[Capstan Winch Drive - FAFNIR KF10 Bearing]

As the title says, the bearing you need for your Capstan winch drive pulley is a FAFNIR KF10 Bearing.

I found a replacement bearing for my winch pulley from this company;

https://www.mmbbearings.net/

[Mechanical Fuel Pump Repair Kit]

I rebuilt my fuel pump using an FPA-182 Fuel pump kit from this company. The stainless steel socket head retaining screws show in the photos were not part of the kit.

http://www.then-now-auto.com/product/fpa182-fuel-pump-kit/

 

[Refurbishment of M29C 7333 Water pump]

Look carefully at the first photo and you can see why my water pump had seen better days in and around the mechanical seal. As weasel water pumps are made of 'Unobtanium' I had to machine and fit a new 316 Stainless steel seal collar to the seal . The photos better show how this was done.

I also had to replace the water pump bearing. I was unable to source a NOS or a 'drop in' replacement bearing so I opted to machine to size a generic after market bearing. See attached dimensions PDF The bearing is of Chinese manufacture but it was all that was available.Water_pump_integral_shaft_bearings.pdf

A fellow from the UK kindly sent me another hard to find part, namely the water pump bearing retainer clip. Water pump bearing.pdf

I am please to say that the water pump repairs were 100% successful.

[Return Roller Refirbishment]

Rather than lumping my M29C weasel restoration into a single topic, I will post multiple topics to make it easier to view and comment on.

I picked up a set of return rollers that already had new rubber on them. I got them from a cache of Spare parts that came out of Antarctica (another story) back in the 90's. First photo show me sorting through just one of the many parts bins. Over the years and spending a lot of time and $$$$ I assembled enough NOS spares to finally refurbish my return rollers. Second Photo.

The third and fourth photo shows what can happen to NOS parts when stored for many years. In this case the end was almost corroded away. I have kept this shaft as a spare but fortunately I had another return roller shaft to replace the corroded/damaged shaft. 

I had noticed that the majority of the ex Antarctic return rollers had been retrofitted with Bronze bushings in lieu of the OEM needle rollers. In view that my weasel will be used in the water and the modification had well and truly proved itself in Antarctica, I machined and fitted new bronze bushings to my return rollers. I was able to fit a longer bushing to one side of the roller to better carry the load.

After cleaning the grease nipple thread followed by bead blasting and etch priming, I was able to put together the return roller assembly ready for a final coat of paint.

A friend of mine owns a CNC paper cutting machine that came in handy to cut new gaskets. See PDF

Cheers JW

Return roller gasket.pdf

[Weasel parts available for sale.]

Jesse, BZ on your work. Can I make one suggestion. To improve the longevity of the winch drive universal joints I have modified my winch drive universal joints and retrofitted Lovejoy Rubber boots. To ensure that the rubber boots are secured in place I had to machine a small groove into the universal joint. Perhaps you could machine the grooves in your universal joints prior to assembly. That way it is a straight forward job to retrofit the rubber boots at any time in the future.  BTW OEM Lovejoy universal joints do have this groove machined into them.  Pictures below better tell the story. Cheers

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

I am finished, my part of the restoration is done. Here is a youtube video of it today

 

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

Test fitting and getting closer to the finish

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

There does not seem to be an end to the work

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

I had to machine a new hull plug receptacle.

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

Now to deal with the front panel work

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

Filling in the sides and checking the muffler etc for fit

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

Working under the sponsons, repairing stripped threads in the lower hull and more finishing work.

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

More hull work but it looks much better than before. The big piece of channel in the last photo is to hold the two sections in alignment for welding.

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

Now came the time to marry the donor sponsons and red weasel hull to what was left of the T24 hull. Again hours of amusing fun.

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

And more hull repair work

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

Continuing on with the lower front hull repairs

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

Now repairs to the lower front of the hull

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

I then returned to the lower T24 hull and continued the repair work.

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

And more grafting work

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

The grafting continues. I also had to repair the hood bow retainers in the donor hull.

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

Now it was time to marry the red weasel donor hull section to the new sponsons. Hours of fun 🙂

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

The new sponsons were ready to install.

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

Steve and I imported an M29C from Duluth Mitchigan in 2007 only to find that the hull was rusted beyond repair, even for me. Having said that, what was left of the hull was a perfect donor section for this T24 repair. I set about separating the engine bulkhead and rear uppermost hull from the donor weasel.

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

The sponsons are really starting to take shaper now

[T24 ARN139999 Hull rebuild]

Continuing on