Saturday, July 2, 2011

Back to work...

This has been a busy week, but I guess that is normal... :-)

 Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday found us going to Bismarck for an agricultural class, which was very interesting...
 Thursday morning we worked on getting the corn cultivator and the hay cutters ready to go in the field, then after lunch Jacob and I cut hay, while Dad started cultivating corn... We were able to get two fields of alfalfa cut down, and Dad got quite a bit of corn cultivated too!
 Friday morning we got a sprinkle of rain again, so there wasn't much field work that could be done...  Mom and I went to Bismarck to run some errands, pick up a couple of things, and I had to deliver a computer that I sold... I ended up spending about two hours running around town trying to find a specific bolt I was looking for, but finally did find one. ;-)

 Now for a couple of pictures of my latest project:


 I don't recall if I posted this or not, but I sold my other four-wheeler a couple of weeks ago... I found another one in need of repair, which I picked up pretty cheap. So now I am working on repairing this one. :-) Here is a picture of what was wrong with it:


 Apparently what happened is the piston seized in the jug, which caused the bottom of the piston to break out, then the connecting rod/wrist pin smashed into the side of the cylinder a couple of times, breaking out a piece of the cylinder wall and bending the connecting rod... It also managed to push the piston high enough that it hit the valves, causing them to bend as well...

 I bought a used crankshaft and cylinder/piston off of eBay, so I have been working on putting things back together. I am still waiting for the valves, gaskets, and some other parts I ordered, but then I should be able to get it all back together. :-)

Here you can see about half of the engine put back together with the new (used) crankshaft already installed:


Here is the other half of the main crankcase assembly:


 And a couple of pictures of assorted engine parts that need to be put on yet:




I hope to get it running next week sometime, but it might not happen if the weather is nice and we can be in the fields... :-) I am sure there will be more pictures of it here in the future...
  Andrew B.

3 comments:

David said...

Can we have this one!

Patrick said...

Hi Andrew, That looks like an interesting project. What size is the engine? Hope it turns out good.
I tried to rebuild a 1971 Honda 350 street bike a couple years ago. But with my lack of knowledge at the time, I ended up making a mess of a fairly simple problem. The pistons were stuck because the bike sat out all winter and got water in the cylinders. I probably could have freed them by just filling the cylinders with penetrating oil and rocking the bike in gear, but instead I had to go tear the engine apart. Oh well, I guess that's the way you learn:) It could still be fixed, but it would take more knowledge and money than I can give it right now.

Unknown said...

Thanks for the comments!
David, I'm sorry, but no... ;-) Maybe if you come and visit I'll let you drive it. :-)
Patrick,
It is a 500cc. I got a little time to work on it today, but now I am waiting for some parts to come... :-)
Water in the cylinders = a mess! I had a similar experience like that, and ended up parting the bike out... ;-)
Best get to bed,
Andrew B.