racer2_uk

I need a Chalmers brass radiator from 1912 / 1913, working condition would be the best but will consider all options. Andy

Evening everybody, With the help of Grimy and other experts I have now had not only a second ID of Pierce-Arrow but it has been narrowed down to a 5 ton truck of late 1916 to early 1917 manufacture, this was from a restorer of 3 of these trucks and using the stamped in number to give the build date. Thank you all for your knowledge and sharing it. Andy

Evening Grimy and all, Well done Grimy ! I new someone on here would know, thank you all for your interest and idea's but Grimy has done it. Grimy, my gearbox is very similar to your spare, maybe I have a 38 or 66 version or a different year, did Pierce-Arrow manufacture there own gearbox's or did they buy them in ? I really appreciate the help from this forum, now I have to decide what to do with it as it was with a large collection of parts I recently acquired. Andy

Morning everybody, Can any of the experts out there ID this early transmission, it is very big and I suspect it maybe an early truck unit, it is about 2 feet by 18 inches, it has a gear change mechanism that comes in from the top turret probably from a side gear lever, it has it's mounting underneath, 2 flat mounts at one end and hollow brass bushed mount at the other end. There looks to be some sort of PTO coming from one end, the top cover is accessed by wing nuts, there are no marking other than the 2 numbers stamped in. Any information would be greatfully accepted. Andy

Good morning everybody, Thanks to everybody for your interest and idea's for a chassis for my HS V8, the reason I am looking for a car with an engine problem or no engine is that I want a car with a title to make registration easier over here, also I want to hillclimb the car and a truck chassis is not allowed in the hillclimb "car" clubs. Thanks again for all you help and idea's. Andy

Evenin Bob and everbody else that has shown interest in the engine rebuilds, Bob, thanks for thinking about the chassis you found, I am looking for a complete car that has had an engine failure or the engine is missing, anything 1910-1918 will be considered. Thanks again to everyone that has taken an interest. Andy

Good evening everybody, Thank you very much for you kind words, it is appreciated, to 1937hd45, I have to admit that not all the photo's are of my workshop, the crank grinder is in my local engineer's, I don't have the equipment for crank grinding, reboring and white metalling, the other shop is my friend Steve's balancing shop, he is known as "wobbly Steve" and is the best balancer I have found, he does F1 stuff ! This engine has been a challenge at times due to the extent of the problems due to age and condition, I have rebuilt many engines with problems but this was hard work. Some of the other engines I have rebuilt are, Alvis Leonides radial, 1924 Napier Lion, 1914 Daimler double sleeve valve, 1913 Chalmers 36, Spare 1913 Chalmers 36, my current rebuild of an unknown European air cooled 4 cylinder from around 1905-1910, Thanks again for your interest. Andy

Evenin 58L-Y8 and all, Thank you for all the positive messages, I am amazed that you all appreciate what I have done with this old HS V8, it took a lot of work but I am so happy with the result. Here are a few more photo's of the rebuild. As I asked earlier, if you know of a brass car with a failed engine please let me know. Andy Andy

Good morning everybody, I have just found this thread and was amazed to see the photo of the Herschell Spillman V8 that was for sale on PreWar car, I bought that engine ! it was in Australia before I shipped it to the UK a couple of years ago, I also bought another from Norway, both were in poor condition but the Norway engine was a lot worse but gave me a lot of parts, the engine from Australia seems to be a 1916 version, the Norway engine a little later, the core plugs and crank bearing width's are the main difference's. There were a huge amount of engineering problems to overcome, from frost cracking in one of the combustion chambers and oil pump to rusting through one of the cylinders along with the normal seized in pistons, worn out skew gears and worn out white-metalling. I fitted a K-W Ignition WW1 aero magneto driven from the rear of the fan drive and a handed pair of Rayfield carbs and exhausts of my own design. The engine is now finished and running and waiting for something to drop it in, has anybody got a 1910-1918 car with a failed engine ? anything considered. Andy

