I didn't get as much done in the shop over the weekend as I had originally planned due to the fact that my son bought a non-running 02 Duramax truck Friday night and I was helping him to diagnose it for a while Saturday morning. I will admit though, I was enjoying my Saturday. It rained here all day and my son and I were working in the shop with the radio on and goofing around and I really enjoyed helping him on his new to him truck. Days like that are hard to come by as he gets older and has a life of his own with school, work and friends. I cherish those times I get to spend with him more and more as I get older. I don't know what I will do when he moves out on his own.
Anyway, I had a couple of projects that I was working on and then when he needed a hand or had a question I would drop and help him. I didn't get anything completed on Saturday but screw it, I had the best Saturday I have had in a while. I didn't want the day to end, we opened up the shop and started a 8:00 am and finally went in the house @ 6:30pm when my wife informed us that dinner was ready. Didn't get either project done so I finished them up Monday night.
I had a blind that came crashing down in our coach the week before when my wife and I took a quick trip up to West Yellowstone and met some friends for a long weekend. The road between Ashton, ID and Island Park, ID has been under construction for nearly a year now and although they are getting closer it is still a mess. There is about an 8" drop off from the new pavement to the old within about a 3' taper with the "BUMP" sign placed about 10' before the drop off. Then again coming back up to grade about a quarter of a mile further, 8" rise in about 3' with the "BUMP" sign right AT the bump this time. A 40k pound coach doesn't like that very much.
Upon the drop off the co-pilot Carefree power blind came crashing down and put a nice little nick in my dash as well as scared the crap out of my wife and I. I found a wide spot to pull over and removed it until we got to the campground. Upon inspection the plastic tab on the end was allowed to flex which pulled it out from under the screw head. I could have merely reinstalled in and been fine but that isn't the way I do things. The coach has 95k miles on it now and has never given me a problem but I want to make sure it NEVER comes down again.
I used a piece of 2"x3"x1/4" wall aluminum square tubing to make the new mount. I figured I may as well make two of them and redo the driver's side as well before it does the same thing. Here I trued up the piece of tubing.
I cut the little plastic ear off of the end of the blind, near the motor.
And here is the new mount machined and installed on the blind. I used the same screw holes as original I just replaced the screws with slightly longer ones.
I rehung the blinds in the coach and they feel much more secure than prior. Hopefully I will never have that issue again.
Next up was a Magnuson supercharger that a guy brought me off of his Honda Civic that he races. Evidently the pulley was loose on the shaft and it took out the keyseat and woodruff key. He brought me just the front half of the supercharger so I had to press the shaft out of the front housing.
Here is what the keyseat in the shaft looked like.
Pressed the input shaft apart. The end that drives the internal gears and the bearing press off.
Shaft, drive end and bearing pressed apart.
The pulley keyway was buggered up as well. However, this was some crap aluminum, I am guessing some form of 30xx series aluminum because it didn't want to weld for crap. Originally I had thought I would weld it up and then broach a new 1/8" keyway in it. Well I had to regroup and go to plan "B". There was .018" clearance between the shaft OD and pulley ID so the clearance had to be taken up somehow. I thought about machining a sleeve and then boring the pulley and pressing the sleeve into it but once I broached the keyway that would weaken it considerably. I then decided seeing as how I had to weld up the damaged woodruff keyseat in the shaft, I may as well build up the diameter of the shaft and turn it down to match the pulley.
Masked and beadblasted prior to breaking out the TIG welder.
First pass, root of the keyseat.
Second pass I did a weave pass to try to completely cover the worn keyseat.
I then proceeded around the entire shaft in increments to avoid getting too hot. Building up the shaft using ER-70S2 TIG rod.
In between helping my son and heating up the shaft, I trued up the bore in the pulley due to it being worn uneven.
Then got out the broach set and found the correct size.
Then broached a 3/16" keyway in the pulley.
Pulley complete.
After the shaft had cooled I turned it down to a couple thousandths less than the bore of the pulley.
Set it up in the mill vise in preparation for cutting the keyseat.
Found center of the shaft, zeroed the knee and took a .010" test cut on the shaft.
Keyseat complete.
Cut a piece of keystock and inserted it for test fit.
Test fit pulley, keystock and shaft as an assembly.
Pressed the bearing back on the shaft, the drive end on the shaft and pressed the input shaft assembly into the front housing. Then installed the pulley and keystock.
Unit complete and ready to call the client to pick it up.
