Grrrrr. I can't get my flywheels true.

[Bills37]

Talk about a dog chasing his tail. I'm dead nuts on the pinion shaft but I got .0025 on the drive side that I can't get out. Can someone walk a neewbie thru this? I lapped my pins in with lapping compound and the contact seems even all the way around. I'm at a loss here.

[diesel55]

hello are there any hair line cracks in the wheel taper /worn taper if used wheels.

[fillibuster]

Talk about a dog chasing his tail. I'm dead nuts on the pinion shaft but I got .0025 on the drive side that I can't get out. Can someone walk a neewbie thru this? I lapped my pins in with lapping compound and the contact seems even all the way around. I'm at a loss here.

Did you true the drive shaft with the drive side flywheel only? This helps. It takes a little trickery getting the centers of the true-ing stand that close together (I use another home-made set from a lathe bed). If the flywheel has a little run-out I smack the shaft with a brass club, or wood block, re-torque, and check again. Get this as close as you can. I had success also in using a brass shaft to hammer in the drive shaft with successive torque-ing and true-ing checks.
I'm usually suspicious of the taper of wheel and shaft taper matching, because I've had grossly poor fits. If you lap things in perpendicularly, it seems things should go that way, but I can't say I've done well with lapping.
Some builders will say, "Hey, these wheels are junk, get me some new ones". Hope you're better off than that. Go to the club.

[Bills37]

hello are there any hair line cracks in the wheel taper /worn taper if used wheels.

No cracks that are visable to the naked eye. As far a worn taper, I would think that it would show when I lapped the crankpin also the readings don't wander. Doesn't matter what I do. I can't seem to close this .0025 runout on the drive pin.

[Bills37]

Did you true the drive shaft with the drive side flywheel only? This helps. It takes a little trickery getting the centers of the true-ing stand that close together (I use another home-made set from a lathe bed). If the flywheel has a little run-out I smack the shaft with a brass club, or wood block, re-torque, and check again. Get this as close as you can. I had success also in using a brass shaft to hammer in the drive shaft with successive torque-ing and true-ing checks.
I'm usually suspicious of the taper of wheel and shaft taper matching, because I've had grossly poor fits. If you lap things in perpendicularly, it seems things should go that way, but I can't say I've done well with lapping.
Some builders will say, "Hey, these wheels are junk, get me some new ones". Hope you're better off than that. Go to the club.

Yes, I ran both wheels individually on centers. Their both within .0005. I'm using a lathe so distance isn't a problem. I just removed the QCTP & compound to get them out of the way. I'm new to this so maybe it's just part of the learning curve. I've done everything else to these engines in the past I want to learn this part of it. Not much info out there on the whole process and I've never watched it done. It seems to be a bit of a Dark Art.

Are you smacking the shaft or the fkywheel?

[fillibuster]

Yes, I ran both wheels individually on centers. Their both within .0005. I'm using a lathe so distance isn't a problem. I just removed the QCTP & compound to get them out of the way. I'm new to this so maybe it's just part of the learning curve. I've done everything else to these engines in the past I want to learn this part of it. Not much info out there on the whole process and I've never watched it done. It seems to be a bit of a Dark Art.

Are you smacking the shaft or the fkywheel?

When true-ing each shaft with its flywheel (pinion had no run-out) I had wobble in the wheel, several thou. Smacked the shaft a light tap with a 2# club on the end of an 8" 2x4, check true and re-torque and check true again, took about 6 of these exercises to get all wobble out of it. Then assembled crankpin, and slowly worked the true-ing and torque together, same process. I also clubbed a socket over the nut to help shock the wheels together on the crank, re-torque-ing and checking true as it progressed.
Patience. Can't be in a hurry. Results are gratifying. If it's your first time without seeing it done you're at a disadvantage. The indicators should tell you a number of things, but you will either club on one wheel or the other, or spread the wheels opposite the crankpin, or draw them together, a very little bit at a time. Watch both indicators concurrently for similar (or dis-similar) direction of run-out to determine which correction is needed.
Somebody's got a book that describes it better.
I've seen a little balancing handbook, but have never seen a true-ing handbook.