Evenin everybody, The world seems to be opening up a little, the weather is warming up and it is time to get out again, I have been out and about on the Chalmers and have now done 500 miles on the new engine, it is going well, I have had a couple of small leaks on the radiator and water pump but other than that it has just used petrol ! My first trip was down to my favourite spot by the canal in Audlem, I have carried on rebuilding the little engine from France, it is starting to look very good, I am working out how to fit a magneto and what sort of carb I need, Recently I was able to buy a cylinder set of Napier Lion valves and guides, I made up a display stand to show a Lion piston and the valves just how they would be in the engine, The first sprint of the year was at Curborough and we had 9 Edwardian racers entered, all 4 had American V8 aero engines, 3 OX-5's and a Sturtevant, it was a great day but I was 0.3 seconds slower than 3 years ago, I put it down to being a bit rusty ! Lat weekend we drove to our first vintage rally of the year, a great selection of cars, trucks, tractors and motorcycles, I am looking forward to more miles out on the chalmers. Andy

Afternoon everbody, Well this apology will have to be the biggest yet, I am very sorry for the 9 month's I have not kept you all updated with the Chalmers ! We have all been going through such a strange time but that has meant workshop time. I found an unknown engine in France, do any of you guys have any idea what this engine is ? It is a metric engine, splash lubrication, exhaust over inlet, it has a clutch in engine oil which was castor oil, there is a place for a starting handle and an incredible adjustable timing and lift camshaft which can be adjusted while running, Our local steam pumping station is now back in steam and running after many years, it is a great place to meet up for tea and cake, This is a great video I found on youtube, thanks to the camera man. In the summer I drove over to the Audlem transport festival, there was just about every type of car you could imagine, A few month's ago I managed to find something I thought would be impossible, I now have a genuine factory tool kit for my Napier Lion aero engine, it is mostly complete and I already have a few of the spanners that are missing. Now back to the Chalmers, after travelling over 25,000 miles I decided to swap the engine for the spare that I bought from Michigan and rebuilt a few years ago, It was a lot of work to look just the same ! But it did sound well on stubs, I made these to check the mixture and see the flames. After having a knee injury in August I am trying catch up on projects and hopefully have another year hillclimbing and touring. Thanks for your patience, I hope to see you on the road. Andy

Hi Barry and all, I have seen the Barney Pollard story before, quite a collector pioneer. We had the first Vintage Sports Car Club pub meet of 2021 yesterday, we had a lovely lunch, good beer and great cars in a covid safe way, we had a lovely Humber special, Iain's racing Morgan, 2 wonderful Riley special's and the Chalmers, Hopefully as we start to open up again we can have more day's like that. Andy

Evenin Alastair and all, Well this has been a long stretch between updates, apologies up and above the usual, I haven't got that much to tell you guy's other than the covid hasn't got me yet ! During UK lockdown I have been busy and rebuilt a couple of engines, more recently I have done a bit of work on the Chalmers, the gearbox input bearing was making a small amount of noise, I think several years living in the kerosene and engine oil clutch mix finished it off so I changed it for a sealed unit, I also made up a small oil separator tank for the fuel tank pressure system, it would occasionally get engine oil in the small pipework and cause the pressure gauge to read very high. I then gave the old girl a good clean, Hopefully we will be able to get out and do a bit of touring this year, oh dear, have I said that to early ? lets see what happens. All the best to you and please stay safe. Andy

Hi Alastair, thumbs up-ers and all, As usual I have to apologise for my lateness of updates, sorry again ! Alastair, when things are nearer to normal and you have made the trip to visit family, please get in touch and call round to see the Chalmers, I am not that far from Manchester. We have been doing the right thing and keeping ourselves to ourselves and that will hopefully help in the reduction of virus transmission, the few times we have been out it has been at some sort of distance, on a particularly hot night we had a great night run and passed Blithfield reservoir, another hot day we ended up at Hetty's tea rooms which is situated at Froghall next to some preserved 19th century lime kilns which the Caldon canal was built to serve, the lunch was very good, I have been finishing some extra parts for my spare Chalmers engine, I have made a water jacket cover plate as I want to try a twin carb conversion, I hope to use a pair of early Dodge carbs, I have also been working on another project and recently cleaned out the oilways on a crank, this tells us that if you have the chance on a rebuild you must clean the oilways thoroughly, I also had to make a set of shell-backs to white metal, and today we had a great run out to Grindley Brook near Whitchurch, the wonderful Lockside cafe served a wonderful lunch while watching the narrow boats going up and down the Llangollen branch of the Shropshire Union canal, The Chalmers has been driving well, and I am just about to fit a new pair of rear tyres before they get to be slicks ! I will keep you updated as we wind our way through these socially distanced times. Andy

