Wheeling machines etc

cardiffrob · Post by **cardiffrob** » Tue Dec 08, 2009 2:05 pm

I've been making panel beating tools to have a crack at wheeling some cowling parts. I've scoured Youtube and read a few articles (inc. the one on the Isaacs Fury cowlings. Phooooaaar!) and have decided that it is possible for me to make something workable.

I was wondering if anyone had any good practical tips or links to suitable websites where I can get a few more pointers. Any good books you could recommend?

Also, any tips on annealing and hardening ali sheets and which sheet to use?

Thanks

Rob

G-AWMN · Post by **G-AWMN** » Tue Dec 08, 2009 2:50 pm

Rob,

I think I am one step further on than you. I have just purchased an English wheel from Justin Baker www.justinbaker.co.uk I purchased the Raptor 2000 in kit form. After a lot of thought decided at £299 I would go ahead and if all fails can always cut my losses on ebay.

Hopfully you can see my efforts at next years LAA national rally.

I have had the machine about 2 weeks and the only advice so far is it looks a lot easier when watching the video's!

Can I suggest that if you go ahead and give this a try that you carefully select the grade of Aluminium sheet you buy as this varies from soft to hard and obviously the harder the harder if you get what I mean.

Annealing aluminium alloy is a bit of an art. You need to heat the material to about 400 degrees C and then let it cool slowly. Cooling in the workshop should be fine. Obviously care has to be taken to avoid overheating or you will end up with a bit of a mess. Two methods to try. Rub a light coating of soap on the material and heat from underneath with a blow lamp, at the approximate right temp the soap will turn black. Method two is to heat with a blow lamp and keep testing the temp by rubbing with the wood part of a match stick, when this starts to leave a black trail/mark you are hot enough.

As far as hardening is concerned this will probably not be required as the material will probably work and age harden as you go.

I am based in Essex so probably a bit far for you to visit but you are always welcome to come and give it a try. Perhaps we can suggest this for the next LAA course. Good luck if you do give this a try and I look forward to reading all the other advice.

Stuart Penfold

cardiffrob · Post by **cardiffrob** » Tue Dec 08, 2009 3:18 pm

That is the same one I was looking at. I went to see a 'version 1' model and the top bearing had failed and had become quite floppy. The bottom wheels had a coating of rust on them but it still sold for £170+£30 p&p, so I'd guess you wouldn't lose much.
JLB hasn't responded to my calls although his wife says they've run out of self-build ones. I'll try him again later.

Thanks.

PS Got any pics of your progress so far?

ColinC · Post by **ColinC** » Tue Dec 08, 2009 9:38 pm

Stuart/Rob,

I booked onto one of the LAA metalwork courses a while back before the content was well defined and was a bit disappointed that it was more oriented towards the RV builders than general metalwork. Good nonetheless, but not entirely what I wanted.

Perhaps we could get the LAA to show some interest in running something more related to 'sheet-metal bashing' this winter. Would you be game?

Colin

cardiffrob · Post by **cardiffrob** » Wed Dec 09, 2009 8:29 am

I'm going to call Justin Baker again today. Since he is into Wheeling in a big way and used to work on aircraft, he might be a good person to run a course.
I've ordered a machine and it should be here within a week. I've had a go at making a curved panel and have facbricated a bloomin' great Oak mallet and some metal-bashing hammers. The first curved piece was made by shrinking only and no stretching at all of the panel. I made a pair of 'shrinking tongs' to pleat the edges and then squashed them in to shrink the outermost inch of the sheet. After an hour of light planishing of the resultant surface imperfections it made a reasonable 1/4 bowl shape. It is actually a bit better in real life than the photo portrays. If I could double that piece then I've got the front of the top cowl finished!

The original cowling....
http://i82.photobucket.com/albums/j279/ ... ished1.jpg

At present, in GRP........
http://i82.photobucket.com/albums/j279/ ... 000542.jpg

Rob Swain · Post by **Rob Swain** » Wed Dec 09, 2009 10:52 am

ColinC wrote:I booked onto one of the LAA metalwork courses a while back before the content was well defined and was a bit disappointed that it was more oriented towards the RV builders than general metalwork. Good nonetheless, but not entirely what I wanted.

I did the course last winter (the second one, I think) and found it very good.

Admittedly it is primarily aimed at kit RV building, and pre-punched kits at that, but it covered all the bases for that very well with the right mix of theory and practical work.
The particular 'black art' it covers very, very well is solid rivetting, and a lot of the panel preparation for solid rivets also applies to pulled ones, so much of what is learned can also be applied to Zenairs, Sonexes etc.
To be honest I don't think you could really do a better course in a single day, and it was very reasonably priced (well I think it was anyway).