[Bills37]

If I read you right it sounds like I should start with less than a full torque on the nuts, true the wheels and then increase the torque and recheck until I reach the full torque spec.
I'll give that a try. Thanks

[fillibuster]

If I read you right it sounds like I should start with less than a full torque on the nuts, true the wheels and then increase the torque and recheck until I reach the full torque spec.
I'll give that a try. Thanks

I don't know many who do it that way, but it helped me. Thing is, every time you adjust the true of the wheels it seems to affect the torque. I clubbed the wheel with a socket over the nut to help set things a little tighter and firmer, and each time I did that the eventual torque was less. Last time it did not reduce at all. Gotta watch your forked rod/thrust washer clearance as you go.
I lost the felt washer on the pinion shaft last summer, and disassembled the cases, checked the true of the wheels, and they were still within .001. Built 10 years ago.

Have you checked in the engine building section? They discussed balance some time back. See if they talked true-ing.

[T. Cotten]

Bill!
Phil too!

Put the hammer down slowly, and let us approach this calmly.

Preparation is everything, and hardware with sixty or more years of duress benefits from a little caress:
http://virtualindian.org/10techfly.htm

Tapers can be corrected with a little patience.
But the more they are hammered, the more difficult it will be.

...Cotten

[Knotthed]

Kiwi has a lower end rebuild video that goes over this procedure.

I have not yet trued any wheels, but it seems fairly straight forward after watching his video.

You need indicators on both shafts at the same time, not one at a time when the wheels are assembled. If you only have one shaft with the flywheel between centers, the shaft should be dead on.

Perhaps, if you give some readings on the shafts in relation to the crank pin I could try to walk you thru his adjustment procedure.

For example; if both pinion and drive side shafts show both positive or both negative runout in the same location then the flywheels are not parallel with each other - you would either wedge or clamp opposite the crankpin to resolve this.

If the runouts are in different locations on each shaft then you have a rotational problem around the crankpin. To rectify this you would hold the assembly up on one wheel and smack the elevated wheel in the direction of the table thus rotating each wheel around the crankpin.

I think someone mentioned earlier, you should check your nuts for runout on the faces of them before assembly. I have been shown a repro nut that was shockingly bad, I could not believe it.

Hope this helps.

[Indiantim]

I had a similar problem last year, I found using a hardwood wedge between the flywheels was better than hitting the pheriphary of the wheels. Took me 3 days though to get them perfect. Read the VI section on lapping the tapers on a lathe, use a old pin as a lap with grooves to distribute the lapping paste.

You will get there in the end.

[fillibuster]

Bill!
Phil too!

Put the hammer down slowly, and let us approach this calmly.

Preparation is everything, and hardware with sixty or more years of duress benefits from a little caress:
http://virtualindian.org/10techfly.htm

Tapers can be corrected with a little patience.
But the more they are hammered, the more difficult it will be.

...Cotten

Hi Tom!
okay, I'm calm now, but you can call me reckless, I got a record!
I have this theory that the wheels' tapers are required to CONFORM to the shaft tapers, being just a bit softer. I've encountered new wheels and new shafts whose tapers were so poorly matched that the shaft, when placed into the wheel, wobbled terribly, and left only a 20% impression with the first 5 minutes of lapping. Another new drive shaft was required, which fit much better, but still had that wobble although very slight. Had I lapped that fit I doubt the tapers would have been conical (with straight sides), but rather more orbital. That is my disagreement with lapping taper fits, as I believe the shafts have that possibility of losing their taper form. It is the wheel that one should wish to conform, and old wheels likely have been DEFORMED to assume true in the past.

Who can say that the wheels were chucked in at zero runout prior to taper cut? or perpendicular to the cutter on a mill? or that the cutter was running true?

I welcome criticism, btw, as my peers perceive me as a crude cowboy, a modest one at that.

Bill's getting some good feedback.

[fillibuster]

I had a similar problem last year, I found using a hardwood wedge between the flywheels was better than hitting the pheriphary of the wheels. Took me 3 days though to get them perfect. Read the VI section on lapping the tapers on a lathe, use a old pin as a lap with grooves to distribute the lapping paste.

You will get there in the end.

I agree with this plight. Patience. Some take time, those fits ARE NOT consistent!
Bill, just confirming (I re-read your earliest posts); you first checked the wheels' runout with a dial indicator or the outside face with the shaft on centers, rotating? and had .0005 runout on the dial? one at a time, pinion shaft with pinion wheel only, then drive shaft with drive wheel only?

[fillibuster]

I had a similar problem last year, I found using a hardwood wedge between the flywheels was better than hitting the pheriphary of the wheels. Took me 3 days though to get them perfect. Read the VI section on lapping the tapers on a lathe, use a old pin as a lap with grooves to distribute the lapping paste.

