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Author Topic: Powerline 10/1 inspection  (Read 63302 times)

Doug

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Powerline 10/1 inspection
« on: September 09, 2006, 07:31:48 PM »
Hello Group:

I decided to start a new thread now on my 10/1 Petteroid.

Its a powerline 10/1 Petteroid 102 bore 116 stroke all bushing unit ( no TRBs in this )with elelctric start and a water pump. First impression of the spare parts is they are massive and no one cut corners on the amount material used.
Most everything I see is a little crude but things seems to shiny where they need to be. No rust on anything I can see and no damage to the parts themselves like nicks or course tooling marks so I can let a small sigh of relief on that point. I've run my fingers over everything trying to feel problems an grit looking for obvious signs that might make were worry but so far nothing realy bad jumps out. There are some crude grinding marks on the face of the main bearing jounals, but I don't think this is an issue this doesn't look like a thrust bearing contact point but I have to check this before I give it a passing grade. The oil journal in the crank look a little crude too but there is an obvious attempt by the machinist to chanfer the holes and  it "feels ok".

The 4 inch piston is perfect, the spare bearings look as good as you can get. The grind on cam shaft gear needs a littel closer inspection before I pass judgment.

I can't go out there and open parts to dwell on them long my 2 year old also wants to look things over and he's not helping. I need to get the work bench cleared off and buy a 6 pack and be left alone for a while at my own pace.

Obvious points to those out there thinking of buying any 3rd world engine:

Are you a precision freak? Some things will disturb you.

A work engine isn't going to win a beauty contest ( nor will I ).

Treat as a hobby, move forward and learn as you go. These things are also time machines in many respects and a window into a way of life in the third worlkd most of us will never see.

Photo's and impressions as I progress.

Doug


mobile_bob

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #1 on: September 09, 2006, 11:44:40 PM »
looking forward to seeing your progress, fun ain't it?

bob g
otherpower.com, microcogen.info, practicalmachinist.com
(useful forums), utterpower.com for all sorts of diy info

Doug

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #2 on: September 10, 2006, 12:12:42 AM »
Yes its kind of like Christmas Bob....

Gasket set and seal look like top quality stuff. However the head gasket is just like on the Listers copper composit and a little thin....

Cam on closer inspection looks real good. I don't know about the hardness but the grind looks absolutly perfect and the 8 inch cam gear looks "Indian" but its got a hell of a lot of Iron in it. The govener is a big Glytal (type)  coated beast of the thing. There are a hell of a lot of parts going into a Petter cam and govener assembly. The cam is hollow with a linkage runniout to the fuel pump rack. There's a built in bearing on the PTO side for the accesories and its quite a bit more heavily built than you would expect because this is intended to serve double duty for the valves and fuel injection pump, staring handle drive and in my case water pump and alternator drive.

With the exception of the cylinder block most parts have been painted with a red sealant. The cylinder is painted Lister green inside the push rod recess and the finnish is a little rough, while the outside is that blue metalic paint that is seen in the Pictures on my putfile.

Oil pump is a gear driven gear type pump and the machining quality isn't spectacular but shiny enough not to make me worry.

My comfort level with the parts is a little better than it was after I saw the crank.

Doug

Doug

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #3 on: September 11, 2006, 02:27:35 AM »
Starting to find sand and grit in some of the parts. Fortunately these are spares and were never run and damaged. Sand in the main cam bearing assembly, for this I don't have a spare....

Doug

Doug

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #4 on: October 15, 2006, 10:26:05 PM »
The tare down is taking much longer than I had hoped because of time or lack there of...

To date I have the case open cam cover off, one head completely stripped and rebuilt and most of the smaller bits off opened and checked.

Nothing realy to complain about withthe exception of some damaged threads on two studs and one stripped banjo bolt. The cam in the engine is far better than the spare I have. The spare head is a far nice one than the one on the engine. I keep finding crud in places but nothing near as bad as I expected and the machining continues to improve the deeper I get into the motor to more critical parts. It apears to be a case of India saving shiny for where its needed rather than where it looks good.