Many aluminium aircraft are built with essentially flat sheets in single plane curves and rivetted together (including C152 and 172s - just look at them carefully) so in that respect the course covers much of what you would need to know to build or renovate an aly aircraft. In the light of that I would say that the course does indeed cover 'general metalwork' for aircraft.

A metal forming, wheeling and panel bashing course would be good, but I do wonder if it could be run on the same basis as the current course, in a class format. I think it would need to be more of a 1:1 course, and I do wonder how accomplished you would actually be at the end of the course itself. Expensive but it would be interesting though...

Brian Hope · Post by **Brian Hope** » Wed Dec 09, 2009 12:33 pm

Hi all, I have arranged a course at Turweston on Saturday 6th February. Space for 6 delegates, all will have use of a machine as it is intended to be a hands-on day. £95 each, and Justin will have a special price if anybody decides thay would like to take their machine home with them.
More details in the next magazine but if you want to reserve a slot ring the office and and make a booking.

G-AWMN · Post by **G-AWMN** » Wed Dec 09, 2009 3:50 pm

Only had my machine a couple of weeks and as yet I do not have any parts that I am willing to share with the forum. Hopfully this will change after this weekend! Rob, I am impressed with the mallet amd hammer. Well done.

I have rung the office and booked my place on the course. Have the machine might as well learn how to use it properly.

Stuart Penfold

cardiffrob · Post by **cardiffrob** » Wed Dec 09, 2009 3:55 pm

Aaaaaaargh. On longhaul that day. Bu66er!

Can it be videoed?

cardiffrob · Post by **cardiffrob** » Thu Dec 10, 2009 9:08 am

My machine is in the post!

I've also had a chat with Justin and he might also be able to run another course if there is enough interest. I'm off work until the 24th of January (Hint hint)

Nigel Ramsay · Post by **Nigel Ramsay** » Thu Dec 10, 2009 11:53 am

I've just booked onto this course. There's ONE place left I'm told!

In fact, I worked at Rolls-Royce with Justin and got to know about his wheeling machines there. T'was I who persuaded him to exhibit at Sywell as I knew it would raise a lot of interest. We suggested he run a course and I'm glad Brian chased this up because it seriously adds to our required skillset. Also, you won't meet a nicer fellow!

Take a closer look here at http://www.justinbaker.co.uk/

Rob Swain · Post by **Rob Swain** » Thu Dec 10, 2009 2:14 pm

Brian Hope wrote:Hi all, I have arranged a course at Turweston on Saturday 6th February. Space for 6 delegates, all will have use of a machine as it is intended to be a hands-on day. £95 each, and Justin will have a special price if anybody decides thay would like to take their machine home with them.
More details in the next magazine but if you want to reserve a slot ring the office and and make a booking.

I stand corrected as regards how the course can/will be run.

I have no need for this course at the moment (Avionics is next one for me in Jan) but thanks are still due to Brian for organising it. Hopefully it will be available in the future should I have need of it.

Thanks for your sterling work on getting all the courses up and running, Brian.

cardiffrob · Post by **cardiffrob** » Thu Dec 10, 2009 6:28 pm

If I've understood this correctly, 1200H4 is a good all-round material for a cowling and 2014 series material is more robust but not wledable. Does that sound right?

ColinC · Post by **ColinC** » Fri Dec 11, 2009 1:50 pm

I just phoned and booked places for a friend and I. Am quite looking forward to this one.

There is still one place left I understand.

Colin

cardiffrob · Post by **cardiffrob** » Wed Dec 16, 2009 4:13 pm

I've got the wheeling machine up and running. It took about a day of work to assemble it. No big problems if you have small fingers and 2 working hands.
The first attempt at a cowling is almost good enough to fit if it had a polish, although I did cut it out just a little too small at the front so I'll need to redo it with a better allowance for the change in shape that comes from wheeling (just down to experience, I guess)
The finish on it is bare and uncleaned/unpolished, straight off the wheel.
All this folklore about it being a black art is not entirely true. I did all this curvature without touching a hammer so I could've made it even more curved if I'd have started with a bowl shape bashed out beforehand. I can see that an Aston Martin finish and shape would take a long time to perfect but I've got the feeling that, at the current rate of progress, I'll be able to finish the aircraft cowls and maybe even re-body my Austin 7.

PS Justin Baker. Top class workmanship and an extremely nice bloke to chat to on the phone.

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Wheeling machines etc

Wheeling machines etc