NO FREE LUNCHES

I have mentioned a few times that I’ve been using black Hammerite. I bought a 2.5 litre tin on ebay a few months back for about two thirds normal price. Unquestionably this has been thinned down, not a lot but sufficient to still see the metal underneath after one coat.  For comparison I tried some from another old but unopened tin I had laying around and that gave total obliteration with one coat. The seller must have bought a job lot of a reject batch. Sad how some people earn a living.

In my humble opinion Hammerite Smooth is both the best and worst in metal protection. In brush on form out of a can it is unsurpassed, I used it on my Land Rover chassis a decade ago and not a trace of rust has come through - it still looks like it was applied yesterday. In thinned spray form it does no more than colour the workpiece and, short of a dozen coats, affords virtually no protection at all.    

SHOCK , HORROR , I'M CHANGING THE SPEC !

  I’m now going to contradict my earlier comment about sticking to originality. Apart from buying new fixings I’ve decided that most will be stainless steel or brass rather than plain steel. There are literally hundreds of nuts, bolts, washers and assorted fasteners on this machine and the prospect of de-rusting, polishing and lacquering all this bare steel is too daunting to contemplate. If this were a classic car concours competition I would be marked down for departing from originality. But it isn’t and just for good measure I may even use some other polished brass fixings if I think they look better.  C’est la vie !    

As I mentioned at the outset I’m not completing every task in one go but flitting between different jobs. Intermittently over these past few days I have been trying to remove the galvanised plating on the ride-on seat which is patchy and rusty in places. Advice online tells me that soaking in vinegar will dissolve the plating. No it doesn’t, at least not after a week in soak but it does make your workshop smell like a fish ’n chip shop !  And no, lemon juice doesn’t clean alloy.  I will have to resort to a Dremel type rotary wire brush or elbow grease for cleaning the alloy engine casing.

 Once again I’ve been spending far too long trying to decide on a suitable red for the cylinder, chain wheels and clutch discs. By chance I was in Wilkos and noticed a tin of Hammerite smooth red and it was a perfect match for the existing shade. Update. However carefully I applied the red Hammerite the brush marks show, it dries too quickly and in consequence does not leave a good enough finish especially on parts on full view. I’ve had RAL 3020 traffic red oil paint mixed as this gave a far superior smooth lustre. (Just visable top left of photo.) 

 Costs are escalating out of hand ! Whenever I contemplate any project I guesstimate the fiscal commitment if only to know how much to budget.  I have been a mile out on this mower restoration and I’ve hardly started. God forbid it may even come to diverting funds away from my beer and women allowance !  

 Although I’m having new rollers and handles machined I decided to make a matching oak handle to fit over the end of the clutch lever. Not original but I think it should look good. I purchased an oak stair spindle, cut out a section, drilled a centre hole and then shaped it to fit. The end of the clutch lever is flat oval shape bare metal which I ground circular so as to be a jam fit inside the new handle centre hole. I’m happy with the result.

The clutch lever leather pad had virtually disintegrated so the remains were removed and the old rivets were snapped off.  I found an old leather bound blank diary in my loft, cut out a section of the cover and this made an ‘as new’ replacement. I didn’t have any small brass rivets nor was I going to buy a pack of a hundred when I only needed two so I used a couple of brass M3.5 electrical screws, ground down the head just sufficient to remove the slot, slid on a tiny brass washer and after fitting burred over the other end.

 

ROLLOVER DAY

  I’ve fully dismantled the ride-on / seat assembly. The two piece roller came apart easily and after more degreasing I’ve painted the inside with black Hammerite.  I’ve been experimenting with ways to clean the rusted and pitted face back to clean bare steel. More on this later because a few weeks back  I also spent a long time trying to figure out how the machines rear drive roller comes apart and I thought I would have one more attempt this week.

Very rarely do I concede defeat but dismantling the rear roller into it’s component parts has beaten me and I’ve spent a whole day in my failed attempt. Not that anything needs mending as it works perfectly but I want to take it apart to properly de-rust, clean up and repaint.  My advice from fellow enthusiasts is that the centre cog/ratchet pulls off the shaft. Fine in theory but without a cog puller and no luck trying to lever off with screwdrivers it will have to stay put. Furthermore the cams were also impossible to remove from the chainwheel pawl pins. The nuts on the inside of the chainwheel can be locked but the slots in the cams/screws are too narrow for an ordinary  screwdriver to get a firm hold. Doubtless there’s a special tool with more leverage to do this job but I’ll not bother. Or maybe I will make one on a rainy day, I’ll decide later.

