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28th August 2004 - a final photo
of him before stripping down. The steel trolley he is mounted on is one of two that I made from scrap iron lying around the place and is only intended as a working trolley - as I get an engine it gets mounted on one of these trolleys so that I can start it and generally work on it in comfort. Note also the polished flywheel - I did this while the engine was running with coarse sandpaper just to see what it would look like. Also the new (non original) silencer. Yes - that is a Jaeger 4 inch self priming centrifugal pump lying in the background! |
This is what the casing and parts looked like after about 6 hours of work with a flapwheel on an angle grinder and a grinding tip on a pencil grinder. (After this I said a silent prayer and asked that my next engine have flat sides:-)). At this stage the case was pretty smooth with all casting marks and surface roughness removed. Although I am going to use a filler/primer (MS primer) I do not want it to be too thick. There is no substitute for a good surface to start with. Note the ridge on the magneto mount flange - the centre of this was almost flush with the adjacent casing. I worked on this with a flat file to get a clearly defined line here and it really made a difference once I had completed painting the engine. |
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After the grinding I gave the
whole case a light sandblasting to get a uniform surface for painting.
I used a small "pistol grip type" sandblaster and ordinary white river
sand - the kind we use for plastering (rendering) brick walls with in
South Africa. It is very similar in texture to fine beach sand. At the same time I applied a thin coat of polyester filler (the lighter colour patches in the pic) to a few places. Notice the "masking" - this is normal signmaking self adhesive vinyl. Beg some offcuts at your local sign shop - it is a lot easier than using masking tape and paper and also works a lot better. (I'm lucky in that I own a sign business.) |
| The first coat of primer is
applied. I used MS primer which is a 2K type primer with good filling
properties and gives an excellent base for the final paint. Although it
is capable of filling and smoothing fairly rough surfaces I prefer to
give it a number of lighter coats (often sanding in between with 360 to
600 waterpaper) and building it up slowly as opposed to one or two
heavy coats. |
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Here is the casing ready for
the colour topcoat. I have finished applying a number of light
coats of MS primer and the whole case has been lightly "flatted" with
1200 waterpaper. |
| Another view of parts ready
for colour coat (the tank still needs some work). As I finished
preparing and priming parts they were put one side under cover while I
worked on the other parts. That way I would be ready to paint the
colour coat on all the parts at the same time. |
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Before priming the cylinder
head I bolted it and the top water jacket together with the gasket in
place and ground the outer edges to the same size with an angle
grinder. Thereafter I used the sanding disk shown in the pic to smooth
them and followed this up with an 80 grit flapwheel on a die grinder to
polish them. These two parts never seem to line up on any of the Wolseley's that I have seen and doing this to them really made for a much better looking result in the end. I thought that including the gasket was a nice touch. After this I seperated them, polished the inside of the cylinder head and applied masking and primed them. |
| "Panelbeating" the tank. The
tank had a few dents and these were filled
with polyester body filler after grinding all the paint off. Here I am using a flexible sanding block to shape the filler. As I plan to use a high gloss paint it is important that this is done properly as blemishes, ripples or flat spots will stand out on the finished product. This "filling and sanding" was done quite a few times before I was happy with the result. With the tank being the highest part of the engine it is also the part spectators notice first so it is important that it looks good. |
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Once everything was primed
and I was satisfied with the finish I lightly flatted it all down down
with 1200 grit wet sandpaper. I prefer to hold the paper in my hand for
this and not on a sanding block - just a personal thing - I think it
gives more sensitivity and control to the flatting down. Thereafter i wiped it all down with a "tack cloth" and immediately sprayed the basecoat onto all the parts I decided to use a basecoat / clearcoat paint system. This is a closeup of the gunmetal basecoat after application. The basecoat is the colour and does not have much of a gloss. The clearcoat (which is a 2K type paint) is applied next and provides a high gloss finish. |
| This is a pic of the basecoat
and signage applied to the watertank. It is now ready for the clear
coat. I do the sign by cutting a vinyl stencil and applying this to the surface and spraying it with the correct colour base coat. The stencil is then removed and the lettering lightly sanded with a 1200 grit wet paper just to break the edges and give a smooth (to the touch) finish. After the clear coat has been applied the letters should not be able to be felt when running a finger over them. More about that in another article sometimem |
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Notice the high gloss finish after the clearcoat has been applied. I realise that a lot of collectors will not like this finish - preferring to have a more original finish but "to each his own". Wolseleys are pretty common in South Africa and I feel that this finish attracts a lot more attention from the general public at a show. I have only had this engine at 3 shows and already it has been the reason why, on 2 occassions, farmers have been so impressed that they have given me another engine that was lying in a shed at home. |
| All that remains now is to reassemble the engine and fit
it to the trolley and wheels and this is the final result. An engine that you can be proud to display.  |
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