Saving Old Seagulls

Hi Rob - all I do on Villiers flywheels is to run the engine and hold some 320 grit emery cloth in contact with the flywheel. You might need two or three goes, as the fine grit emery quickly loads up with the aluminium oxidation, which also helps in reducing the cut of the emery to produce a nice semi - bright surface. I don't think the flywheels were ever bright polished.
On the later ignitions with Wipac guts where the flywheels were painted, the best paint match I have found is Vauxhall Antique Bronze. Rick

Thanks RichUK
I confess I was thinking along the same lines. Nice to know, though, that its tried and tested

Will have to wait till I get it running again........with the correct lubrication !!!! and some new and newly bright bits. And I still have to find a well priced local 140 oil provider. The ends in sight.

Hi Rob, I get my EP140 from millers oil, costs about £16 for 4 litres and that includes next day delivery.

Millers seem to want to charge £8.95 delivery for products under 20Kg ?

http://www.millersoils.net/2purchase.cgi

Possibly a silly question this time.
On removing the tiller arm this weekend for corrosion removal I've run into a problem?

Now its a castle nut with split pin that holds the arm on. The split pin was all but rusted away. So I diligently cleaned off the gunk so I could see the pin and then drove out the remains. However on undoing the castle nut some way the whole stud bolt started unscrewing and came out. Inspection of the hole showed oil in the cavity with aluminium swarf?

On the sensible presumption that the castle nut was there with its split pin to stop it vibrating loose. What’s to keep the actual bolt in place. Was it originally bonded in place or welded from within prior to assembly?

The best responding answer would be the swarf is from the original drilling / tapping. And the bolt is simply tightened very tight. In my case the rust on the outside thread simply being too much friction to unscrew?

Should I be worried or relax?

All is almost ready for reassembly, with thanks to SOS for fresh parts.

Relax. I'm sure it's the original swarf - many of these studs come out rather than the nut.

Good luck with the reassembly. We're all waiting to hear that it fired up first pull!

Hi there Rob,

Charles is right, nothing to worry about. I remove dozens of these and they often have swarf in there!

I guess they did not bother to remove it as no one would see it for 40 years!

The studs are normally locked in with 'locktite' or similar stud 'glue'.

Why Seagull never used S/S for these parts is puzzling. I hope to start stocking all S/S nuts and bolts in the future, the price difference today is negligable. I will put a notice on the News page of the site when I get sorted with them.

Regards,
John
SOS