Here is what we started with.

Very soon after getting it back home we did a quick think about what we would use and what we wouldn't first thing to go was the grass box and collector unit closely followed by the cutting deck. Next on the hit list was the engine. Not that their was anything wrong with it in fact quite the opposite, Stig wanted it for his standard class mower and it was too big to race anyway being a 16 horse twin Brigs and Stratton. Of course the wheels and axles were no good to race with so we soon had them off. Finally we were left with what we thought we could use.

So as you can see by the pics not much, a chassis, the seat base panel and dashboard assembly.

As you can see in the pic we had hung onto the front axle but after a bit of deliberation we decided to let it go to another member who wanted one.

Started the rebuild this Christmas and finally got it all rubbed down. Andy giving me copious amounts of much appreciated and valuable help, with both advice and labor.

(I have to say that he keeps looking on the site)

One of the first jobs was to locate and fit the rear axle pillar bearings and axle.

This in itself was a relative simple job once we had established the exact position of the old rear axle. Plus welding a bit of reinforcing to help support the bearings. This may have been a bit of overkill but what the hell.

As you can see the side frames are made from 1.5” box section (lightweight) and we are still pondering as to the position of the brake disk. Fitting it to the outside saves us from cutting a slot in the chassis and in turn producing a weak spot. Also it allows us a bit more scope in placing the caliper.

Just before we packed up for the day we decided to throw a few bits together to see how the old girl was shaping up.

All in all Andy and I felt a bit chuffed with ourselves, quite a bit done no injuries and in time for a celebratory drink.

This weekend has been quite busy despite the facts that we have as yet no parts for the group four. So not to waste time Andy and I decided to do a little work on the Transit tipper. Fitting a reversing light to be precise or not so precise the amount of times we positioned it under, over and eventually in the rear bumper. Got to admit it was my fault not his I got to technical with the details and confused myself. Despite this small hiccup everything went more or less according to plan. Till we came to fit the switch, this turned out to be the wrong type. A non permanent contact type so Stiggy had to hold it down while he backed up the street. Not a big job to alter though.

Sunday brought a new day and new ideas. I had heard from Ron @ graysonline that my bits were to be posted off Monday so we figured to clean up the garage in preparation. That took all of an hour and the inevitable happened, couldn’t bare the thought of going inside so we turned to the Stigs scag, or should I say more to the trailer. It’s served him well over the last two years and after a bit of pondering we decided that for the most part it was in fine fettle. It's only let down had been being a bit weak on the back end (Some say I’ve got the same problem).

The old frame looking a bit tired

So with that in mind I promptly started to cut the back end off with a grinder and immediately set my jacket on fire. Being over eager to get started I never bothered with my overalls and I had a fleece on to keep warm. I certainly got warm after that. [Tip No 1 don’t wear a fleece when grinding]. After close inspection of the removed parts it was decided to give the swinging arms another season we just built another back frame in a more suitable format adding gussets of the metal kind to the top and bottom.

The new rear end

Next on our list of things to do was a remove a rear wheel of the old axle from the Westwood 1600. One wheel had slid off quite easily but the other had decided to weld itself on I think. After copious amounts of soaking in WD40 and other substances we had manage d to move it about four mm. We were now getting desperate. Desperate measures were called for. I decided that we could afford to lose the actual axle and save the gearbox for a working tractor. We split the gearbox, ground through the axle about twelve inches in from the wheel and mounted it over a piece of tube with the intention of removing from the opposite direction. It’s quite surprising what you can achieve with a big hammer and the will power. Following a few well placed blows the thing finally slid about six inch so thought what the hell we turned it the other way up, give it a few more wellies and out she popped. A great relief for the Stig, he wants the wheel for a standard class group four, although we must confess that the original tyre got a little damaged taking it off but we reckon it will be alright.

Just for the few that may be interested, this is the gungy mess inside a Peerless gearbox. The crud sticks to everything it touches so if you are thinking of tackling one I would recommend you have some old overalls on that you don't mind losing as this stuff makes a hell of a mess in the automatic washer and may even cause weight loss with all the humble pie you have to eat when the misses finds out what you've done.