 For weeks I’ve been deliberating on how to clean the very rusty and pitted face of the rear rollers. I’ve come up with all sorts of possibilities and even contemplated having a few thou milled off on a lathe. I need not have worried. Taking one of the rollers off the ride-on attachment I wedged this on the floor and then simply used a power sander with a very course grit oxide sanding sheet and sanded about a 15 degree segment at a time. The metal came up like new, even some of the pitting disappeared. On first attempt and despite the roller being ridiculously heavy the force of the sander shot the roller over the wedges and onto my toe. Golly gosh I exclaimed as I limped off to construct a safer jig !  

 Anyway I’m satisfied with the results of my efforts, old and restored in photo.

Sods law. Some of the painted parts were temporarily put outside whilst I was working on the roller inside the garage. Whilst distracted there was a sudden downpour and the fresh paint finish was pitted and ruined. I will now have to wait weeks till the paint is fully dry before rubbing down and painting again.  The machine may be green but air was blue !

TO STRIP OR NOT TO STRIP ?

 I’ve been dreading this week, do I strip down the engine fully or leave as is and clean up the casing ?   I’m not too au fait with engine innards and as it was functioning at the outset I see no point in a total dismantle. So I removed everything from the casing that could be removed and bunged up the holes very tightly with rags. I read somewhere that however tempting never to use a sand blaster to clean an engine as grit will inevitably find its way inside. So heeding this advice I started by soaking the engine in Gunk then scrubbing by hand with a stiff paint brush.

I had already removed the flywheel for cleaning but it’s worth recounting this experience.  I followed the instructions on the OLMclub website but as the engine had been removed it was necessary to clamp the shaft tightly in a vice and then wack the nut undone. This was scary indeed as the first turn to loosen went well but the second turn to prise the conical flywheel mount from the mating taper on the crankshaft took an almighty wack to get it unlocked. I had visions of the entire engine shattering.

When removed the very tarnished brass flywheel had been cleaned up with a polishing wheel on my bench grinder. There’s something very satisfying about polishing brass as the results are instant.On advice from OLMclub "the magneto flywheel contains a pair of permanent magnets and the original Villiers maintenance advice was to place a piece of iron (e.g. a spanner) to bridge across the poles thus preventing loss of magnetic flux."  That's too technical for me but I did as I was told ! 

At this juncture a fascinating discovery. When I removed the flywheel case I noticed some very faint hand writing had been scratched on the inside .It read:

“Reconditioned by R C Whitcombe

1983 September

West Pennard

Nr Glastonbury.

Ellison”  (Don’t know what that word meant)

Thanks Mr R C Whitcombe you did a fine job which, 27 years later I hope to emulate.

The engine fins were badly rusted so these were rubbed down with a wire brush and wet&dry and will be painted with black Hammerite. The  crankcasing being alloy was easy to clean on those sections that are accessible but an absolute nightmare in all the nooks and crannies. As an experiment I’ve left part of it soaking overnight in neat lemon juice and await the results in the morning.

 The spark plug was surprisingly just how it should be. Having over the years wire brushed or replaced hundreds of plugs on the machines we use in the business I’ve learnt to tell just from a visual inspection whether it needs replacing or if the an engine is running rich or otherwise but obviously I’ll test for a strong spark when the engine is installed.
Update. Photo shows engine prior to any restoration work but with the mounting plates re installed. After removing  I noticed that the front port and starboard plates (not front and rear) were not exactely the same vis-a-vis hole alignment, only fractionally out but sufficient to prevent them being interchangeable. So after removing a second time each was marked L and R as viewed from the front.    

The clutch lever mechanism was dismantled for cleaning, painting and replacing all the nuts. A straight forward job except that the four actuating links and fixings* are hardened steel and very difficult to polish. Nevertheless I’m satisfied with the outcome.
*These are yet another thread type ! More on this later.

ANY COLOUR YOU LIKE AS LONG AS IT'S...... GREEN. (Sorry Henry !)

Started painting this week. Not withstanding being painted directly over bare metal and rust whoever painted the mower last did a fair job as it was not painted whilst assembled. Not a single part was stuck to another by dried paint so it must have been completely dismantled just as I’m doing.  There’s more pressing work that needs doing other than painting but like lacquering it’s essential the painting of component parts is completed before the winter sets in. I’ve learnt from experience that although paint can be touch dry in  a day or so and allegedly ‘fully’ dry in 3/4 days the reality is that oil based paint simply does not go rock hard for several weeks-if not months- especially in a cold, wet environment. (As in my garage!) When the time comes for final reassembly I don’t want to be smudging paint that hasn’t fully cured.

