The following warnings occurred:
Warning [2] Undefined property: MyLanguage::$archive_pages - Line: 2 - File: printthread.php(287) : eval()'d code PHP 8.1.28 (Linux)
File Line Function
/inc/class_error.php 153 errorHandler->error
/printthread.php(287) : eval()'d code 2 errorHandler->error_callback
/printthread.php 287 eval
/printthread.php 117 printthread_multipage



Austinsevenfriends
What have you done today with your Austin Seven - Printable Version

+- Austinsevenfriends (https://www.austinsevenfriends.co.uk/forum)
+-- Forum: Austin Seven Friends Forum (https://www.austinsevenfriends.co.uk/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=1)
+--- Forum: Forum chat... (https://www.austinsevenfriends.co.uk/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=14)
+--- Thread: What have you done today with your Austin Seven (/showthread.php?tid=1921)

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230 231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240 241 242 243 244 245 246 247 248 249 250 251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260 261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270 271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 280 281 282 283 284 285 286 287 288 289 290 291 292 293 294 295 296 297 298 299 300 301 302 303 304 305 306 307 308 309 310 311 312 313 314 315 316 317 318 319 320 321 322 323 324 325 326 327 328 329 330 331 332 333 334 335 336 337 338 339 340 341 342 343 344 345 346 347 348 349 350 351 352 353 354 355 356 357 358 359 360 361 362 363 364 365 366 367 368 369 370 371 372 373 374 375 376 377 378 379 380 381 382 383 384 385 386 387 388 389 390 391 392 393 394 395 396 397 398 399 400 401 402 403 404 405 406 407 408 409 410 411 412 413 414 415 416 417 418 419 420 421 422 423 424 425 426 427 428 429 430 431 432 433 434 435 436 437 438 439 440 441 442 443 444 445 446 447 448 449 450 451 452 453 454 455 456 457 458 459 460 461 462 463 464 465 466 467 468 469 470 471 472 473 474 475 476 477 478 479 480 481 482 483 484 485 486 487 488 489 490 491 492 493 494 495 496 497 498 499 500 501 502 503 504 505 506 507 508 509 510 511 512 513 514 515 516 517 518 519 520 521 522 523 524 525 526 527 528 529 530 531 532 533 534 535 536 537 538 539 540 541 542 543 544 545 546 547 548 549 550 551 552 553 554 555 556 557 558 559 560 561 562 563 564 565 566 567 568 569 570 571 572 573 574 575 576 577 578 579 580 581 582 583 584 585 586 587 588 589 590 591 592 593 594 595 596 597 598 599

RE: What have you done today with your Austin Seven - AustinWood - 04-08-2020

Measuring gradient in percent is stupid. The old ratio makes sense. 1 in 2 is 50% and 1 in 1 (45degrees) comes out at 100% whatever that means!

RE: What have you done today with your Austin Seven - Denis Sweeney - 04-08-2020

Not so much what have I done today but over the last two weeks.....

Some may recall my post on “Rear Hubs” where I was experiencing problems and noted that I had previously fitted replacement halfshafts sourced from Kirby in the late 80’s. Well in the end I decided to not run the risk of sticking with these halfshafts and so ordered some new un’s  and have spent a couple of weeks in self isolation in the garage, stripping out the old and rebuilding with new.

Fortunately all new bearings were installed previously but with felt seals so these were changed as well.

One thing I had noted from driving Ruby was a serious clunk from the rear end whenever trying to reverse, the same clunk appeared when returning to forward gears and all was peaceful until the next reversing manoeuvre.  What I found when stripping the axle was there was a "huge" amount of backlash on the pinion.  This was very difficult to remedy and I found myself going round in circles. However after much soul searching and a flash of inspiration at 2:30 one morning, I tried blueing the adjuster ring faces to see where premature contact was being made.  I found that outer ring of the bearing on the carrier side was coming into full contact with adjuster ring, preventing the CW fully engaging with the pinion, even though there seemed no way the adjuster ring could be moved further out. However after further examination and gentle persuasion the adjuster ring finally agreed to move further out and the backlash has now been reduced to acceptable levels.

The original Kirby halfshafts were not the cut and paste jobs that were highlighted in the previous posts but the dimensions of the tapers and screw thread lengths etc were somewhat different from the new ones.
  
An additional benefit in stripping the rear end down the rear end is that, related to another previous post I'd made questioning “Just How good should my Ruby brakes be..” I found that the rear brakes have only been working on the outer edges of the linings and so only about 20% max contact between drum and lining.  The reason for this was simple, I did not appreciate the importance of the little metal tags on the Semi Girling brakes and so as a recent post noted that the springs are very tight and when fitted, the shoes sat over at an angle. Naively, I had assumed that once the drums were in place the shoes would self align themselves to the drums, not so! The brakes shoes stayed exactly as installed and so ran with only an outer edge contact.  In addition the linings had begun to break up along the outer edge at the rivets, this may have been a touch of over enthusiastic wellie when fitting the linings or just the bad set up.

So with some serious lessons learned, new brake shoes, adjusted clips and brake shoes sitting square, all new seals and shafts, the rear end is now all back together and ready for a new fill of oil and hopefully a roll out of the garage in the morning.

