I’ve now got as far as I can get with it. The crankshaft is out, the big end is off, camshaft out and the barrel removed from the crankcase. One thing that I can’t seem to do at the moment is to unstick the piston from the bore as it’s corroded itself together. I don’t want to damage either and so excess force is out of the question, at least for now until I’ve tried everything else.
The next part of the process will be to boil the assembly in oil in an effort to free the piston; usually I would put the whole lot in acid but the piston is aluminium and won’t survive that process! The crankshaft, camshaft and magneto drive gears are all made of steel and are being acid stripped as we speak, so they should look half decent shortly.
The connecting rod has some numbers cast into it and the crankshaft has also got some numbers and a logo stamped onto the surface. I’ve tried to take photo’s of both, but hopefully the crankshaft numbers will be more legible without the rust.
I’ve taken a photo of a very messy workbench for you, Angus! You can see that I’ve not had time to have a tidy up whilst dragging this lump apart, but I can assure you that all is now spick and span and waiting for the next stage which will be the boiling oil.
Now, where’s Mrs. Geoff? Do you think she’ll miss this big saucepan……?
