[SEL] 'Small' engine progress

[Patrick M Livingstone]

A little bit of progress on the 'J.D. Small' engine today. I took it out to
a mates place where I carefully unbolted the engine from its board and
mounted it on a higher block of wood. It was then belted to an electric
motor to bed everything in. One of the bearings was running a little hot so
with a bit of shimming it was soon fine. After about 1/2 an hour on the belt
the engine was warm and it now has excellent compression.
http://www.oldengine.org/members/pml/myengines/small/05050103.JPG

We rigged up a temporary fuel system and added an extra tap to allow the
adjustment of the gas/air mixture. We could not find a regulator to suit the
LPG bottles we had so we set up a line to allow a straight feed of gas. I
heated up the hot-tube to a nice cherry red but we could do no better than a
single pop :(  Without a regulator there is simply too much gas pressure
even with the tap almost fully of. I will get regulator during the week and
we will try again.

As a consolation to not getting the Small running we fired up my mate's 8hp
Mogul portable which had not been started since December 2003 (it runs
sweet) and his 8hp Star. The little engine is nice but you cannot beat the
big ones :)
Patrick

Patrick M Livingstone
Leichhardt NSW
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