Hopefully the efficiency of the brakes will improve, but I will be checking the fronts first .......
 
Cheers Denis S

RE: What have you done today with your Austin Seven - Henry Harris - 05-08-2020

Fun and games today with new felts in the axle casings. There must be a way of fitting the spring clips without having to make a special tool!

RE: What have you done today with your Austin Seven - Tony Press - 05-08-2020

 "I found that outer ring of the bearing on the carrier side was coming into full contact with adjuster ring, preventing the CW fully engaging with the pinion"

I was going to point out that the original carrier bearings were the Austin narrow  outer ring specials but of course here it makes no difference ! Sad

RE: What have you done today with your Austin Seven - Bob Culver - 05-08-2020

Hi Denis

I would be surprised if any degree of backlash would give rise to knocking; gross errors more likely to chip the ends of teeth. Presumably you have obtained a reasonable mesh pattern despite the past.

RE: What have you done today with your Austin Seven - Denis Sweeney - 05-08-2020

Bob, I had read up Woodrow, the A7 Companion and a paper on Ruby rear axle rebuild from Essex A7 club and it was there it was noted that a “clonking noise” would be apparent if there was too much backlash, hence my comment, apologies if that is a misinterpretation.
The condition of the CW&P is good with no sign of any damage. I managed to get a reasonable pattern which I believe is very similar to that described by Jack French. I employed the assistance of my good wife to look and tell me, independently, if the pattern on my CW looked like the JF picture and she said yes, so I think it is close.
What I did find is that I mixed a bright yellow acrylic paint with a little oil and this gave a much better definition than the usual blue, though it was more difficult to clean off.
As for making a special tool to insert the seal retaining spring, I had a tool that I had made for folding edges of sheet steel when repairing the bodywork and it is a 12” long 1/2” round bar with a cut in one end made with two saw blades fitted into a hacksaw. Then one side adjacent to the cut in the end is filed away at 45 degrees.
Having seen one of the springs fly off into a far place in the garage whilst trying to fit it and then spending the next three hours trying to find it, I saw this tool on the bench an thought this might work, it did, I found they went in very easily. So a few moments making something similar is well worth while.
I used the modern lip seals to replace the felts fitted previously, and you dispense with the original steal cups and the seal sits into the casing, this did not work at first and after discussion with the supplier I rounded off the edges of the recess in the casing with needle file and then very carefully used the needle file to remove a very thin layer of the rubber round the outer edge of the seal and then with a touch of grease these did make a tight fit into the recess.
Cheers

RE: What have you done today with your Austin Seven - Steve Jones - 05-08-2020

(04-08-2020, 04:37 PM)Steve Jones Wrote:
(04-08-2020, 04:04 PM)Malcolm Parker Wrote: In terms of steepness, I think the top of Old Wyche in Malvern might rival it, but that is only a short stretch of road in comparison.   Being the UK, all traffic is now prohibited from Old Wyche but a few years ago the Light Car Section of the VSCC got permission to use it for a demonstration (or as Fred Dybnah would have said 'a demonsteration')  run by cyclecars and three wheeler Morgans (assisted by the Morgan Factory in Malvern).  I was one of the marshals at the top of the hill, equipped with a long length of rope to put across the back of any cars that failed to climb the hill, all very 1920's.   It was a red hot day and the pub at the top of the hill, where it joins the main road at an impossibly steep gradient, was crowded with well lubricated spectators.   A young policeman had been sent  to oversee the junction.
What he didn't realise was that some of the 3-wheeler Morgans were racing machines which are very highly geared.  They could only get up the very steep gradient by approaching it at high speed.   A magical afternoon that will long remain in my memory.   The marginally legal motor events are generally the best!

A photo showing Malcolm and his fellow marshals at the top of the hill with their rope remains for posterity on the front cover of the 2000 edition of the VSCC's 'List of Members And Their Cars'. I'll scan it later and add it here. 

Steve

And here he is. Second white hat from the left, chap with his sleeves rolled up.

   

Steve

RE: What have you done today with your Austin Seven - Reckless Rat - 05-08-2020

The sign at the bottom of the chemin de Saint-Julien claims it to be a gradient of 33%, whatever that is in imperialspeak - probably 1 in 3. All I know is that it was steep enough for the car to experience a bit of wheelspin on a couple of occasions despite a very rough concrete surface. Might have been debris related but it only happened on the two very tight bends so possibly also axle deflection.

Glad to have done it though. Probably a unique A7 experience for France at least, unless someone else knows different? Have any of the NZ branch had a go at the number one? It looks awesome. Looks nearly as steep as the south bay cliff tram up to the Grand Hotel in Scarborough!

RE: What have you done today with your Austin Seven - Duncan Grimmond - 05-08-2020

"Looks nearly as steep as the south bay cliff tram up to the Grand Hotel in Scarborough!"
I'll vouch for the gradient there, positively vertiginous!
The Invergaregig(spelling?) corkscrew is a fair old one too

RE: What have you done today with your Austin Seven - Chris Garner - 05-08-2020

I used to use the Scarborough cliff tram a lot when, as a student, I worked as a kitchen porter at the Grand Hotel around 1960. Great job - all the food you could eat and a selection of waitresses.
Does anyone from that part remember the Silver Grid bar- our drinking haunt?