[TheForge] Ralph, Mike and their toys (Was: OT Threads ?)

[Ralph Sproul]

	........and now - more from the Ralph & Mike's Rube Goldberg machine
approach.  Remember - giving a farmer a welder is a dangerous thing - all
those disclaimers about doing this at home apply here.

	Hi Mike, The govenor on the old sawmill with a half-truck drive was a belt
drive govenor that stood off the engine at 11:00 and had a lever coming off
it inbound towards engine center that ran the linkage back to the
carberator.  I asked and they said it was off an old tractor.  I remember it
as way cool the snow plow pump shaped unit with a belt drive and the lever
doing what it needed to do and pouring the coal to the old mill when they
laid into a piece of hardwood.  Got me excited as a kid to sit there and
watch it work.  It was the first time I'd had a govenor explained to me.

	You would certainly get another 10-20% more power if the engine idle
doesn't run the motor with enough power as a throttle plate being opened
when required makes that motor pull harder when needed.  If you've got the
motor against the boards in an attempt to make her go - this may not be a
worthy investment - but you mentioned an rpm (didn't know if that was top
speed or not) - but if it ain't, it's gonna add some to the top end with a
govenor kicking in when needed (like when the low pressure switch kicks in
on the compressor - and she goes from spin to pump.

	Maybe one of your antique engine or antique tractor guys might have some
knowledge - or better yet someone on this list may have some info in that
directions as there's a vast resource on this list.

	I have a junk yard I go to on occassion.....he may have one of those
goveners as he's got over 200 antique tractors he's collected.  I'll check
when I'm up there next.  The govenor would be affordable to ship - but the
pulleys he more than likely would have would probably NOT be cost effective
if you've got something up that way to use.

	For the proof of theory - you could always just couple the shaft to the
hammer with a bolt on flange.  That'd be pretty easy to make to couple to
the driveshaft to your pinion gear shaft with the bearings you sent me the
picture of.  Sheaves could be sought after later to belt it up.  I think
that's probably be smart anyway as your frame and drive shaft would be kind
of low and the drive sheave to the upper pinnion sheave could be a way to
leave the old half-truck drive right on the ground or it's front tires and
just a couple blocks in back.  The guys at the mill had a cross bunk
perpendicular to the frame and two blocks to provide space......then turned
a couple of trailer springs upside down to staple the frame to the bunks to
prevent creeping while under a laod.......funny some of the things you don't
forget. :-)  The chugging, lugging, farting and poping of the old motor in
the cold was taken up by the front tires/springs/shocks of the front half of
the truck still intact.
	It was kind of a crazy set up as the driveshaft was couple directly to the
main arbor (with a U-joint of course) - but it was over 17 degrees and that
could have well been the reason they lost the bearings as well.

Ralph

-----Original Message-----
From: theforge-bounces at mailman.qth.net
[mailto:theforge-bounces at mailman.qth.net]On Behalf Of Mike Spencer
Sent: Tuesday, February 14, 2006 10:47 PM
To: theforge at mailman.qth.net
Subject: [TheForge] Ralph, Mike and their toys (Was: OT Threads ?)



> ... ran the driveshaft right to the mill husk (which was metal).
> They found they kept loosing bearings on the direct drive all
> mounted in line with steel contact and no cushion.

Yes, you mentiond that before, albeit in less detail.  I already have
a jackshaft with the small gear and pillow block bearings on it.  The
present plan B (still rather nebulous) is to make a flexible, heavy
rubber coupling between the engine drive shaft and the hammer gear
shaft.  Since it will only turn at 900 RPM, I doubt that balancing is
critical. Or 1:1 V-belt pulleys would be doable too, if a bit more
expensive.

> They used a centrifugal governor to run this as the motor needed the
> throttle held open during work periods milling.

Oooh.  That's an as yet unsolved problem.  I have to find or build a
governor.  I've seen one made in the back yard from baling wire,
bicycle chain and (mostly) wood that was very clever.  (I wish I had
bought it -- nice piece of functional folk art.) If I can't find
something to bolt on, I figgered I could try to do something similar,
upgraded from the bit-brace, nails and claw hammer level to ball
bearings, welded construction and machined slip ring.  Most governors
I've seen (and that's very few) were gear driven, sort of hard to
modify for an ad hoc bolt-on even if I found one.  But I'm looking
around.


- Mike

--
Michael Spencer                  Nova Scotia, Canada       .~.
                                                           /V\
mspencer at tallships.ca                                     /( )\
http://home.tallships.ca/mspencer/                        ^^-^^
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