hddennis

If your steering box is the same as mine and it appears to be in your pictures, it has a very neat feature. Drop the pitman arm off the box, rotate 1/4 turn and you have a new gear surface and it's possible to do this 4 times so at least one has to be the tightest as most likely it's never been done. Howard Dennis

Hey Wayne, good to hear from you again. Plugging along on my Maxwell, near the end but going over things I rushed and still dealing with some pesky gremlins like an oil leak in front of engine I can't pin down. Howard Dennis

Just stumbled across this and had to add my 2 cents in defense of the late teens Maxwell's as I own a 1917. Yes, it had a blown rear axle when it came to me and it took the contents of 10 other rear axles to get enough parts to get mine back together. That being said I found out some very interesting facts that help defend the Maxwell. All 10 rear axles had either gone through a catastrophic failure or were about to. One appeared to have blown up and had all new parts put in but the previous failure had cracked the carrier and it failed and sent all those new parts to the junkyard where I found it. I thought I'd hit a home run on this one and set these parts aside to chase others. Meantime I ran across a collector who had studied these a little deeper than I and had done a Rockwell hardness test and discovered the ring gears and possibly the pinions had been over hardened to the point of being brittle. When I checked the gears in the last rear axle I mentioned I found the gears were as new with no miles but were full of hairline spider web like cracks! One really amazing thing in all these rear axles was the amount of broken gear teeth the Hyatt roller bearings were able to digest and turn into a metallic slurry and still keep going! My theory is two fold. First this rear axle has survived well in 1915 and 1916 Maxwell's. The trouble seems to have started in 1917 when Maxwell was under a contract to build 10,000 tanks for the government but it was to be done in secret without public knowledge in the Dayton Plant. Imagine the logistics involved in doing that. Also during this time many men were called to war and they were being replaced by women. Most people think this wasn't done until Rosie The Riveter in WWII but actually it started a generation earlier. The secret tank production and women replacing men put a large portion of Maxwell's workforce in jobs they were not familiar with and caused I believe the gear failure that led to a bad reputation that the Maxwell didn't deserve. The very low survival rate of the wartime Maxwell's I believe bears this out. Another interesting fact is that upon getting the tank contract Maxwell purchased large quantities of material and tooling and when the war ended early the government walked away from the contract and left Maxwell holding the bag! That and the poor reputation must have done wonders for Maxwell's bottom line! Howard Dennis

Jim, this place was mentioned recently on a post here about spring shackle bolts. Howard Dennis http://www.asbbearings.com/

Just for future reference here is the best antique car part supplier I have ever worked with bar none! John has made multiple belts for me and they come with a lifetime guarantee and free shortening when they stretch which they will do over time. Also they are very affordable. http://www.leatherdrivebelts.com/ Howard Dennis

Thanks David, When the edge is folded back onto itself is it glued? Howard Dennis

Years ago I watched a friend upholster a buggy seat and was amazed at how he did the backrest support and made it seem as if the support just grew out of the leather covering. He's gone now and I'm about to cover my Maxwell's backrest with leather and wonder if someone could give me tips on how to deal with the support rod. Howard Dennis

Thanks now I know what the cones look like and how they work, unfortunately they weren't included in the assortment. Howard Dennis

Th That helps me understand how these get anchored in the wall or floor. I just couldn't figure out what spread the teeth. Howard Dennis

Thanks Guys appreciate the help. If I follow this correctly they would only be useable to someone owning a special hammer drill used as Terry described above? Howard Dennis

Thanks, so they drill themselves in and then what locks them in? Howard Dennis

Just purchased a large assortment of antique brass screws that appear to have been from the shop of a woodworker. In the assortments were about 20 of these odd drill bit like tool bits stamped with the word BULLDOG. They are 1-11/16" long 15/32" OD and 5/16" ID on the back end with a metric internal thread I have yet to identify. Does anyone recognize them or have any idea of their purpose? Howard Dennis

John, would you have any spring & shackle bolts that look like these with the drilled bolt and threaded end that accepts a grease cup cap? If you do I'll have to get measurements from my Maxwell. Howard Dennis

Thanks for those ideas guys, I've already found several Snap-On meters that seem as if they were the same. Maybe that will be a more productive search as Snap-On is still in business. Howard Dennis

Bloo, I hate electrical work because I'm no good at it and don't understand it. When I opened this meter the batteries had about 50 years of corrosion so it all had to come out for cleaning. I took the gray and red wires off the studs to get the C cell tray out and allow me to take the two black leads off the posts just below the clear meter. The gray and red wires I just stuck back on the posts that mount the battery tray so I wouldn't forget where they go, they actually should be put on the posts after the tray is put back on. Howard Dennis

Thanks Bloo, Your right about that switch it reads "normal" when up and "double" when down, think it has something to do with 4 cylinders and 8 cylinders. The dwell meter HT-864 only has 2 leads that attach to studs below the clear meter. It has one D cell battery above the meter and a tray that holds 4 C cell batteries below the meter. The HT-400 meter has 2 large diameter leads (10-12 Gauge?) that attach to a large copper band going around the entire inside of the meter housing and 2 smaller leads that attach to studs below the clear gauge. Howard Dennis

Still need info on these meters. Anyone have any idea where I might find instructions on their use? Howard Dennis

Could you share the name of the company? Maybe Bob could check them out. Howard Dennis

Mine were so hard the only way to reduce them was grinding! Howard Dennis

Bob, I ran into the same situation on my Maxwell. Local machine shop wanted thousands to make me new shackle bolts. King pins would have been more but luckily I found N.O.S. on eBay. Returning to my shackle bolts which I thought at 5/8 inches in diameter were a lot bigger than many later cars used I came up with the idea of turning them down to 1/2 inches and buying bushings I found online. Local machine shop did 1 bolt and said he burned up 3 bits and would have to charge many more hundreds of dollars to do the rest and he just wasn't interested in doing them. Frustrated I went down and bought a Harbor Freight mini lathe and a separate powered grinding attachment for less than it would cost to turn half my remaining shackle bolts. Don't know if your Hupmobile has the same overbuilt bolts or not but in my case it worked out well in solving a problem I just couldn't justify spending the going rate on. Howard Dennis

Just realized that the owner who contacted me privately about reproducing these never got back to me and try as I might I can't find the original contact information. Please contact me again or respond to this post as these parts are still needed. Howard Dennis

Thanks Bloo, I hated to bother you but I spent all morning on that site trying to find a way to contact somebody and it just isn't there. Howard Dennis

A question asked on here this morning brought sad news to our hobby: George Paul Bachleda, of Olcar Bearing Company passed away peacefully Sunday, May 26, 2019. George had an uncanny ability to find bearings for our cars others said were impossible to get. Several days ago I ran into an electrical problem and emailed my friend Chris who had gone above and beyond to help me and other restorers and asked nothing in return.So unlike Chris I got no reply and checked on the forum to find he hadn't visited in months. Google turned up why: Chris Wantuck, known as Friartuck on the forum passed away March 8, 2019. I'll miss the help from both but most of all I'll miss the great conversations we had discussing our passions for antique cars. Howard Dennis

Johan, I hate to post this but a Google search turned this up: George Paul Bachleda, 74, passed away peacefully Sunday, May 26, 2019. George was a help to a great many of us with his ability to find bearings long obsolete and deemed impossible to find by other sources. He will be missed. Howard Dennis

Bloo, I attempted to register here last night and it seemed to work but failed to send me confirmation and now won't let me use my own log-in and says to contact an administrator which is impossible because that requires a log-in ? Catch 22 ? Howard Dennis