LADmachining
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- Joined
- Sep 22, 2009
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Happy New Year everyone!
Following a request from another member, I have uploaded some photos of my Edwards 5 cylinder radial engine that has been an on-going project for a few years now.
Construction commenced in March 2004. Here is the starting point....
This was about £60 ($120 at the time) worth of material. I expect the material cost would have doubled in recent years..
I didn't proceed with the project in any particular order - just completed what I had the tooling for, and what would fit on the machines I had at the time.
4 x link rods completed.
Cutting the recess in the master rod. This pushed my Sherline mill to the limit for available space. The roatry table is mounted horizontally on the table, whilst the spindle is rotated through 90 degrees and is parallel to the table surface. Even with a long series end-mill, it was only just long enough, and had to be used with the minimum of the plain shank in the collet. I was glas when this part was finished!
MK1 version of the oil pump. After building it, I found some errors in the plans, which meant that the passages in the main body of the pump did not line up with the plunger. Bob Seigler corrected the drawings after I sent him an email querying the problem, and a new pump body was made.
Piston blanks, awaiting milling of the conrod clearance slot in the underside, and drilling/reaming of the gudgeon pin hole.
Facing off the mounting face of the inlet manifold block, after completion of milling operations.
Here is an action shot of a process that probably had the longest set-up time of all - about 3 months! I could not work out a simple way of cutting the complicated shape of the rocker arms with the equipment I had, so I set about converting my SHerline mill to CNC. That should do it.... ;D First part of the process is to cut out a rocker blank from a piece of 1/4" ali plate to the side profile shown in the drawings. This blank is then mounted in the milling vice, and the profiling work continues, forming the rounded ends of the rocker.
A before and after shot, showing the first stage blank in the background. Still a little more work to do before the part is completed - drilling/tapping for tappet adjuster and rocker tip thrust pad.
Oil sump completed - pretty self-explanatory!
By this time, I had moved to a new house and had a much bigger workshop - this meant bigge rmachines! Here is the blank for the crankcase about to undergo machining.
Faced to length, then internal recess bored. Just completed boring for main bearing. Face of the case and bearing recess were turned at the same setting, so can be relied on being in exact alignment - this allows use of the face for future setups, knowing it will allow any subsequent machinging to be in line with the crankshaft/main bearings.
The case was removed from the chuck, and a piece of scrap bar turned to be a good fit in the main bearing recess turned above. The case was then mounted on this mandrel. Here, the gearcase end of the case is being turned so that the crankcase ends up the correct width, then the gearcase mounting recess is formed. I just worked to the plan dimensions, the gearcase ID will be turned to a good fit on this step.
Having completed all lathe operations, the part is moved to the mill, where it is clamped to the table and centred under the spindle. Various holes are then drilled and tapped by co-ordinate drilling.
Case now mounted on the rotary table (also converted to CNC) for milling of the cylinder mounting flats.
More to follow soon. In the meantime, here is a link to the Photobucket album where there are quite a few more photos.
http://s488.photobucket.com/albums/rr242/LADmachining/Edwards%20Radial%205%20Work%20In%20Progress/
Regards,
Anthony
Following a request from another member, I have uploaded some photos of my Edwards 5 cylinder radial engine that has been an on-going project for a few years now.
Construction commenced in March 2004. Here is the starting point....
This was about £60 ($120 at the time) worth of material. I expect the material cost would have doubled in recent years..
I didn't proceed with the project in any particular order - just completed what I had the tooling for, and what would fit on the machines I had at the time.
4 x link rods completed.
Cutting the recess in the master rod. This pushed my Sherline mill to the limit for available space. The roatry table is mounted horizontally on the table, whilst the spindle is rotated through 90 degrees and is parallel to the table surface. Even with a long series end-mill, it was only just long enough, and had to be used with the minimum of the plain shank in the collet. I was glas when this part was finished!
MK1 version of the oil pump. After building it, I found some errors in the plans, which meant that the passages in the main body of the pump did not line up with the plunger. Bob Seigler corrected the drawings after I sent him an email querying the problem, and a new pump body was made.
Piston blanks, awaiting milling of the conrod clearance slot in the underside, and drilling/reaming of the gudgeon pin hole.
Facing off the mounting face of the inlet manifold block, after completion of milling operations.
Here is an action shot of a process that probably had the longest set-up time of all - about 3 months! I could not work out a simple way of cutting the complicated shape of the rocker arms with the equipment I had, so I set about converting my SHerline mill to CNC. That should do it.... ;D First part of the process is to cut out a rocker blank from a piece of 1/4" ali plate to the side profile shown in the drawings. This blank is then mounted in the milling vice, and the profiling work continues, forming the rounded ends of the rocker.
A before and after shot, showing the first stage blank in the background. Still a little more work to do before the part is completed - drilling/tapping for tappet adjuster and rocker tip thrust pad.
Oil sump completed - pretty self-explanatory!
By this time, I had moved to a new house and had a much bigger workshop - this meant bigge rmachines! Here is the blank for the crankcase about to undergo machining.
Faced to length, then internal recess bored. Just completed boring for main bearing. Face of the case and bearing recess were turned at the same setting, so can be relied on being in exact alignment - this allows use of the face for future setups, knowing it will allow any subsequent machinging to be in line with the crankshaft/main bearings.
The case was removed from the chuck, and a piece of scrap bar turned to be a good fit in the main bearing recess turned above. The case was then mounted on this mandrel. Here, the gearcase end of the case is being turned so that the crankcase ends up the correct width, then the gearcase mounting recess is formed. I just worked to the plan dimensions, the gearcase ID will be turned to a good fit on this step.
Having completed all lathe operations, the part is moved to the mill, where it is clamped to the table and centred under the spindle. Various holes are then drilled and tapped by co-ordinate drilling.
Case now mounted on the rotary table (also converted to CNC) for milling of the cylinder mounting flats.
More to follow soon. In the meantime, here is a link to the Photobucket album where there are quite a few more photos.
http://s488.photobucket.com/albums/rr242/LADmachining/Edwards%20Radial%205%20Work%20In%20Progress/
Regards,
Anthony