You will get there in the end.

I'm failing at finding the vi site. GRRRR! dam computers! where's my club?!!

[T. Cotten]

Phil!

I have no problem with the principle of tapers conforming to accept the shaft,
as it is much like pulling a nail into oak. The Z wheels are "malleable".
(It seems that brandX hardened their wheel tapers by pulling the pin .060"!)

The tapers have a work-hardened surface from the last assembly.
Disrupting this thin layer allows it to conform for the next assembly.

Lapping techniques ordinarily are only applied for removing burrs or 'high-spots'.
My re-alignment techniques upon a lathe may seem brutal, but they served to correct the wheel tapers enough to give the truing assembly a great deal more control, and occasionally the mallet could be spared entirely. A brief discussion of assembly techniques can be found at http://virtualindian.org/1techflywheel6.htm

(The initial installment of the series is http://virtualindian.org/1techflywheel.htm
If these links will not work for you, try http://vifiles.org/10backissues.htm for the VirtualIndian web magazine back issues, and check out issues #1 and #6.)

It was my practice to routinely lapp all four tapers.
Thereafter, I was finally able to make flat-rate,
and sleep better at night as well.

....Cotten

[Bills37]

I agree with this plight. Patience. Some take time, those fits ARE NOT consistent!
Bill, just confirming (I re-read your earliest posts); you first checked the wheels' runout with a dial indicator or the outside face with the shaft on centers, rotating? and had .0005 runout on the dial? one at a time, pinion shaft with pinion wheel only, then drive shaft with drive wheel only?

Yes, I check each wheel individually and had .0005 runout or less on them. When I put the wheels together, I can get the pinion to less than .0005 but the drive side the best I can manage is .0025. Maybe Mr. Cotten's lapping process is in order. I just did them by hand but the accuracy and amount of pressure would be much better using his method.

[Bills37]

Bill!
Phil too!

Put the hammer down slowly, and let us approach this calmly.

Preparation is everything, and hardware with sixty or more years of duress benefits from a little caress:
http://virtualindian.org/10techfly.htm

Tapers can be corrected with a little patience.
But the more they are hammered, the more difficult it will be.

...Cotten

Sage advice indeed.
I've read your treatise in VI, it's by far the most detailed explanation I have found on the subject. Thanks for sharing it.

Do you use the crankpin that you intend to use as the "lapping arbor" ?

[T. Cotten]

Bill!

Whenever possible, I would cross-groove a spent crankpin or mainshaft for the lapp,
and keep the new shafts pristine.

....Cotten
PS: Please note that I use the past-tense, as I have been searching in earnest for years to find a pro to re-open Liberty's motor and chassis departments.

[Bills37]

Update: Since all the prying and banging in the world wouldn't true up these wheels, I decided to use Mr. Cotten's method for lapping the tapers. I saw another method on You Tube but I liked this method better. (plus I didn't have a 1" collet for the mill)

I made a lapping arbor out of an old cankpin and ground some relief grooves into it.

86468647

[Bills37]

The new lapping arbor fitted in the lathe. 8648

[Bills37]

8649The wheel fitted up to the lapping tool. Does it look like it will work Mr. Cotten?

[T. Cotten]

Bill!

This site is suddenly so screwed up that I can only view a thumbnail of your pic, and it took four attempts to reply,
and that's on a Vista system on DSL.

If I disappear from this forum folks, it was not my choice.

....Cotten
liberty@npoint.net

[Rooster]

This website is not a problem for my computer system or internet connection.

[T. Cotten]

Rooster!

I can only post photos from my WIN98 on dial-up.
Two different formats appear when i clicke 'manage attachments', and I never know which one will appear.
When I edited my last post in the intake thread to include photos, it duplicated the post, and then wouldn't give me the delete option. I couldn't even edit it to say "duplicated post deleted".
So I had to jump back to my wife's Vista and DSL to get the full delete option format.

The site will not allow the Vista to upload, nor even to drag-and-drop a previous upload.

Just clicking to the next thread can make it sit and spin for several minutes.
The dial-up is much, much quicker.

All other sites open like lightning for the DSL.

....Cotten

[Rooster]

I can see now why you are so frustrated, Cotten.
I noticed that the 'web cahuna' was doing some upgrades here yesterday, I was hoping it might help with your issues.
But either way, please don't "disappear"...

[marsh1915hd]

May be before they put the " UP GRADES" on they should try them out. Because they don't work so good. Spell check, picture loading and many others.

