Thread: 17 Leblond restoration?

Here is the banjo after 24 hours in the bath. I is stripped clean, i guess being a flat simple shape means there is no nooks and crannies to hide from the electrons.....



I have put the tumble reverse casting and gears in complete now, just to see how it goes(to give you an idea the large gear is about 8" across). After 1 hour the top of the tub looked like a tar pit....
I had a check this evening (after say 7 hours) and the steel gears look great, most of the paint is gone and the CI gear is getting there. I'm not sure if i've just struck a lucky electrolyte mix or what but it seems to be working a treat.

The tumble reverse is done now, i left it in overnight and then pulled it to bits to finish it off. What i have noticed is the amps go down the cleaner the item gets. I thought it was the anodes getting mucky at first, but put a new dirty bit in and the amps go back up to 5 or 6.

Anyway, on to bogging and sanding......I have started by using car bog on all the obvious spots sanded it back. I picked up a liter tin of septone acrylic spray putty at supercheap, but rather than spraying it (not having a gun i would sacrifice for it) i just brushed it on. It seems to have worked a treat and i will sand it back in the next few days to see how it went.

A few things i will say though.....
The stuff stinks, worse than 2pac poly, thinners etc.....and it doesn't go away....
Once its on your hands it don't come off easy....i look a bit like a smurf right now (its blue)
It doesn't agree with rubber floor mats, i dripped some on one and it turned green and started eating through the rubber

Another trick that i stumbled across was an easy way to trim masking tape. Once stuck on, i was trying to use a stanley knife blade to trim the tape but it kept catching on dags on the casting, so i filed the dags off....except filing the edge you are trimming to you file straight through the tape and clean the dags up in one go! Remove the unwanted tape and voila!

Ewan..is the bed of that lathe OK ? Does it need scraping ? You really are taking on a big job

Hi Mike,
The only test i have done on the bed is dialing the saddle ways off the T/S. They show a 10thou or so dip at the head end. With a little luck i will be able to employ Mark Grays planner to do the bulk of the work, then scrape to a master. It is a huge job.....but setting a 2015 time limit means i can take it slow and steady. Although i already have several large jobs in the pipeline that i need her for.....

I have had the back gear shaft in the tub for the last few days, (whole) and decided this arvo to pull it out and try to disassemble it. It came apart much easier than i expected, pulled the small gear of with the 3 leg puller and once the clutches where both in neutral the other gears pretty well fell off (these need to spin free when not engaged).
The clutch is strange, i expected to see a tapered cone splined to the shaft and engaging in the gears, but instead each clutch is simply a ring with a wedge missing and a wedged shaped "piston" that is driven out into the ring by a tapered sliding key, thus expanding the rind and locking it inside a large bore in the gear. So simple! All the parts of each clutch are stamped with a number, 24 and 28 IIRC, original i guess

one of the rings and wedges still on the shaft



the 2 larger gears and clutch parts, biggest gear is about a foot dia



Close up of the clutch ring, wedge and tapered key.

Hi Ueee.

Are you using washing soda as the electrolyte, the bango looks great.

What current and voltage are you using, if you know?

Ken

Originally Posted by neksmerj

Hi Ueee.

Are you using washing soda as the electrolyte, the bango looks great.

What current and voltage are you using, if you know?

Ken

Hi Ken,
Electrolyte is (guessing here) 1/3 washing soda : 2/3 caustic, or maybe 50:50? It is slowing down now though, i think its time for a replacement lot, there was no "tar pit" with the back gears.

Power is supplied by an old computer router switchmode unit, 12v 5A. The beauty of a switchmode driver is that you can not over do the current, it maxes out at about 6A and goes no higher, but doesn't switch off, like the battery chargers do. Fresh piece and clean anodes it hits the 6A mark, then slowly drops as the item gets cleaner to .5A or so.

Its only been 9 months....but there are parts being cleaned now in the caustic mix left from the Rivett.

Ew

Hey Ew, another great machine and fantastic resto job. I am continually impressed by the lengths you go to pulling these things apart and really starting from scratch. We must catch up for a drink one day )

Apart from the size, the LeBlonde is light years ahead of my old Pitts in terms of design and construction even though they were only 20 odd years apart.


Keep up the good work!!

20 years but WW1 came along and with that huge advances in most facets of engineering. If you look at most pre 1910 lathes they are all pretty similar to the pitts, then you find that they change to machines much more similar to what we have today. The biggest drawback is the spindle speeds they were designed to do.

Anyway, since i am in painting mode with the Rivett i thought i'd get in and do Blondie. too. I striped the countershaft off and thought about the best way to do the bed. I had an old 12v pump, which i know is all plastic internals....so a few bits of copper and brass and some hose and i have a sort of spray unit for the caustic soda. My elcheapo mag base and some cable ties and it works a treat. I put the saddle in the tray as well as i don't have a tub big enough.
I *think* she was black, then painted grey at some stage, then some resada green in some places......

As luck has it i was googling for colour ideas and found this SmokStak - View Single Post - An Older LeBlond lathe Comes Home it is the only other WW2 era HD i have found on the net. So black it is......

Ew

Originally Posted by Ueee

As luck has it i was googling for colour ideas and found this SmokStak - View Single Post - An Older LeBlond lathe Comes Home it is the only other WW2 era HD i have found on the net. So black it is......

Yeah, but that one is a dark blue. You can't even suggest that it is light black.

Michael

Originally Posted by Michael G

Yeah, but that one is a dark blue. You can't even suggest that it is light black.

Michael

Maybe...only thing i would say is Flash? it looks the same as mine was, which is definitely a sort of charcoal black. I am thinking either a charcoal or a REALLY dark blue, so dark at first glance it looks black.....

Ew

I like this colour, but it may not be dark enough....need to find one in real life to look at.

https://www.google.com.au/search?q=p...m%3B1000%3B611

Ew

Originally Posted by Ueee

I like this colour, but it may not be dark enough....need to find one in real life to look at.

https://www.google.com.au/search?q=p...m%3B1000%3B611

Ew

Just as long as it is not light red. That would be unfair.

Dean

I'm not manly enough for light red.....

I picked up a tin of Duramax ZP today in Dulux midnight blue, looks good in the tin.....
B62-Midnight-Blue.gif

I now have most of the parts either ready for painting or ready for repairs. As the repairs will mostly be brazed i need to get it done before i think about paint.

Some pics of the parts, including close ups of the built in oil wells for the headstock bearings (missing wicks) and the QCGB ones, they are missing felts. The back of the bed is pretty well striped, now to do the front and try to get the rack off.....

Cheers,
Ew

Looks great Ueee. Those parts look big! Love the size of the TS housing.

Nothing looks better than clean, ready to be painted CI parts...

Simon