Hi Alastair and all, I had been looking for a brass / Edwardian era car for a while, they don't come along that often and when I saw it at Beaulieu autojumble in 2012, it was the last car at the far end of the fields, I had to have it, it had potential, I didn't go out looking for a Chalmers, it really found me, there are 3 1913 4 cylinder and a 1912/16 6 cylinder I know of in the UK, there is also a 4 cylinder in Germany. My brother Gareth won the Ace Vehicles "North West Sports and Saloons" back in 2000, he was in his Ford Escort Cosworth in class D, he also won the Ford Saloons and the Formula Saloons in it, he went on to drive in the Time Attack championship in various Mitsubishi Evo's with 700-1200 bhp. I have been lucky enough to visit New Zealand twice, driving top to bottom was the classic trip we did, meeting lovely people, and seeing spectacular sights along the way, very envious. Let us know how you go on with the Chalmers, if you have any questions about the cars quirk's just ask, we should be able to help. Andy

Hi Alastair, Small world ! I raced a Sierra XR4i 91-94, a Sapphire Cosworth 94-96 and an ex-Dick Johnson RS500 96 and 97, I did the Ford modified saloon car championship, the Lynton trailers championship which I think became the CNC heads championship, we must have been on track together at some point maybe in the Tony Sugden Skoda era ? I was the Fords champion in 97. I went on to race at Bathurst a couple of times and did the Nurburgring 24h 5 times. The Chalmers is a little more relaxing ! Well done for being in the most wonderful country in the world. Andy

Hi Barry, thumbs up-ers and all, Barry, I use Lister Petter generator pistons, they come in the correct size, are very good quality and are very reasonably priced, I modify the gudgeon pin bosses to give more little end width and weld in an alloy piece to get rid of the diesel combustion chamber, I have given up on re-inventing the wheel ! I use a Colchester lathe, it has been an excellent piece of kit, I have had it for over 20 years along with a Bridgeport mill. I have finished the Splitdorf magneto repair, I made the replica bearing carrier plate to replace the broken item and also gave the distribution disc a light skim, it went together quite well, I then fitted the distributor cap and points assembly, finally the magneto was trial fitted on the spare engine, I now need to make and fit a leather drive disc and then time the magneto. I know we are hearing this all the time but will everybody please be careful at the moment, STAY SAFE, stay in the workshop as much as possible ! Andy

Good evening everybody, I hope you are all being very careful while we are going through this very unusual time in the world, self isolation is the new way to live so we are being told, although I have to admit I have been trying to self isolate for years ! I have been able to be in the workshop a lot recently now my new knee is performing well, I finished modifying the Chalmers pistons and added new gudgeon pins, the repainted block assembly dropped onto the bottom end fairly easily, most of the ancillaries went on and the engine is now sitting on it's stand ready to be fitted in the future, I have been worried for a long time about the magneto on the Chalmers, the cast aluminium bearing carrier plate that sit's behind the points is very weak, I have bought a couple of these Splitdorf model X magneto's as basket cases over the years and they have all been broken, I decided to make a new carrier out of aluminium plate, it is a very time consuming job but is very satisfying, I will keep you updated as I progress with the machining and hopefully I will end up with another functioning unit. While all this workshop time has been going on I helped Jack make a 4 branch manifold for his Riley 9, just before we all went into "lockdown" due to the virus I made the most of a warm day and drove out to my favourite canalside stop, I had already decided not to compete on the Chalmers this year but due to the virus all motorsport has been stopped until further notice. I will update the magneto progress soon. Be safe everybody. Andy

Hi Ball & Ball carb specialists, I have just found this thread and am also looking for information but specifically on a Ball & Ball type DV9 carburetor, does someone have information of these for me. Thanks in advance. Andy