After weeks of deliberation I’ve decider on a colour. This has been another nail biting issue. Firstly a lawnmower should be green. I’ve seen restored machines in other colours and as good as they are they simply don’t look ‘right’. Choosing a colour is subjective, personal as well as confusing as there are simply too many shades and what looks correct on a colour card may not be right when seen in the whole.   Anyway I’ve opted for RAL 6005 moss green oil based gloss. Fingers crossed it will look acceptable on the end product. Absolute originality is not that important here as I understand Atco used whatever shade of green was available at the time and this varied.

It’s a good job we restorers don’t cost our time. Irrationally I’ve spent the past few days stripping the non original red paint off the handles. It’s so ingrained that no amount of paint stripper and wire brushing will shift it. So after at least ten hours work-all for nothing- I’ve decided to have new handles turned. And whilst I’m about it I’ll also have new oak front rollers made as the existing ones are rotten and split.

 I’ve made a new tool box. There was nothing wrong with the old one-it just looked shabby. I’ll use the existing lid but bought a strip of white oak to make the box. I’ve yet to decide what transfer to stick on the lid.  Straight forward job. Old and new in the photo.

I also fully restored the starting handle. Fortunately the oak wooden handle was sound albeit ingrained with oil and dirt but that was simply sanded back to clean bare wood and then brushed with three coats of  yacht varnish.

  Although I bought a set of new Whitworth spanners specifically to use on this restoration I’ve also purchased a complete set of period pre WW1 AF spanners complete with original spring clip all in virtually unused condition. Along with an old brass oil can I think these look the part in the new tool box.

MAY CONTAIN NUTS

 It’s my objective to restore this machine to as close to original as possible. Every restored Atco Standard I’ve seen, however good, have the nuts, bolts, fasteners etc painted over when the frame is repainted. I stand corrected but I cannot see how when assembled new all the fixings were anything other than bare metal. Accordingly I propose replacing all the existing painted fasteners with new which will be left bare but lacquered. That said I’ve discovered that most if not all the bolts and nuts have oversize heads, eg modern ½” BSW nuts have an across flats dimension of 0.82” (13/16”) whereas on the Atco the nuts are 1” AF and also deeper.  I can’t trace any new nuts this size so today I’ve stripped, polished and lacquered all the large ½” bolts and nuts but will buy new for the remainder as the AF difference on the smaller sizes is minimal. And yes I appreciate that as soon as these nuts are tightened on final assembly they will have to be lacquered again!   

Display or use ? Today I’ve made a major decision. I’ve been losing sleep over this ever since I bought the machine !  The restoration will be solely for display / exhibition purposes and not for use. Accepting the oily rag purists will disagree but my thinking goes like this.

1)      Although a lawnmower this contraption could easily be mistaken for an ancient war machine !  Five drive chain wheels and cogs are all fully exposed to fingers and loose clothing, the hot engine, exhaust pipe and silencer are all unprotected, the countershaft and sharp starting socket is a rotating dagger and worst of all the unprotected fan wouldn’t be out of place in a Roman chariot race ! Put simply this Atco is a serious injury waiting to happen. I’m not taking the risk.

2)      Every moving part –most of which are fully exposed- has to be oiled or greased, the drive chains being a good example. At best this will coat the entire machine in a fine film of oil as soon as the mower is started. This in turn will act as a magnet for grass clippings, soil and all manner of debris thus defeating the object of keeping the mower solely for display purposes. BUT, and just for the record when the restoration is complete I will have the machine run if only for a few seconds so at least I can say “it works”.

THE SHINING

Today I’ve been rubbing down, polishing and lacquering all the ‘shiny bits’.  This would normally be one of the last jobs in the project but there’s a method in my madness. Today has been warm and dry, ideal weather conditions for lacquering. I’ve learnt from past mistakes that lacquering during the-coming- cold damp winter leaves a bumpy, dull finish which doesn’t dry to an acceptable gloss.  I’m fairly happy with the results but the petrol tank may have to be done again. Wadding and polish will give a better finish than lacquer on brass but tarnishes after a few months if not regularly polished. The slightly less shiny lacquered finish should last a lot longer.

For the record the petrol tank, fuel lines and carb were full of all manner of debris. No wonder the machine had difficulty starting and ran lumpy. All now thoroughly cleaned out.