Axle 25 x 1000mm Solid  £26.95

Rear Brake Disc Ventilated & X Drilled  £22.50 and Disc Carrier Gold  £11.95

Steering Wheel Boss HQ 20mm £6.50

Total £61.40

Supplied by Graysonline (Rons Bits)

Split Nylon wheels 6” *4  Total £40.00 and Front and rear hubs  Total £52

Steel Reinforcing Rings 2 per Wheel Total £18.00

Tyres 13” Aggressive Fronts *2 Total £32.00

Tyres 15” Rear *2 Total £35.00

Inner Tubes 13” *2 Total £8.00

Inner Tubes 15” *2  Total £10.00

T Drive *1  £95

Hydraulic Brake System Complete with fluid *1 £95

Total £385 

Plus Postage and packing £23.50 Giving a grand Total of £408.50  

I put these figures on just to wind up fellow members of the club as I know at least some of them can't resist checking my figures.

As you can see from these figures the initial cost is rising but not out of reach of the average enthusiast. But all these parts were brand new and included vat, you could economize by modifying used parts, begging, and borrowing or just plain long term loan of a very understanding mate.

If your not put of at this stage then you are home and dry as the biggest outlay is now over (I hope). The rest is mostly your time doing the build. I for one have enjoyed every minute of the time I have spent on the project up to now and will continue to do so in the future.

At the moment I am waiting to get some machining done on the back axle, keyways to be exact and also a couple of holes cut out of the tractor chassis to accomodate the T Drive and transfer shaft, but hopefully we will be back in full swing by saturday.

22/01/05

Well yesterday and today has been in my view quite productive. The Stig has had a guest over the weekend Simes from the 10’oclock Horses, so he was unable to give me too much assistance. He calls it guidance but I’m not so sure. We have managed to assemble the back end of the tractor T Drive, Brake, Caliper etc with very little difficulty. One problem we had was not having enough bits of various metals around like flat bar and angle. So I went off to Robin Jacks our local metal, mower and Turpin mask specialist, and it took me the best part of an hour to get the bits of bar and angle I wanted. I told him I thought he was rather expensive. He asked me if I squeaked when I served drinks. Must have called me a tight bar steward (I think). In the end we came to an amicable arrangement. He charges what he likes or I don’t get my metal. Not to procrastinate, (Got that one out of the dictionary under P), on with the build.

We built the frame for the T Drive out of 5mm plate 140 * 120 and drilled to suit M10 bolts. Our local supplier Robin didn’t have any M10 bolts 140mm long so we had to resort to stud bar and nuts but the end result was the same. The bottom plates we welded to the top plates were made out of 1”*1/4” bar and drilled to suit M8 bolts. The brake caliper we felt needed some sturdier metal so for that we used some 50mm * 10mm bar. The hardest thing about this operation was ensuring that the bracket remained square to the brake disc as welding tends to pull things out of line as the weld contracts.

I figured we are now getting very technically minded with our project, Andy says I’m more testicle (because I make a balls of everything). I’m sure it was just a bit of banter??. For those of you out there that are observant you will notice from the pics that the brake disk is now inside the frame and not between the wheel and chassis. When we came to fit everything together the clearance between the caliper and tyre was miniscule and was in danger of rubbing should the wheel slide in fractionally on the axle during one of those high speed corners that I would like to think I was capable of.

Well this weekend we intended to Do the front axle on the westwood. but like all best laid plans it has turned to ruin. (Thats quite posh for me)

I went for a few simple bits like rose joints and found that I had to order them. My supplier reckons Tuesday before they arrive so that is that. Went down to the Stigs to convey the bad news,and scrounge some tea. We ventured into the garage to measure up his Scag trailer for more modification with the intention of doing it over the weekend and guess what? You would be right we got carried away made the bits and fitted them.

A slightly different design to the original attempt We reinforced the mainframe with 1" angle iron and sat the shockers more or less upright. Using the original swinging arms and more 1.5" angle to make brackets. Seems to have made a sturdier job. Next will be the stub axles but once again we are waiting for the metal.

12/02/06

This weekend was a bit of a disaster to start with. Andy and I or should I say me decided that I’d be a bit of a turner and turn some 25mm bar down to 20mm for the stub axle’s.

