Westerbeast

[skycheney]

Feb 10, 2014 17:35:57 GMT -5 Avenger said:

Well, that stinks. I know DSL only goes just so far from the Central Office. I'm really surprised at the cable company though.

Oh well. Maybe sometday they'll get their act together, or satellite communication will get better. How about cellular? There's smart phones that will create their own Hot Spot that your computer can connect to.

Cellular would work, but then you have data limits. I had a meeting with a tech from the wireless place today. He wants to move my antenna but it will require some extra equipment and he has to get that "approved". We'll see what happens.

[Avenger]

Soaking the rot with WD-40 wasn't too helpful. Probably not much of a surprise there. We ended up breaking and cutting a lot of stuff apart. Once we could get the wires off the brushes we tested continuity of the field coils and,... well,... there wasn't any. "They said the back end is ugly."
So now we separate all of the field coils and find three with continuity. Unfortunately there's four field coils.

Now that we've found the bad field coil we've got to dig deeper. Two concerns come up. One is the state of the rest of the "back end" a.k.a. generator. If one coil is bad, what are the odds that the rest are on the cusp of failure? The other unknown is the "Prime Mover" a.k.a. the engine. Just because they said it ran well doesn't mean we're ready to bet money on that.

So the generator end comes apart:


img src="http://i60.tinypic.com/iemmty.jpg" style="max-width:100%;"

We pulled the field housing off leaving the armature in the breeze. The faulty coil is removed and we stripped the insulating tape to get at the wiring connections. Continuity tests determine that the crimps between the solid copper coil wire and the stranded connector wires are at fault. This is somewhat good because it means the windings aren't broken, but there's some creeping green on the windings that we exposed. Maybe minor, maybe not. One bridge at a time.


img src="http://i61.tinypic.com/1ghnjt.jpg" style="max-width:100%;"

So the plan is to repair the crimps and reassemble the back end. If we can get the generator to make power we can test it under load and see if the engine can do it's job. If it can, then we'll explore further investment in the back end.

[Avenger]

Somewhere in here, after freeing up the engine and before taking the generator apart, we did a quick test start of the unit just to see if it would run. It started and ran with manual throttle control so we just idled it for a few seconds. It spit out a lot of glowing carbon bits, but it ran. Also the oil pressure gauge didn't function. After the run we cleaned the contact on the sender and the gauge now reacted when we hit the switches. However, we didn't try another test run. We regard it as highly unlikely that the oil pump doesn't function since we looked at it while we were troubleshooting the lockup question.

Our effort to do a temporary patch on the field coil to be able to do a loaded run test on the entire assembly didn't pan out. The initial continuity check showed us having a complete circuit when we did a "wiggle test" of the crimp connectors. However when the wires and crimps were replaced and the coil re-wrapped it failed the continuity check.


img src="https://i.imgur.com/fE2SyExh.jpg" src="http://i60.tinypic.com/j6jrcp.jpg" style="MAX-WIDTH:100%;"

So unwrapping we will go. The creeping green seems to have won. At some point we can get continuity when we stick a machinist's scribe into the corroded part of the winding. So the broken wire is buried in the winding and can't be practically patched. Now it's decision time....


The conversation in the shop weighs whether it makes sense to risk investing in a set of field coils without knowing if the prime mover is really capable of making enough power to carry a fully loaded generator. Realistic thought aside and with our usual "Can Do!" attitude, unencumbered by any rational consideration of the time and effort involved, we know we can fix the engine if it needs it. Heck the little tinker-toy is so small we can bore the cylinders, deck the block and resurface the head in the Bridgeport if we have to. So we decide to roll the dice.

The entire field housing comes apart. The amount of scale on it is incredible. Quite a bit of chiseling, needle scaling, and bead-blasting is required to turn this:


img src="http://i59.tinypic.com/28chic0.jpg" style="MAX-WIDTH:100%;"

Into this:


img src="http://i60.tinypic.com/29wswg8.jpg" style="MAX-WIDTH:100%;"

Unfortunately the camera malfunctioned and lost the picture of the housing "in white". So you only get the before and after pictures.

Fortunately the missing material is not in the seating areas where the field magnets attach, so there shouldn't be any alignment or clearance problems. Another issue we uncover is the aluminum adapter flange has serious corrosion damage. The part can be restored by cutting off the ring that is cast into it, machining a step into the posts and then turning a new ring with a matching step to keep the housing ring concentric with the flywheel.


img src="http://i62.tinypic.com/2vnhr80.jpg" style="MAX-WIDTH:100%;"

After cleaning the parts and evaluating the fit of the existing ring, surprisingly, rationality actually kicks in and we elect to reuse the adapter. The attachment points are still solid and there's enough of the locating step left to ensure proper positioning of the field housing. It's good enough for standby power.

Did I actually just say that?

[skycheney]

Sometimes it's the challenge that wins. Once you get started, you have to keep going. Anything less is defeat, rational or not.

Nice work.



BTW, my internet is back up. The wireless guys finally put up a relay antenna on my barn as I suggested. Imagine that, it works. Why didn't they think of that?

[Avenger]

Thank you Sky. I was beginning to think that I was talking to myself.

I sent a PM to Scott about a FL electrical shop that's supposed to specialize in Westerbekes, BUT HE'S NOT CHECKING HIS PMs!
Although the notifications on the "new" Proboards are kind of a secret. So I'll forgive him if he gets around to answering at some point.

I hear what you're saying about having to solve all the problems yourself. Sometimes it seems like that's what I do all day long. I wonder how they're going to keep America going when they take all the incentive away from the do-ers and we all just kick back and watch the struggling of the useful idiots.

Since you've got decent internet I'd like to see some pics of your vacation in the Travelogue, even if there's only three people
watching.

[Avenger]

We took the armature off the flywheel and did a little cleaning. We put it in the lathe and indicated the commutator rings. They're a little eccentric and they have spots and other "things" so we took a couple of passes with the lathe. .008" later they're true and clean.


img src="http://i60.tinypic.com/1z38gma.jpg" style="MAX-WIDTH:100%;"

After that we polished them, working down to #600 grit paper.

So here's where I need the experts, Yachtsmanbill? Is #600 grit fine enough? They feel smooth, but how is it going to feel to the brushes?

[badhattitude]

I dont have any personal knowledge of the but was told they do good work.

[Avenger]

That will do. At least it's not "run away!"

Thanks for the help.

[captddis87]

Broward Armature in Ft Lauderdale

[Avenger]

Feb 21, 2014 16:56:41 GMT -5 captddis87 said:

Broward Armature in Ft Lauderdale

That's them. How'd you know?