Good evening Barry and all, Happy New Year, Well as usual I have to apologise for the ridiculously long time between updates and this time it really has been a long time, sorry ! Since the last update loads of things have happened, we had a lovely VSCC Prescott weekend, I took the Chalmers to a very old well known iron landmark along with several trips over to the Welsh border, a great VSCC Loton Park hillclimb, a wonderful holiday in Barbados, a complete computer meltdown and subsequent loss of photo's and info, a total knee replacement and various other sundry annoyances and disasters, other than that everything has been normal ! VSCC Prescott was it's usual delight of mad old cars and mad old people, we blended in quite well, The Chalmers looked well with the backdrop of the Ironbridge in Ironbridge gorge, on a wonderful run out to Llangollen I found the motor museum was open , they have a very rare Alfa Romeo Montreal, Barbados was wonderful and here are a few typical holiday photos, the steam power plant at Nicholas Abbey, the incredible HARP gun, and a really fun track session at Bushy Park in a Radical, in October I had my second total knee replacement, I am now starting to get back to normal but they do hurt, a lot ! after a really good year hillclimbing the Chalmers has won 2 awards from the VSCC, the Edwardian trophy for the most championship points by an Edwardian car and the Marc Birkigt trophy for the most championship points in the 5 to 10 litre category, I am yet to understand how a car that will only manage 53 mph downhill can actually win trophies for going uphill ! I have just started to get back into the workshop even if it is only for a few hours until my knee is 100%, I have started modifying the pistons for the spare Chalmers engine and have been working on a repaired cylinder block for another project, I have to keep remembering to rest my knee ! machining the block after extensive cast iron weld repairs, We travelled just over 3000 miles in 2019 and had a lot of fun doing it, I have decided that for 2020 we will give the hillclimbing a rest and take the Chalmers touring some interesting places around the UK instead. Thank you all for your patience and hopefully I will have some interesting stuff to report this year. Andy

Good evening Barry, Wayne, Carl and all, Yes, I am still around, I have too apologise even more than normal due to my late updates, I have been doing various projects and non Chalmers stuff along with Life ! Since my last update ( just after the last century ) the Chalmers has been here, there and everywhere. We went on a lovely trip to Jersey to see family and friends and found a great museum, won the local pub's car club's best car award, Curborough sprint went well and I was a second better than last time, I put my Ferrari on the road after all the work earlier in the year, it is so good to be driving it again, Dave turned up in his stunning Riley special one morning, Harewood hillclimb was just as good as ever, although I didn't improve my time I did get the Chalmers very sideways a couple of times, We have attended many pub meets, and have been on lots of trips and the Chalmers is doing well with over 1500 miles so far this year, Shelsley Walsh is alway's special, such a long motorsport history, the Chalmers went 3 seconds quicker up the hill mainly due to fitting the spare carb, the downside is terrible mpg although I still couldn't get even close to this Le Zebre with a Curtiss OX-5 ! I was invited to the Chateau Impney hillclimb near Droitwich to run the Napier Lion engine for everybody, I had the assistance of Jack to help start the engine, the event was one of the best motoring weekend's I have been to, I found this great piece of footage on Youtube, thanks to the poster for his great camera work, I found this wonderful 2 owners Brough SS100 outside the Saturday night party, we had a flyby on both day's from the Lancaster, and in true supercar fashion the Fiat S76 "Beast of Turin" outshon a Bugatti Veyron, I will try to get my update regularity back to normal, thanks to everybody for their messages, I am still here ! Andy

Evenin everybody, Happy New Year to you all, yes I know I have not posted an update in ages but that doesn't mean I have been sitting around doing nothing, well not all the time ! Since my last update I decided it was time to go through a car I have not used in 15 years, it is my 1988 Ferrari 328 GTB, I have gone through the car from indicator lenses to cam belts, injection metering heads to brake disc's, as soon as the sun comes out I will have the car back on the road, I have been spending most of my time on the spare Chalmers engine I am rebuilding, I have modified the spark plug carrier's just like I did on the first engine, it allow's the electrode to be in the mixture rather than up inside the thread's, I have again used Caterpillar D9 engine valves, I shorten them to suit and add a new collet groove, I have also used new valve spring's, I cleaned up up the camshaft bearings and gave the camshaft a little "run in" on the lathe, The spare crank has had a light grind, new bearing's and has been pressed back together with the help of my Riley driving friend Andy in the next village who has a 100 ton press, the timing gears are all lined up and the lifters fitted, the con rod's have been re-metaled and I am making new big end bolts, I am waiting on suppliers of wrist pins as the original's are pitted, I have yet to modify the pistons. Again sorry for the delay in updating. Andy Sorry I forgot to add that my friend Dave came round in his model A.