Plaster is used to make the casting look better in a lot of places and this makes for some ugly clean up.
So far the name of the game has been to strip, scrap, clean bead blast fill and prime a little. Spot putty is as far as I will go to make a casting look good and I only go so far as to fill tiny voids. Ive used a little Devcon WR2 epoxy on some parts to smooth casting like the water outlets so a hose will not leak.

Painting is a combination of what ever they had so I have two shades of green inside, red blue and some bare cast. My paint job consists of Glyptal 1201 inside on beaded clean parts. My exterior finnish is red oxide prime, some spot, and intermediate coat of Guillevin "School Bus Yellow" industrial enamel with a final top coat of geniun CAT high gloss.
The CAT paint looks like a million bucks but the colour high lights every defect so on some parts I've begun to sand with an 80 grit -120 - 240 and a light sand between the first prime and spot and the final prime. I'm trying to keep the amount of paint on this to a minimum. These parts are cast and should look like cast when done I also only have 3 can of the CAT paint left before I have to go to the dealer and buy more or switch to a substitute that may not match.

All the fasteners have that blue panit on them too so they go into the steel shot machine for a spin. For rust prevention I follow that up with a light coat CRC Clear electrical varnish. I need to chase the threads on some holes and studs with paint in them for that I ordered a 17 dollar 5/16 Brittish fine tap and a die. Not a common item here in Canada so I might be waiting a few days.

Very little work is needed to clean up these castings for paint thanks to the glass bead. This is a must for doing and indian engine. The casting themselves are sound but the surface prep done at the works was awful. The dampness of the plaster combined with a dirty virgin casting leads to such a poor bond with the factory blue in some places I can remove a lot just with a thumb nail. This is a pityy because the hammered finnish bllue used at the works actualy seems like good paint and would have looked and held up well had it been done right the first time. Internaly there seems to be a mix of about 3 differetn products to seal in anything missed durring the clean up. A lister green that looks like just a standard oil paint, a light green hard finnish low gloss sealer of some kind and a red low luster finnish that looks like Glytal

Why all the plaster?
These casting aren't bad, my guess is they do this so often that now its habbit and the rough grind marks from preping the casting must scream to be plastered to them.

Knicks are dents in the casting are few, but the spare head had a little rougher go than other machined surfaces. Machining surfaces go from crude but acceptable on the head and cylinder block to some realy well done clean and flaw less finnishing on the block and covers.

Thats about it for now. My two year old realy tries to help and this didn't make for much progress today....
More pictures when the next batch of paint dries.
And I think I'm going to make my own manifolds and a third water outlet out of steel and try and make it look like the cast parts.

Doug


Doug

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #5 on: October 19, 2006, 04:04:45 AM »
Head nuts and gib key are my big head aches right now, I've been looking for a solutions all night.

Head nuts:

My biggest tools won't loosen the 9/16 WS nuts holding my head in place, I even cracked a 6 point 1 inch socket with an impact so the solution is a much bigger wrench and I think I can get a monster 1 inch from the Mill Wrights at work. Round two with the big wrench and a cheater bar if needed is comming...

Gib key:

I don't have the room or leverage of a long output shaft of a Listeroid to keep a conventional Gib key puller like the others have. But I do have a thick fly wheel casting so I'm going to make a puller from two pieces of plate bolted together. One to support the key and one to encircle the crank shaft and bolted onto the first for strength and suport. I'm going to to use 4 jack bolts one on the crank center and the other three against the flywheel. Tightened together they should provide me with enough force to free that key.

Extreme Option: ( prepare to cringe and squirm )
Sacrifice the crank, I have a spare and its only a 20 dollars. I just might be able to squeeze a blade in between the fly wheel and back of the engine and saw it off so I can press the key out and strip this miserable beast. And this isn't such a horifying option because I might still get a longer shaft sub arc welded on to the stub

I have to get that key out now when its new is better than later when I realy need those two spare sets of bushings. 