Its old but it works(Now)

 All seemed to be going well till the final cut. Using my new toy a digital vernier caliper I reached the required diameter on the first stub axle tried the bearing on it to find that I’d made a right pig’s ear of it. One end was undersized. Not by much about .3 of a mm. Anyway not to be daunted I took the bull by the horns and decided to give it another go and prove what a great engineer I was. MISTAKE number two. Should have done what I did later a lot sooner. I turned the next axle down and kept getting funny readings of the vernier caliper. As I took a shade off it seemed to get fatter. The only conclusion was that the metal was expanding with heat. Being shall we say a lathe of some experience it was not fitted with a cooling pump. So with no more ado I decided to apply coolant by hand for the final couple of cuts. This seemed to work perfect; I checked my measurements and all seemed fine. I removed the headstock and offered the bearing up for size. It fit perfect. Then having grabbed a bull by the horns the damn thing decided to toss me to one side. The bearing while fitting perfect at one end was .3mm undersize at the other. Turns out, (no pun intended) the centre for holding the loose end of the bar was ever so slightly out of true. So hey presto I finished up with a taper 20mm to 19.7mm. This being a good lesson learned and finishing up with a rather large but well made bodkin I have now got the whole thing centered. Well that’s enough of my gaffs on with the build

To proceed. The Lay Shaft

The lay shaft has been fitted in place. We decided to use part of the original machine to take the shaft through the chassis, as it was just the right size, and it also had decent sized bearings in it which just happened to match a nice bit of shaft we had lying around. Basically, the drive will run via a belt from the engine - towards the rear of the machine and beneath the chassis. The lay shaft runs just in front of the seat, and has a pulley on the top above the chassis, and one below the chassis which is lined up with the engine pulley. The pulley on the top of the lay shaft is lined up with the pulley on top of the T-drive - so in the end we're getting from the engine to the T-drive in two steps, the front one below the chassis and the rear one above, just under the seat. Hope that makes sense!

19/02/05

Today we feel has been very productive regarding the group 4 build. Yesterday we spent doing Stiggies caravan up which has now taken up residence at my gaff.

This is my grandson Tom. He likes to help

We have managed to construct quite a substantial front axle out of 50mm square box section.

As you can see by the picture we kept it as simple as we can. The king pins started out life as 30mm solid round bar. We then turned the ends down to 18mm to suit the rose joints. The stub axles are 20mm solid bright round bar. We turned about 13mm on the end down to 13 mm and drilled a 13mm receiving hole in the stub axles at an angle of 10 degrees. This was to offset the angle of the axle tube which was cut off at a 10 degree angle. The plates on the ends (50mm * 6mm) were drilled with 18mm holes and offset at 14 degrees.

It seems to be quite a sturdy construction but time and a couple of laps over a rough field will tell. To fix the axle to the mower we decided to weld 1 ½” * ¼” angle to the top drilled with three 10 mm holes and on the bottom we use two pieces of 1” * ¼” flat bar 2” long with a 10mm hole in the centre of each.

The track rod ends comprise of 1” * 1/4” flat bar and 10mm rose joints. We adapted and welded to make the track rod as we didn’t have the right stuff to hand and me being a tight sod figured it would be as good. You can always economize in small places to keep costs down.

Overall the finished job whilst not being an entry into a beauty comp is perfectly functional and as the emperor John Pardon would say Its only a lawnmower. I might add at this point that John and his good lady wife Joanne put me up (or put up with me) for a night at the AGM this year along with the Stig and his wife Joanne. And they were the perfect hosts. A delicious brecky the following morning to see us on our way home. Thanks very much John and Joanne.