[T. Cotten]

Amazingly,

I am posting this from a second WIN98 PC on dial-up, an ancient Gateway with an ancient IE, that previously couldn't even browse the site except in long vertical strings of text.

Suddenly it works great,
and ten times faster than the Vista on DSL!

Back to topic,
Now I can see Bill's photo, and its enormous!
Everything looks great as I scroll over it millimeter by millimeter, but I chose a bronze bushing to go over the protruding pin, so that it would bear well upon the flywheel. If that's aluminum, please keep it anti-seized.

Just a reminder Folks: a lot of grief can be avoided by straightening and aligning each rebuilt rod before crank assembly, as Chief rods nearly always need a tweak, often to correct an offset.
Demagnatizing doesn't hurt either, which I believe was omitted in the VI discussion.

....Cotten

[Bills37]

I didn't have any bronze handy so I went with the aluminum. I have about .010 clearance between the pin and the bushing. Do you recommend that be tighter?



Also on the subject of your computer problems with Vista, do you have an icon in the toolbar at the top of the page that looks like a sheet of paper torn in two. If so, click that and it might solve your problems.

[T. Cotten]

I didn't have any bronze handy so I went with the aluminum. I have about .010 clearance between the pin and the bushing. Do you recommend that be tighter?



Also on the subject of your computer problems with Vista, do you have an icon in the toolbar at the top of the page that looks like a sheet of paper torn in two. If so, click that and it might solve your problems.Bill!

I only expected the large bushing to press the flywheel squarely upon the spindle axis, I never considered the bore.
After all, I dealt with many different pin diameters.

And I see no un-identified icons anywhere other than those insipid emoticons below the text frame.
How many millions of collective hours of productivity has Western Civilization lost to opening such pointless frills as those?

And we worry about carbon.

....Cotten

[fillibuster]

Hi Bill and Tom! been away, busy as hell, then the viking meet and dad's day, etd
haven't been to the vi yet, but I'm trying to sit at the front of the class, here.
Bill, can I get a better pic of the fixture of the flywheel approaching the chucked crankpin? I want to see how you ensured perpendicularity of the wheel to your crankpin.
Otherwise, I'm very jealous of your equipment. I'm still working with the old belt-drive stuff.
I like your lapping tool/old crankpin.

[Bills37]

Hi Bill and Tom! been away, busy as hell, then the viking meet and dad's day, etd
haven't been to the vi yet, but I'm trying to sit at the front of the class, here.
Bill, can I get a better pic of the fixture of the flywheel approaching the chucked crankpin? I want to see how you ensured perpendicularity of the wheel to your crankpin.
Otherwise, I'm very jealous of your equipment. I'm still working with the old belt-drive stuff.
I like your lapping tool/old crankpin.

As you can see there isn't any fixture. I'm relying on the taper of the pin and the squareness of the aluminum bushing to maintain perpendicularity. I think I got this right but I'll confess I'm new to this so I may be missing pertinant information.

86578658

[T. Cotten]

Bill!

That's the way I do it..,
The flywheel will rest squarely upon the lathe ways as well.

....Cotten

[fillibuster]

Bill!

That's the way I do it..,
The flywheel will rest squarely upon the lathe ways as well.
..
Sorry fellers, my confidence has ebbed here. I think we agreed that achieving perpendicularity on the pinion and drive shafts prior to assembly is a must.
Why would we then lap the crankpin fits without the same diligence?
In my mind a vertical mill makes sense, with the wheel level-ed on the bed, and the lapping shaft plumb and running true. If we use less than our best effort here, we leave ourselves likely to need brute force to correct things, and as Cotten has warned us, used wheels may have been deformed already. Wouldn't it be important to know where the crankpin WANTED to go?

(I'm told this message is too short to post. why does it do that?)
(It still says "message is too short". )
(says lengthen your message to 10

how bout some emoticon junk
characters)http://www.antiquemothttp://www.antiquemotorcycle.org/bboard/images/icons/icon14.pngorcycle.org/bboard/images/icons/icon6.pnghttp://www.antiquemotorcycle.org/bboard/images/icons/icon6.png
http://www.antiquemotorcyclhttp://www.antiquemotorcycle.org/bboard/images/icons/icon3.pnge.org/bboard/images/icons/icon4.png
....Cotten
gonna lose this msg

[fillibuster]

t e n c h a r a c t e r s? at least?