By hook or by crook, little blue monster won't beat me.

Oh ya stripped all four studs for the rocker box removing it to access main head studs. Something is wrong with the studs Powerline is using. This brings the tottal up to 5 stripped damaged studs on this engine all 5/16 WF studs. All studs were cleaned with a Gasket and Paint remover before I put a wrench on them and three stripped out with moderate effort ( one is probably serviceable but clearly damaged ). I've noticed that the thread fit is rather loose on some of these and it kind of leaves me with the impression that Powerline could be using a fastener with an extra loose fit like a class bolt used for being assembled dirt or with slightly damaged threads. Maybe this is the way WS bolts are suposed to fit I don't know but this is damb strange.
These are clearly new fasteners and look well made and undamaged I emailed Atual Patel about this latest batch of threads that stripped and I'm waiting for his reply. I don't think these were stripped being tightened but maybe someone sold them a bad batch of off spec nuts....

More info as it comes

Doug 
« Last Edit: October 19, 2006, 04:18:32 AM by Doug »

buickanddeere

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #6 on: October 19, 2006, 04:51:47 PM »
  Carroll Smith's Nuts, Bolts, Fasteners and Plumbing Handbook.
  A must read for any tinkerer and I just scored a new re-print at Crappy Tire.
  C.S. reafirms what I've seen for years about fastener woes. My company has sent us on a couple brief intruductory classes on torquing etc.  Eye opening and fear inducing figuring how many critical systems in all machines whose questionable quality fasteners are tightened via by guess and by golly.
  Once used fasteners in critcal areas and many brand new fasteners should be tossed in the scrap pile.   

lgsracer

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #7 on: October 19, 2006, 07:08:43 PM »
Check out NASA's Fastener Design Manual.

It is available for download in PDF format here:

http://gltrs.grc.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/GLTRS/browse.pl?1990/RP-1228.html

ABSTRACT:
This manual was written for design engineers to enable them to choose appropriate fasteners for their designs. Subject matter includes fastener material selection, platings, lubricants, corrosion, locking methods, washers, inserts, thread types and classes, fatigue loading, and fastener torque. A section on design criteria covers the derivation of torque formulas, loads on a fastener group, combining simultaneous shear and tension loads, pullout load for tapped holes, grip length, head styles, and fastener strengths. The second half of this manual presents general guidelines and selection criteria for rivets and lockbolts.

Some other NASA pub of interest are located here:

http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/5900/5950/Publicat.htm
« Last Edit: October 19, 2006, 07:16:04 PM by lgsracer »

Doug

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #8 on: October 22, 2006, 09:18:46 PM »
Atual Patel is looking into the matter and is talking to his bolt and suplier....

Gypsum dust and paint might be a factor, my stripper is caustic and may not be penetating deep enough to soften the goo.

Atual sugests trying to pull the fly wheel with the key if all else fails. A mechanic friend familiar with Gib keys drew a picture of something that might work. He also says with a little tension on the key and a sharp wrap on the fly wheel hub the key shoudl fire out like a shot....

Doug

Doug

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #9 on: November 03, 2006, 10:56:49 PM »
A second trip to the machine shop exposed a problem with the valve guides on the spare head...

Now its ben there for 3 weeks on a do as you have time sort of deal with the owner.

The head itself is fine, the guides were slighly to loose a fit  for a proper valve job. Fortunately Atul provided a spare set of guides ( Freebie ) in my order so I'm ok. Down side the 3rd set of valve spring retainers and taper lock keepers is even worse than the others.
These parts seem to be the lowest priority in production. I assume from looking at the tooling marks these parts are individualy fit and finnished by hand with a file. A little tinkering and I find I can clean these up and make an acceptable fit between the vavle stem and the taper lock keepers.

Doug

Doug

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #10 on: November 04, 2006, 03:57:12 AM »
Pushed out my Liner ( spare ) this evening. Its been moved a couple of inches, but never completely removed.

Its been sitting in crate 3 since September with a coat of oil and now its time to look things over closely....

