Pressure relief ball

[Steve kay]

This may be a silly question to which there will be dozens of "dead easy, just..." but having lifted engine to get access to oil pressure relief valve, removed cover and spring, I am now wondering how to extract the ball. Sticking a magnet over the end of the hole/cylindrical tube into the crankcase has not worked. Is there a quick and easy traditional method, or must the oil pump be taken apart to allow the ball to be pushed out from inside the pump?

[Ruairidh Dunford]

I have always used a small magnet on a telescopic pen.

[Nick Lettington]

If I remember correctly from my physics lessons forty something years ago,  if you put a magnet on one end of a steel rod (pin punch, nail, etc,) the magic transfers to the other end... it might save you having to wait for amazon!

[Steve kay]

Well no matter how many decades ago, physics must have been much more help than a Latin o level ever was! Experiments first thing tomorrow.

[squeak]

compressed air supplied down the oil gauge takeoff hole may do it. keep your eye on the ball !

[David Witton]

If you leave a screwdriver aligned with magnetic north, it will eventually become magnetised. Many of my (ferrous) tools have been magnetised this way because of how they happened to be stored in the workshop aligned this way

[Steve kay]

I did not attempt to align a screwdriver, but attached a long 2BA bolt to a magnet, and withdrew the ball. A rather scabby ball it proved to be, so a replacement should be winging its way to Wales even as I write. Snapping a small ball is beyond the powers of my smartphone, but the ball is certainly neither smooth nor round.

[Nick Lettington]

I'm pleased that the laws of physics have not changed.  I think Latin is useful for some... I gave it up after third year to study physics and Franglais. Mantenant je ne racont pas plus... but I do remember how to conjugate a few Latin verbs in the ablative and how to fish a nut out of a spark plug hole when your magnet is too big to fit...

Next week I'll tell you how I used to tie the spanners to my wrists when fitting the front wings on an A35 all over again.

[David Stepney]

Nick, I always thought that the ablative case was a matter of declension rather than conjugation.

[Nick Lettington]

Nick, I always thought that the ablative case was a matter of declension rather than conjugation.

I'm no cunning linguist, however I do have a very vivid memory of a giant of a man swinging his arm in a massive circle whilst bellowing out "nominative, vocative, accusative, generative, dative, ablative..." and us all chanting back "amo, amas, amat..." beyond that is lost in the mists of time.

I'm fairly certain conjugation is the term for varying the endings of a verb according to person (I, you (singular), they (singular) we, you (plural) they (plural), where as declension is what one does when one finally arrives at one's destination and can finally take relief in the conveniences.

To steal a line form another forumnist, "I'll get my hat"