Aligning Centurion engine to gearbox

[Mike Cecil]

Nice job, Malcolm, looking much better than when I saw it a couple of years ago.

I think you will find that stab was a feature for all the Cent marks.

Regards

Mike

[Malcolm Towrie]

Robin, to tell you the truth, I'd forgotten you had lights! We've just started working on the lights. Can you mail them and I'll refund the postage?

Mike, I got confused. What I meant to say is we seem to have a later style, more sophisticated stab control, not the system described in the Mk 3 tech manual. Does that make sense?

Malcolm

[Lynn Eades]

Malcolm, just to update your post #30, There are two Centurions in the south Island of New Zealand. The one I previously mentioned owned by the gold miner on the west coast, and the one John mentioned in ChristChurch (east coast) Both at similar latitudes. The Christchurch one was for sale on Trademe at one stage. I thought it was cheap, so it may have moved. No idea.

[Malcolm Towrie]

Another update: after getting the bulk of the external painting and metal work repair done, we took the tank for a drive around the arena on a very hot and dusty day. (There are separate threads showing this, I think.)
Two problems showed up: the old oil seals in the transmission and the final drives leaked, and the engine ran hot. Not dangerously hot, but at the upper range of comfort.
I confess the oil leaks from the lip seals on the transmission input shaft, the output shafts (4 seals in total), and the final drive input shafts weren't all that surprising since the tank had been gate-guarded in the late 70's, so the seals were at least 40 years old. I took a flyer because getting the transmission back out isn't a lot of work, and I knew finding replacement seals would be tough.

The overheating problem is most likely because the fins in the one rad are still clogged with an oil/dust mix. We spent hours with varsol and pressure washing trying to clean the fins and hoped for the best, but it it seems we need to do more. These are very thick 8-row rads so crud getting deep into the core is very hard to get out. I'm thinking steam cleaning now.

When's it's running again, I'll take infrared readings of the inlet and outlet temperatures of the two rads to confirm this is the problem.

Regarding the seals, we needed to find seven new seals. I found three seals of the correct size, but the other four were a problem. If the inside diameter fitted the shaft, the outside diameter would be too small. So I ended up getting the seals that fitted on the shaft and buying some mechanical tubing and machining spacer rings to make the seals fit in the housings. I'll post some pics and the seal part numbers for the tiny number of people who care.

Malcolm

[Robin Craig]

Malcolm,

I have to ask, where is your tolerance for having new stock of those seals made again at this point? I do find we are living in an age of new production of many items at very reasonable prices these days.

How is your lighting making out?

[Malcolm Towrie]

Robin,
PM sent.
Malcolm

[Malcolm Towrie]

I installed a nice 12 volt oil priming pump today and got 15 psi at the pressure regulating valve where the oil enters the engine. That should be enough to prime the crank bearings and fill the passages up to the cams and valves before cranking.

Headlights are installed and working and the front and rear sidelights are in progress.

The gearbox and final drives are reassembled with the new seals. We've got to clean up and repaint the gearbox compartment and the gearbox before installation.

The two ammo ready-racks have been overhauled and are ready for installation. These hold two shells each, are located beside the loaders seat, and run on rails over a limited part of the turret ring, presumably for the convenience of the loader when he is scrambling for fresh loads, especially under the floor plates.

Much to my relief, we managed to get a voltage regulator for the main engine generator from Tim Vibert in Australia for a good price. He has a lot of parts for Centurions. I needed this to charge the batteries because ours went missing and we don't plan on installing the auxiliary engine/generator for a while.

Malcolm