We Began on Saturday by tackling the front axle or too be more precise completing what we started. I went for a few bits at our local shop (yes it was Robin Jacks again). I needed a few 20mm plain flat washers to use as stops on the stub axles. While I was searching in his waste washer box I came across a right handy piece of 1/4" keysteele. Came in quite handy as we intended to fit a non arrived noram clutch to the engine shaft. It should have arrived by express courier on friday. I had it sent to work as I am normally there most of the day time. It didn't turn up so that was the end of that. Today Monday I contacted broadbent drives to ask for my express postage back and they informed me that it had been delivered and signed for by Mr Dick Head our resident security gaurd, who thinking it might be something to do with work despite having my name on it sent it to the stores where some equally inept storeman who apparrently has a weekend job as a 6*4 plank of wood put it on the shelf till required. Anyway back to the build. Andy had Fitted the steering shaft whilst I was away. We used the original steering column and fitted this into an adaptor we'd made up on the lathe to fit the 16mm column to the 20mm boss on the steering wheel. A couple of flange bearings to support the column and the job was done. By way of advice Don't use 16mm flange bearings as they seem to be an oddball size and cost an extremely odd amount of cash. The steering is what is called direct steering where the steering column is basically connected direct to the left hand kingpin. A short bracket is welded onto the bottom of the steering column, and another arm made from flat bar is welded to the top of the kingpin - these are then connected by a straight shaft with a rose joint at each end.

We welded a large nut to the kingpin first to give us a bigger surface to weld the steering arm to. In the pictures there's a bit of bar connecting things up - this was just a temporary thing to see if the job would work.

I turned out a couple of spacers to go between the wheel hub and the axle bearing, and stop the axle putting any strain on the t-drive bearings. there's also another collar which fits inside the t-drive to stop anything moving about in there.

We also decided to attache some more bar to the underside of the chassis between the side gaurds to beef it up a bit.

Beefing up the chassis
This latest addition seemed to make the whole thing a lot stiffer. Also we finally got the brake worked out where to put it (I know over the brake disc) I refer to the master cylinder.

Also visitors were present to inspect our work namely Tom And Holly two of my grand children. Under the Strict supervision Of Jo.

To finish of todays ramblings Just a couple of pics of the stigs newley modified and freshly painted trailer

Now aint she Butiful Bernard

This weekend has been yet again a slow one. Mostly tinkering rather than building. JTV paid us a visit this weekend and very kindly donated a fuel tank for the group 4 (thank you John). We have completed the steering linkage but omitted to take a photo prior to stripping it all out again to slap a bit more paint on the control deck and to make a start on the brake pedal. This has become a slow process due in the main part to the fact that Stiggy under the guidance of Emperor John decided to use a hydraulic brake on the Scag instead of the cable operated one he first planned on. Stig suggested we set his mower up with my caliper & master to get all the fitting work brackets etc done on the scag. On completion of the said work Stig decided he’d like to keep it on and I would have to wait till he had got another. So I have to wait for the new one to arrive before I can set up my brake pedal. (That’s my excuse for saying I don’t really know the best way to tackle it). I will be perusing several photos of other machines and perhaps nick a couple of ideas. We took the machine out of the garage to try the steering out on Saturday afternoon mainly to check the turning circle. No engine no brakes 2 man power (Stig and the Emperor giving me a push) and it seemed fine. For those that have not been on the NWLMRA forum this little test was followed by me sitting on the mower crossways on the drive and the Emperor decided to give it a teensy weensy push backwards. Of course no brakes I shot backwards at a rake of knots and flew over the edge down a one foot drop and finished up in the flower bed. (Lucky the cutting deck was absent). I bet it looked hilarious. Cheers John I’m still laughing at the thought. Fortunately no damage was sustained to either the mower or me.

The accelerator pedal was made out of 12mm solid round bar and turned down the ends to 8mm to fit the bearings. A small piece of 25m*4mm flat bar completed the lower half and the connection for the cable was made out of 1 ½ mm sheet steel. The brake lever was made out of a bit sturdier stuff. 16mm round bar turned down at the ends to 8mm and both the riser and pedal were made from 25mm*1.5mm flat bar and a gusset welded in for strength. The extra strength is needed to tolerate the pressure applied when trying to stop 14 stone plus a tractor from warp 2. One small alteration was the steering stop that we had welded on to stop rollover. It was interfering with the engine ever so slightly as the holes wouldn’t line up correctly but after a bit of pratting about it was soon done

Also today we managed to get a coat of paint on the old girl. (The mower, not the missus). And hopefully tomorrow we will be assembling the whole thing and putting a few pics of the creation of the nation on the site.

As it is the more or less the completion of the project I will be putting a few piccies of the assembly on a new page to save all this scrolling down