Thursday, September 10, 2020

Craftsman GT is in the shop

Moved the Craftsman GT into the workshop today.
Thinking I will steal the from the silver LT1000.  Its a 21HP Intek.
Another possibility would be to use a oppy but I don't have a vertical in good condition and don't want to mess with converting the good horizontal to a vertical.  

I was worried that the mule drive was not there but it and the belt are still on the tractor. One of the rear tires has a serious leak.  The tranny is a hydrostatic which is great for yard tugs.

Need to figure out how to wire up a Intek in place of a kohler twin.

Got tired of walking around it and put it back into storage.....


Sunday, May 10, 2020

Monday, April 6, 2020

12000 lb Car Trailer Rebuild

Located a milling machine in Ohmaha NE.   Have not ID'ed it so I don't have a weight.  But it has a 48x10 or so table so it will be a bit of a load.  Only senseable way to go after it is with the car trailer.  But it has a broken spring.  So I looked into new ones.

The places on the net say to measure between the eyes.  Well it came out to 27" and such springs exist but are not plentiful.   Meaning they are a bit more money.

But after a bit of thinking I realized that he center pivoting bit is pivoted due to the  flattening of the old springs.   So I am guessing that the more common 25 1/4" springs are the ticket.

But having gone out and looked again I realized these are 5 leaf springs!  Good and bad.  Means its like a beefier trailer but springs are $$$.  Not quite too bad found 3000lb 5 leaf springs for $35.50 a Libra Trailer Parts. so $142 for the set.  And maybe no tax.  That means I get 12K lbs of springs.  Should be able to haul any lathe or mill on that.

Hit the suspension bolts with PB Blaster.  And rechecked that 25 1/4 springs will fit. Looks like it would.  The rear shackle moves back and forth to accommodate change in spring length.  Need to get pictures of that.

Discovered the bolts are welded to the spring perches and shackles on the back side.  Need to raise the trailer on blocks to gain access to the welds and grind them off.  One of the equalizers is hosed.  But it and the shackles are made from 1/8" plate so I should be able to make new ones.  This will also allow me to make adjustment to the shackle length if needed.

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Cut off a few bolts to remove the old suspension.

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1/8 is too thick for the press to bend.  Ordered an entire suspension kit.   Have the axles and fenders off the trailer.  Too windy to flip it over.  Put 2 car tires from the green town car on trailer wheels and mounted them on an axle.  Plan is to flip over the trailer and move it on this axle.

Found cheap trailer on simplyTire.com.  $63.96 each
Called them and they said the tires can be up to 3 years old.   But returns without question are on them.

https://simpletire.com/trailer-king-st225-75r15-rst53t-tires

Maybe it would be a good idea to fix up the engine power compressor and mount it to the pickup bed.  That way I could mount tires on the road.  Have several 15 in tires but all old.


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Saturday


Did the trailer flip.  Working from the bottom will make it easier to remove and replace the spring perches.


This bolt is typical of the worn out trailer suspension.

Removed the two rear spring perches.  They were looks which connected to shackles.   The new setup has both shackles on the equalizer with the front of the front and back of the back spring eyes in perches.

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Sunday April 12th

Too cold just above freezing.   I have acclimated to warmer temperatures.

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Monday was too cold to be out.  Today, Tuesday was cold too but I did remove one of the front spring perches.   Still have the other side front and both center perches.   The centers maybe more difficult because they have a side support.  If possible I would like to retain that.

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Thursday April 16

Found this site has suggestions for welding on the spring perches.
Best to weld them to a strip of metal welded to the frame to reduce stress.
https://mechanicalelements.com/mounting-trailer-axle-springs/

Brown & Sharp No 6 Screw Machine

A conversation on hobby-machinist resulted in this image of the turret lathe.

From vintagemachinery.org this was added 02/03/2020.  Which explains why I did not see it when I obtained the lathe.

Also includes specs but nothing else.


Sunday, March 8, 2020

Ergo Scrap Wood Push Stick

While working on another project I got feed up with my old push sticks and make this one.  Except for time required for the glue to dry it was only a few minutes.

The wood already had a large dado in it.   I alternated which side it was on and it worked out to be a great grip with just a bit of work on the belt sander.

When the bottom is used up I can just glue on a new one.  Should last as long as I need it.

Started with this stock.  Some sort of sticker or such tossed out by the lumber yard.


Tuesday, January 14, 2020

Ubuntu VirtualBox Windows7 "Make The Cut" Cricut

Because I purchased "Make The Cut" prior to the author getting sued by provocraft I can use MTC with my cricut expression.

Installed VirtualBox, VirtualBox-ext-pack, and VirtualBox-guest-additions from the ubuntu package manager Synaptic.     Do not use the installation from within virtual box.

Enabled the USB and COM3 (in my case).  This has to be done with the windows 7 virtual machine stopped.

Downloaded the driver from within MTC.   Help>Advanced>Download and Install FTDI XXXX drivers.

Select cut project
"Do not use serial port" should be unchecked.
"COM3(FTDI Serial Port)" should be selected.

That is all I remember.   Need to create a new virtual machine and document the steps better some time.

Apparently MTC has not been updated in 6 years and the author was last on the forum 3 years ago.