Transfer port glues same as rotary valve surround tunnel?
Does anyone know what was used as the glue for Anzani transfer ports covers? It looks quite different but the same or similar color that the rotary valve center bearing surround tunnel has in it that shows signs of shrinkage and getting loose. That stuff shrank in the surround tunnel and chips out kind of chalky as if either a filler put in or some related product? Jim Hallum does not recall and I am ready to use JB Weld epoxy in quantity and wonder if there is a similar or better product I should be using. This engine a full 350CC and not a 322cc and is going to be the modernized runner not just restored so doing it absolutely right with the best is absolutely necessary the first time.
The other thing is whether the stuffing of the transfer tunnel is necessary as that surround tunnel has cooling aspects from the air/fuel that reduce once that tunnel is filled and blocked? It seems just the stock gassers left that alone but not so on any of the Alkys, they were all blocked and sealed.
Those tapered pins in cranks are still something else...
Smitty, crankshafts and why they did that would be as good as A Konig why's and where fors as eventually Harrison cranks with Konig rods were put in some hybrid Anzanis crankcases and cast iron blocks that worked real good too.
What the perpetual question to me is why did they ever put tapered pin ends to anchor the big ends in the crankplates of Anzani semi porkchop one side full circle other side per crankshaft side per cylinder ?
Did they not have an inkling back then that someone was going to try to stretch the motor's power as it seemed a while later that Bill Tenney, then from Crystal Bay, Minnesota was already showing up and with others too doing just that with methanol fuels and nitromethane?
Of course with things already happening real fast in North America in particular right in the midwestern USA in terms of full A and B Alky heat racing entries to get to finals there were lots of (dozens) Anzanis running Alky and setting speed and performance marks. Racers already had twisted out of phase crank problems by then so why did they persist using tapered pins until the company stopped producing parts? Would the re-engineering been that hard to do to use straight pin ends, straight crank pin crankshaft plate holes? They sure had the warnings and the time to effect change by look of things but didn't. I hear that there was a second generation more heavy duty crankshaft in the works but have not seen one or if they ever got out before the Anzani line ended. None of the crankshaft parts here allude to a generational change.
When I was tossing around the verticle coupler aluminum castings here not knowing what they were and even thinking of using them as soft bench vice anvils, it was UK's BRF member, Twister who brought up that the only way they could have coupled 2 Anzani crankshafts vertically end to end would be to flip a bottom square stubbed plate on and use it as a crankshaft top to then couple 2 square ends together to keep firing 4 cylinders at 180 degrees. Or in alternative the coupler and crankshaft orientation could be set to fire every 90 degrees vertically.
In this awful cold I went into the garage to check this out and found the measurements of both aluminum maching parts were of the heights required to machine adapters for crankcase to crankcase and exhaust to exhaust coupling and stub to stub the measurement was there in the aluminum. The other thing that seem to confirm the way Tenney appeared to be going was the couplers he had ready to go for such a mating were there and a real good fit. Still this is ticklish machine work and coupling tolerances involved here to go this direction only a journeyman machinist should attempt. I in no way could attempt this and would sure be there looking and learning over his shoulder even it was just to see this done just once.
Harry's little notes and diagrams
Wayne:
That is really neat for you to post one of Harry's notes/diagrams that he used to send out with parts/motors being returned to their owners. If I have heard it once, I have heard it hundreds of times about him, from many different boat racers, some who had many, many different jobs done by him, and some only one. The common thread was always the following comment: "Did you ever see the little notes he always sent along with whatever he was returning to you?" I have many still in a box as I know others do also. Would be great if they could be published in some type of library, so folks could see, who never knew him, just how great he was in what he did. Some engineering drawings I have seen do not have the detail that his "notes" do.
Smitty:
Regards the Model 80 Crank and Harry's thought's the first time he saw one:
I do remember his comments about the engine, as I knew him very well at that time. He was VERY complementary of the construction of the engine, especially the basic design for what it was being used for, i.e. the paramutual racing and betting in Japan. Because the penalty was high if an engine failed in one of the races over there, the engine was WAY overbuilt, and UNDER sized as far as intake (carb and reed valve size) so that it would last forever as it was run over there. The carb size and restricted intake tract really limited the max RPM the engine would turn, in the way it was designed and built to last forever in it's stock condition. He took an engine that I believe McKean furnished (could have been Tom Ige) and made a complete "cutaway model" showing the interior of the complete engine including the ignition, exhaust, intake tract, porting arrangement, etc., that allowed anyone interested to view the interior of the engine and see the quality way it was built. I often wondered what happened to that engine, as it was very well done. Perhaps it was shipped back to Japan eventually.
The basic rule structure for what came to be known as Formula 350 insofar as rule structure mechanically, was devised by he and I in conversations, as I was on the PRO commission at the time and was on the committee that wrote the rules for the class. Four years later we also collaborated on the rules for RB, as the PRO category wanted a class for those competitors to go on to so we did not lose them to another category. We also added a "claiming rule" to discourage internal tinkering with the engine. If I remember right, the claiming price was just under or the same as an engine was selling for in that time frame, or 475.00 including steering bar and a two blade brass prop. If an engine was claimed from another competitor, the "claimer" had to also pay the freight on another engine to the "claimee". Somewhere around here I think I still have the orginal version of the rules written for the class at that time.
There was Wakefield as well Harry called and we had long talks
About a year before Harry Brinkman (Brinkman and "ZAK" (Pasterzak) are/were 2 different people who passed away in different periods of time for those that don't know as some don't know and never heard) passed away he called me to have a very long disccussions about 30H Merc based C-Modifieds in particular seeing I was intersted in boosting the performance on the 2 here. It was not the first time I talked to him, I took interest as many did and if you were interested so was he. I bought his book too in the 1990s that you could only respect was without question and automatic what was advised there. There was so much covered time seemed to stand still with him but was in fact a very long period. Fully half of the time was spend on the Anzanis because he was clearly interested with what they were all about seeing there are restorations going on here.
We very much got into Mercury 4 cylinder crankshafts in general and later specifically into Anzani multipart cranks. He was concerned that I might not have and use all the right techniques, tools & the making up and using some alignmet tools and presses to do them which led to some extra tool acquistions too to make the work so much easier. He also went over how he would do them knowing I was dealing with tapered ended big end pins in a semi pork chop semi full circle combo crank. It was all extremely informative and changed my approaches to doing them in fact simplifying it all once he got through with me for good. Where he got all this who was I to question, I just absorbed it all from him.
We also got very much into expansion chambers exhausts because he got them to work impressively on Mer 30Hs in particular the C-Modified runabout entries. His very successful C-Mod engines he was very pround of are still out there winning races in other drivers ownerships and hands. He also took interest in the planning of expansion chambers in progress for Anzani on gas and somewhat different ones for for Alky leaving out any nitromethane. He knew about their noteriety in terms of Anzanis twisting the tapered pin cranks out of phase making them tighten up enough to stop any rotation in the crankcase. It was as easy throwing the crankshafts off as tightening the flywheel down with wrong methods or priming a cylinder with too much fuel hydralicing the crankshaft out without bending or breaking other parts, the pin would simply change position in the crankplate knocking the crank out of wack. He advised being patient with them and not to do dumb shortcut methods or ways of doing things right down to starting and running the engines.
The previous times I taked to him was at Wakefield Nationals. This last longish phone call would be the last one I would ever have with him. He sure went out of his way to help and point out. He is an example to me of a man who could and would share what he knew with others and that is just what he did with me back then. They were all great experiences.