Bamford in a box

[38ac]

A customer 4.5 HP Bamford arrived today, mostly torn apart. Amish,, save some money by doing it themselves,, Grrrrr.
Me; uh where are all the nuts and bolts?
Amish; uhhhh don't you have any?
Me;  No, I make what I need on the lathe.
Amish; OH
Me; Where are the Gibb keys??
Amish; shrug shoulders???
Me; more time and materials on bill.
Amish; Not included in cost estimates??
Me; No, you pay for that time and materials.

 Turns out they had tried to rebuild it.
Also picture of crank, this happens when you use a standard bearingon a 020 under crank shaft,, more saved money LOL.

[dkmc]

Interesting story. They are getting schooled.

[sirpedrosa]

Holy moly, 

A Bamford toke to shop in shopging bags!

Cheers
VP

[ajaffa1]

I love doing jigsaw puzzles, don`t remember ever having to make any of the pieces though.
I hate having to make nuts and bolts, are any of them high tensile? How will you be heat treating them?

Good luck with it, I`m sure it will be another triumph.

Bob

[BruceM]

Good luck with that Bamford, 38AC.   Baffling that they would select a classic older engine with few to no parts available for it only to abuse it. 

[38ac]

Bruce, the Bamford are worshipped by certain Amish. after being thoroughly abused for many years they could no longer keep them running so they put them away. Now that my little operation has been discovered they are coming out of the wood work for rebuilds.

Bob, I make my fasteners from 1044 bar, known locally as Stress proof. it is fine for applications to Grade 8. I don't substitute in crucial areas such as big end bolts and nuts but all others are fair game.

[BruceM]

 i wouldn't mind a church of Bamford service myself, despite my distaste for organized religion.  I think its great that the Amish found you as the patron Saint of Bamfords!  Seriously, I also have great respect for your skill and craftsmanship with these gems.  Thanks for sharing some of your projects!

[38ac]

Bruce, I have several 4-5HP  cores that belong to me and can be made available as rebuilt.  We can add your engine to the list!
The rebuild process is pretty basic, I'm just the guy who was willing to make the required investment in tooling and  inventory of reproduction parts and pieces. Unlike a Lister where anyone can purchase parts a Bamford owner must either deal with me or have one off parts made at $$$$ prices. I don't sell the parts except in very special circumstances, parts are used here and that locks me in for the shop labor and my labor pays the bills around here.

[dkmc]

There's a range of Amish thinking and behavior. Some are pretty fair mechanics and carpenters. Others can be complete hacks.
If they mostly treat their engines like they treat their horses, they probably can supply a pretty long income stream.

[38ac]

Some pics of what we go through to properly rebuild these. No more big end bearings existed for these engines that anyone knows about. Custom made bearings were the answer but complicating things is the 4-5HP Bamford used two different I D.s in the big end of the rod, early thick she'll bearings and late thin shell, both use the same 3.000 crank pin. Now, when all the possible I.Ds and undersizes are considered the number of stock bearings becomes quite large AND expensive. Also complicating things is there isn't a market for 1000s of bearings. The answer became having one size custom bearing made that would be as adaptable as possible. I had bearings made for the large rod bore and all of the them are 030" undersize. It's much cheaper to grind the cranks 030 under than to stock all sizes of bearings or than having them welded and ground to standard. Pictures show the current Z2 4.5HP project. Boring the big end on the mill, then it was honed to size and locking tabs machined. Also shown is the finished rod and the newly made inserts. Now off to the crank grinder to have the pin sized to my bearings.

[dkmc]

What honing equipment do you have?

[38ac]

I have a Lisle ridged hone and a wide range of attachments for it.

[38ac]

Just a few more pics. The normal overhaul on one of these is 2x what a Lister costs due to all the hand work and lack of cheap parts.
Bamford uniquely shrouded intake valve. There is a rotation stop built into the retainer so the valve cannot rotate. Ordinarily all this goes in the scrap bin and new oversize valves are installed but this engine is low houred. We ground the valves, touched up the seats and it's good to go. Also shown is the copper sleeve for the injector bore. This separates the coolant from the injector. They are always rotted out or close to it. Many of these engines are half full of stop leak that was dumped in an effort to avert fixing this problem. The tubes are shop made as is the tooling required to swage it in place so it doesn't leak.

[keith71]

You are a true craftsman for sure. Basically hand made bearings,resizing everything to better than new specs. Enjoy looking at your cylinder head work.. I hope the Amish appreciate the talent and effort that you put into one of these engines. And treat them better on their new second lives.

If shipping was not so expensive, my cylinder heads would have been sent to you a year ago for some magic to be done on the seats and guides. Yes I could probably find a decent shop to perform this work,but I would always wonder in the back of my head if it was truly done correct, and given the little bit of extra care to know it was done right..

The cylinder heads on my 12/2 are the last thing really holding me back on finishing this engine.. I already bought the replacement valve guides and correct qualcast seats...

Keep showing us the great work you do on these old but unforgotten engines.

[sirpedrosa]

Hi Butch, Gentles

A Petter like intake valve? Holy moly!

Cheers
VP