shits and giggles I got out the float glass plate and my 1-2-3 blocks to check if the side frames were level. N-S they were level, but E-W they were not. That required 3 pieces of paper under the West leveling feet as shims. Tomorrow I cut some shims for under the West frame mounting standoff and fix that problem. From here on, everything will be aligned to the side frames - in some way.

It was my intent all along to have the base sitting flat on the bench, probably on a rubber mat for sound deadening. After I get things aligned: the X axis, the Y axis, and the bed - I plan on putting a 1-2-3 block under each corner of the base and see if any thing changes in the alignment. That'll tell me if I can go back to Plan A, or if I need to tolerate that gap under the base and everything that is going to wind up hiding in there.