Impressions:

Wow, I ran some hot water threw the block to warm things up and let it stand for 15 minuts. A gentle push and out it came. PEC ( Powerline brand ) used some sort of lube on the ring so it slid in easily ( they also included a spare O ringe, thanks Atul ). The block casting is kind of dirty inside, a white rag brings up some grit but nothing alarming. This is the cooling system so a little dirt here doesn't bother me. The liner itself is nice and rings like a church bell. The block too is nice, a few little knicks from handling at the works and possible staced like cord wood as we have seen in the Vithada video. I'd have to say the guys at the works did handle this with care.

This is comming to work withme like all parts do some time next week for the chemical strip and cleaning treatment. I'll run this threw the bead and shot blaster to clean the mill scale from it and seal all non sealing surfaces with Glyptal 1201.

Next will come the matchng of the block with the spare head to see how well the coolant passages match and a trip to the machine shop to check the deck for warpage and maybe under cut for the liner if it needs it.

Feeling much better about all these parts as I slowly work at it. Some people here have ended up with real garbage casting and dirt. I've been lucky, or maybe this is proof that PEC is dead serious about building the best tengines they can.

Atul informs me he's having a hard time with one of his casting supliers. Seems the suplier doesn't want to talk about a casting defect I found on Head 1. Atul tells me this is often a problem in Rajkot, even though he buys his parts from the same foundries and suplier as big companies like KOEL he stil gets hit with the ocational blem ,and this one got threw he's verry sory.

Isn't it nice to hear a frank admition from a works that there are problems and they are trying to resolve them?
Isn't even nicer to know these parts are so cheap you can afford to buy lots and have spares?

Doug 

Doug

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #11 on: November 04, 2006, 07:59:56 PM »
Time was on my side today, did the chemical strip at home....

Interesting observations:

Blue hammer tone hides a lot of sin lol....
But seriously these guys need to learn to be a little more careful with the castings. Petteroid cylinder blocks are machined on 5 sides so you can easily see if there was any rough handling and this block shows a few nicks from being stacked.

Another interesting things is the finnish of the casting. Yes Like all other Indian castings I have seen its only nice where it counts so the inside where the water jacket is, its rough. But on the exteroir unmachined surface a suprise was hidden. The suprise is a realy nice finnish.

I don't know why so many engines are coming from India with castings that would make you cry. Even the PS kit engines that are suposed to be the "Top of the Line Listeroid" are crude next to this block.

Atual Patel tells me hw only buys casting from best foundries in the Rajkot area, and he has many to chose from. He tells me he tends to buy castings and forgings from the same the places that KOEL does and generaly this works out well for him ( with the exception of head casting 1 that had a slight flaw, although it has a fantastic finnish )......
 
Photos of the stripped and clean casting and liner will be up in a few hours with a link from this post in a few hours. Today is my 36 birthday so I'm buisy getting things ready for my son to enjoy lol....

Doug
   

listerdiesel

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #12 on: November 04, 2006, 09:25:01 PM »
It wasn't only the Indians that had casting flaws and blemishes, all of the UK engine makers had some nasties over the years, and many an engine has been paint stripped to reveal lots of filler in the castings.

See our Ruston 1ZHR pages for the new casting flaws in our replacement flywheel, that was a "no-rush but get it nice job".

Peter

Doug

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #13 on: November 05, 2006, 03:25:43 AM »
I'm actualy pleasently suprised with these castings to date.....

The again there is still a lot of iron to be stripped....

Doug

Doug

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Re: Powerline 10/1 inspection
« Reply #14 on: November 05, 2006, 05:54:54 PM »
Making progress in India on QC:

I've been in touch with the works since I began the tare down of the Petter and the people at Anand/PEC have been very keen to get an objective opinion of the engine and faults I have found.

Atul informs me as of last night all these proviously mentioned problems are being lookd into
Its a lot easier to say this is a fluke or that just can't be. PEC has admitted there are problems they are out to resolve.

 Next Powerline that arrives whom ever buys it let us know what your finding....

Doug