Early Radiator construction

[Marcus Ling]

Thanks Steve,

If you look on the gallery on the Replicore site they seem to be using copper tubes.

There are some fabulous examples of the projects they have completed, a lot of Warbird radiators and oil coolers and some wonderful car ones, although they would be very expensive to produce.

https://www.replicore.co.nz/gallery

[Tony Griffiths]

Hi Lance,

Thank you very much for measuring the hexagon.

Sorry I didn't explain very well what I meant by "inside tube" what I should have said is the inside diameter of the round portion of the tube inside the hexagon where the tube hasn't been flared on the ends. The section where I have put the red arrow on the drawing below if possible please.



Tony Betts has put the description of the method the guy used to build a radiator for his Brough, he used Brass tubes although most of the honeycomb radiators I have seen use copper tubes, do you happen to know whether your tubes are brass or copper ?

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Hi Tony,

Thanks for posting the information on the guy building the Brough radiator. While there was a lot of effort building the core, I suspect there may have been the same or more building the header tanks and fittings. I'm certain he takes, and so he should, a lot of pride in the finished product.

I'm not suggesting I want to build a honeycomb core, I'm just trying to see if there is any confirmation of the books that say the early cars had tube honeycomb radiators and if so how long did that continue before it changed to film radiators.

However, for me, the enjoyment of old cars is learning new skills even if they were once commonplace. I had the chance to buy a set of whitemetal pouring moulds and a conrod boring machine. We have had a few false starts but we now are confident in the pouring of whitemetal bearings helped by a local forum member who spent a lot of his working life doing this type of work. I hope its a skill which can be spread to a number of other people in the A7 movement locally to keep the skill going and a service for members who need it for their cars.

Here's an interesting machine (and associated story) about a con-rod borer: http://www.lathes.co.uk/cuthbert/

[Charles P]

A con rod borer converted to a lathe. As you say, scarcity forces creativity.

I for one would like to make a small step in the other direction and find a con rod boring jig for my lathe!

Charles

[Marcus Ling]

Thanks Tony,
That's a very interesting adaptation on the machine. The one I have locally is made by Automotive Maintenance Machinery Co of North Chicago Illinois.

[Bob Culver]

I am still curious how presumably more or less strright fim can be formed to present a true honeycomb apperance. On a true honeycomb each side of the hexagon is double thickness. I presume the film type is sealed behind the honeycomb. Are just the vertical sides double?

[Colin Swinbourne]

Don’t know if anyone has come across these people before- some interesting insight into the construction of the film type honeycomb radiators.

https://ftrs.com.au/honey/make_a_core.php

[squeak]

Thanks for the link, entertaining account of the red bull billycart derby, Karma !

[Tony Griffiths]

A con rod borer converted to a lathe. As  you say, scarcity forces creativity.

I for one would like to make a small step in the other direction and find a con rod boring jig for my lathe!

Charles

There's a unit shown in several pictures on this page that can be adapted to most lathes with a T-slotted cross slide: http://www.lathes.co.uk/drummondaccessories/ 
My first lathe was an M-Type Drummond and over time I managed to collect every accessory ever made - save for the con-rod boring jig. Have succumbed to an offer for the whole kit and sold it, guess what turned up on the following Saturday amonst a pile of machine-tool junk? Yes, the missing item.

[Charles P]

A con rod borer converted to a lathe. As  you say, scarcity forces creativity.

I for one would like to make a small step in the other direction and find a con rod boring jig for my lathe!

Charles

There's a unit shown in several pictures on this page that can be adapted to most lathes with a T-slotted cross slide: http://www.lathes.co.uk/drummondaccessories/ 
My first lathe was an M-Type Drummond and over time I managed to collect every accessory ever made - save for the con-rod boring jig. Have succumbed to an offer for the whole kit and sold it, guess what turned up on the following Saturday amonst a pile of machine-tool junk? Yes, the missing item.

My first lathe was an M type as well and whilst I didn't manage to collect such an array of accessories before moving to a Kerry 1124 I still reckon that the M Type is a fabulous small lathe.
I don't have a T slotted cross slide on my CVA but would happily engineer a solution if I'm ever lucky enough to stumble across a con rod attachment. 


Charles

[Robert Foreman]

Charles, 
  It's pretty straightforward to bore rods in the mill or with a setup in the lathe.