The Classic Machinery Network

Assume 2S restorers have seen the brochure pages on Bitish Dumper thread p.8 and 10-
British Dumper

This is just one page of it , they seem very proud of their axle !

Some great pictures in those old brochures
Thanks for sharing.

Time for an update on my own project.

The tyres that came on the dumper were badly cracked and perished. I didn't trust them not to go pop with a full load in the skip, so it was time to find some suitable new rubber.

Luckily I managed to get hold of some secondhand but unused 7.50x16 Firestone's that look a bit closer to the old tyres than some of the newer offerings, and for a decent price.

I also wanted to get some traditional 3-rib tyres for the rear, rather than the old Land Rover tyres that it came fitted with, but the only option I could find were BKT 6.00x16, but they look the part.

One thing always leads to another and I thought it would be a good chance to get the wheels painted, so I had the tyres stripped from the rims, and took the wheels to be powdercoated satin black. They aren't perfect because there was a bit of corrosion, which left some pitting after they'd been blasted, but they look a heck of a lot better than they did!

Looks great, I like 3 rib tyres plus they make the steering lighter to use. Whats next on the to do list?

Thanks mate
Next on the list is to fit the new piston and cylinder kit I've got in the shed.
She runs ok but can take a few goes to start and won't pull 3rd gear even on the flat. For the sake of £120 I thought it's worth doing.

cobbadog wrote:Looks great, I like 3 rib tyres plus they make the steering lighter to use. Whats next on the to do list?

Kinder on the steering box as well.

Hope everyone had a good Christmas!
I'm lucky enough to have some time off work until 2nd Jan, so one of the jobs I've got lined up over thr next few days is to fit a new cylinder and piston to dumper no.2.
She runs fine but isn't always the easiest to start and won't pull 3rd gear unless you're going down hill. It may not be piston/ring/cylinder wear that's causing the lack of power, but for the sake of just over £100 I think it's worth doing anyway.
There were no real dramas getting the head, cylinder and piston off this afternoon, but one thing that puzzled me was a complete absence of any cylinder base spacers, which are needed to set the piston to head clearance. I've got some ready to put if I need to, but it seems odd there were none at all to start with. Is this a common thing?
With the cylinder off, it bore didn't look too bad, but the piston is scuffed/scored on one side, so probably as well I'm putting a new one it!

Phil, I would guess that it just depends on the piston to cylinder top height as to whether there are any base spacer rings fitted, so long as you have the correct clearance, there may not be any need for them, just measure and check with a decent dial gauge to confirm you have the correct clearance.

Jeremy

Hi Phil.
I think the bump clearance was 28/32 thou, can't be sure now but the shims could be cut on an angle to save taking the barrel and head off the piston. I haven't got the manual near me at the moment so can't confirm the bump clearance, ( memory age etc)
Norm.

Some more progress today...
I've fitted the piston and started off with a 0.015" shim. That gave me a bump clearance (measured by squishing three pieces of solder between head and piston at TDC) of about half what it should be, so I've had to order another 0.015" shim before I can go much further. Unfortunately the good folks at Stationery Engine Supplies are off until 8 January, so in the meantime time I'll strip the head and re-lap the valves to make sure they're sealing nicely.

Shiny!