Evenin Barry and all, Sorry again for the lack of updates, life seems to take over sometimes, Barry, the Alton I was in is the Staffordshire Alton, this is where the famous Alton Towers theme park is based, it is a really nice village with several pubs including my favourite the Bulls Head. As usual I have been working on various projects including removing a set of pistons that were seized in their bores, this an engine for another project but I thought I would show you how I managed to pull the rusted-in pistons from the block, I put the block in the bonfire and got it nice and hot then used the ram from my press along with a few laser cut plates, my assistant Jack and out they came. A couple of weeks ago we took a ride out to Great Haywood for lunch near the canal, it was a lovely day but the Chalmers wasn't happy on the road and seemed to get very hot and ran quite erratically, when we came to leave the engine would not start, I did just about everything I could think of, when I tried to flood the carb the fuel seemed to "boil" in the float bowl, very concerning indeed, I removed the plugs that were very overheated with gaps way to wide, I re-gapped the plug's and after letting the engine cool down I managed to get it started, we headed for home with a rather unhappy running engine. Thinking back to when the problem started I realised that I had filled the tank with fuel just before the poor running started, when we got home I drained the tank and refilled it with fuel from a different petrol station, after this had been done the engine started and ran beautifully and has done so ever since, I have sent a fuel sample away to be checked, watch this space for the results and always be aware of poor fuel. Today I drove out to Audlem which is a favourite even now when the temperature has dropped, on my way back I stopped at Woore church to look at the sculpture of a WW1 soldier that has been made to commemorate the end of The Great War, with over 3100 miles traveled over the year I think the temperature has now beaten me, the warm workshop beckons with the rebuild of the spare Chalmers engine up first. Andy

Evenin everybody, We had a sunny Prescott long course meeting last Saturday, the Chalmers went well, 1.6 seconds faster than last year, there was a good selection of Edwardian's, a varied selection of racer's, and some great "homebrew's", the long course is a very flowing track that is wonderful to drive, We have been out and about since the last update, a nice lunch stop in Alton, with it's round lockup, and beautiful bridge, and as usual we have to wait at the railway crossing on the way home, you may have spotted my Chalmers "ECU" ( Elastic Control Unit ) it holds the advance for me ! we have now traveled over 2800 miles and hopefully we will have a few good day's left. Andy

Evenin Barry and everybody, Barry, I don't think I will get an award for having fun driving the car but I feel more elderly ! The Chalmers has been on more adventures around the countryside, the great weather we had gave us many enjoyable drives, which is basically lot's of runs out for tea and cake On a trip to Derbyshire I pulled in at Osmaston Park, the drive up the park didn't seem to end, in the village they had a scarecrow competition, this one was brilliant, I found another place by the canal, this the flint mill in Cheddleton near Leek, they have 2 operating wheels, this mill ground burnt flint for the pottery industry, the old control tower at Sleap airfield has a great cafe overlooking the runway, it is a typical WW2 building, last weekend was Loton Park hillclimb, we had rain on Saturday and a dry Sunday, on Saturday the Chalmers was the 2nd quickest in the Edwardian class in the wet practice and went on to get 2nd handicap in class, on the dry Sunday we tried our best but were back to slowest in class, as with all VSCC events you see some gems, this Peugeot was beautiful, Mark Walker's "Thunderbug" is motoring art, The Chalmers clutch fluid needed changing after Loton as the extra heat from hard start's tends to overheat the lubricant and makes the clutch drag, a new kerosene and engine oil mix and we are back to normal. with Curborough, Harewood, Shelsley Walsh, Prescott short and Loton Park done we have Prescott long course in a couple of weeks and that will finish the competition for the year, along with about 2700 miles so far the Chalmers is doing well, I will be starting on the spare engine rebuild soon. Andy