Page Forty-Three - The Good and the Bad

 

The engine is assembled, mostly.  So, what have I found?

The Good

For the most part, Alphie’s little mighty mite motor was treated fairly during its life.  The cylinders were all spec, the block was flat, and all its parts were present.  The head was similarly within spec and flat, no evidence it was ever over-heated.  The valves needed seating, but that’s to be expected after such a long snooze.

The crank and cam shafts measured out within specs as well.  The main bearing set didn’t come with new thrust washers, so I loaded up the crank with the old ones and measured the end play (or “end float” as the Sunbeam Workshop Manual calls it), and it's at the tight end of the range.  All good there!

The flywheel and pressure plate seem to have had only a few hours on them.  Either they had been replaced, or Clint and crew drove kindly.  I was a bit surprised to find that the throw out (aka “release”) bearing lacks a bearing.  It uses a friction surface, so no sitting at a traffic light with the clutch in on a Sunbeam.  Jab the clutch, slide it to neutral and release the clutch, else there will be smoke!  Something I will need to train myself to do when Alphie hits the streets again.

The dynamo (I gotta say, “dynamo” is more fun than “generator”) seems to be in solid shape, although I won’t really know until it’s wired and spinning.  The brushes have plenty of life left and after cleaning and greasing the bearing, it seems smooth, but again, I won’t know for sure until it meets the real world.  The cooling fans are interesting: one is a pot metal single casting with a thin chrome plating.  It may have looked good at one point, but the plating is shot, and the pot metal has pitted.  I sanded it off and will powder coat it.  The other one is a flimsy two-piece affair with bent fins.  Although it’s lighter than the pot metal one and I could fix the bent fins, it just feels cheap and “aftermarketish.”  It may be a stock Sunbeam piece, but it doesn’t seem like it.  The parts manual’s exploded diagram only shows a single piece fan.

(Update:  Pot metal doesn't powder coat for sh...!  It looked bullet riddled when it finished baking.  I straightened the fins on the two-piecer and will use it.  It may be an aftermarket piece, or it could be an early model version, but it looks better than the pot metal one.)

Before - RUSTY!

Cleaned

Assemble except for the fan that needs to be powder coated

With new rubber bits too!

The petrol pump (Yanky fuel pump, although the alliteration of "petrol pump" is nice) was another two-into-one project, easily cleaned up and sorted with all new rubber parts.  Mint!

The distributor is cleaned but not reassembled because I plan to add a magnetic pick-up to eliminate the points, but it’s not on the spend list yet.

In the pile-o-stuff that Clint gave me with Alphie, I have three Solex carbs, which I scavenged to make one, using the best from each.  Per the parts manual, I matched up the jets to the Series IV specified sizes and rebuilt it making sure that all the parts made it on Alphie’s carburetor.  (The Brits add another an extra “t” for some reason, "carburettor."  You can’t see it, but “carburettor” has a squiggly red line under it on my screen, so Microsoft doesn’t recognize the spelling either.) 

Cleaned with new kit, even found a new accelerator pump diaphram.

The pile had two Series IV air cleaners, which aren’t available anymore, but they are too dirty to reuse.  I busted them apart; bead-blasted the metal and will to scavenge some K&N style air filter fabric to tuck under the mesh screen.  It should look mostly stock.  I’ll use some of the original filter material directly above the carb throat because I fear the oiled K&N style mesh may ignite if Alphie were to backfire.  Alphie has more dignity than to backfire in public, but I won’t put it past him.

With some K&N type mesh, the air cleaner will appear stock

Clint left me some 25 (at least) year-old, brand-new spark plugs that are finally seeing some service.

The Bad

There isn’t a bunch of bad, but I found a couple of things.  Some of the piston rings came out in pieces, but I haven’t decided if that is the result of thirtyish years of sitting or maybe part of the reason the Organ Donor was put to bed under a tree in a Kentucky field.

Half of the valve tappets had rust pitting.  Again, pitting could be the result of being under valve spring pressure during its long nap.  The oil pan had about a ¼ inch of sludge in it, so maybe it wasn’t oiling as it should, don’t know.  I pulled the tappets out of the second engine and combined a set of pit-free tappets for Alphie’s new banger.

The Organ Donor’s clutch slave cylinder is a petrified fossil at this point, but Alphie’s was only partially petrified.  After sitting in WD-40 for a couple of days and some “gentle” persuasion with a hammer (usually, I’m against hammers in mechanical work, but the damn thing was stuck!), it eventually came apart and cleaned up well.  Likewise with the master cylinders.  The Organ Donor’s had lots of rust-through pin holes, but Alphie’s only had a couple, which I was able to fix easily.  I have honed the bores of the master and slave with the rebuild kits ready to go when I get to that step.

I screwed up and ordered a couple of wrong parts, ordered duplicates of a couple, but that’s par for the Bonehead Wrenching Garage.

See, very little bad stuff!

All the new clutch bits ready to go

More shiny engine pics

I have a shallow and deep water pump pulley. 
I'm figuring out which one fits with the dynamo.

Next

I have two-into-one starters.  I’ll let you know how that goes.  From the looks of them, the Organ Donor’s will be in worse shape, owing to its long interment.  

I haven’t checked out the over-drive gear box yet, but I have crossed fingers (and feel relatively confident) that it’s OK, but I could be wrong…

PAINT!  I still haven’t found Alphie’s painter.  I have pondered the single stage vs. base coat/clear coat route, and I’m leaning towards base coat/clear coat.  Single stage paint gives a more stock like appearance but is difficult to fix imperfections once it’s sprayed.  And one painter I talked to says that single stage paint stays tacky for a long time and is prone to pick up dust.

Base coat/clear coat gives a deep shine that is far beyond the lacquer paints of the 1960’s.  It is over-restoring, but with all the powder coating and stainless-steel bits I’m using, Alphie is already over-restored.

(Update:  I cleaned up the tranny.  I hand turned it through all the gears while looking for mangled gear teeth.  All checked out so it's ready to go.  Again, I won't know for sure until it hits the real world.)

I forgot to take the before pics, but here are some after pics

I mostly cleaned it up.  The tranny was in good nick, just dirty