Back to Work

By Rebecca Carson

I’ve been making progress on the water pump again. We broke the casting on the first Lister H3 water pump as we tried to press out the cross pin but within a week another one turned up. It was a lot easier to unassemble and the cross pin vibrated out as Dad was tapping back the rope seal collars. Thankfully, we didn’t need to go near the press again.

Soon we were picking the best bits from the two pumps and cleaning them up with the parts washer and a scraper. Next we used paint stripper, the wire wheel in the angle grinder and sandpaper to prepare the parts for painting. First I brushed on a coat of Metalflux to prevent any more rust then, the next day, I gave it all a coat of red Bonda primer and when it had dried, I painted it in Mid Brunswick Green. I was thinking that it would be a good looking engine and water pump combo. We bought some gasket paper from Stationary Engine Parts (www.stationaryengineparts.com) to make a new gasket for the end of the pump body. I held the paper against the four studs and tapped with my ball pien hammer until the holes were made. Dad tidied them up with his pen knife and then I slid the sheet into place and tapped gently around the outside edge until the gasket was the proper shape. When that was done, I held it tight to the pump body and tapped out the big hole in the middle.

We had a small squirting oil can that leaked every time you squeezed the trigger so I made a new gasket in an attempt to fix it, but that didn’t work. Dad found the leak at the bottom of the spout, so I suggested that we solder it like Allan Millyard does on TV in Junk and Disorderly. That worked!

The Traction Engine Club of Ulster’s show at Ballee started again after Covid 19, and we showed my Lister D in the stationary engine pen. The engine ran smoothly for the two day show while we went to the autojumble where I bought a big Aladdin Pink Paraffin can and a

Painting on a coat of Metalflux rust converter.

First coat.

Second coat..

Third coat.. Unipart gallon jar. One dealer was asking £10 for a wee grease tub which was far too dear so I walked away. I

I tapped out the outside edges.

Then I tapped around the inside edge. found a wee book from 1952 on farm machinery which I bought for Dad. It was only £2.

We went to see what was going on in the demonstration ring, where we spoke to Rory who had his Rumley OilPull belted up to a roof shingle saw. He was kind enough to give me two cedar shingles which I now have safely stored in the shed. Geoffrey Mark’s Scammell Explorer six wheel drive wrecker was at the end of a line-up which were celebrating the 100th Birthday of the Scammel Company. There were lots of cars and tractors, steam engines and most importantly, stationary engines.

The next week we tried to run up the D but there was no compression so we took out the spark plug, took off the exhaust, turned the flywheel until the exhaust valve was open and blew compressed air in the plug hole. Lots of soot came flying out of the exhaust port, so it was good that mummy didn’t have any washing on the line! There must have been soot jammed on the exhaust vale seat stopping the valve from closing properly because the compression returned and the engine fired up on the next attempt. It definitely needs something to make it work harder, something like a water pump.

I picked the bottom piston because it isn’t as badly pitted.

And Voila! A new gasket.