Lister D Stationary Engine

Beyond the mankyness that doesn't look half bad at all

Looks like great fun, and I am very much enjoying reading all the updates. I am very tempted by something like this but already have too many projects...

The top of the block came up nice (enough) as well





Head gaskets are readily available ,there's a choice of copper like the original or
a cheap (£8) composite one.
It not going to be turbo'd so cheap one it is :






The rockers shafts were cleaned up.


After I took that pic I cracked loose the adjusters and pulled them out and clean the threads up .
Under all the gunge everything is looking in quite good nick really .

Head back on and torqued down and rocker shaft back in .
Quite a transformation !!!


Lubed up and ready to go


The rocker assembly is lubed by the brass grease cap on the side of the case that you turn in to  force the grease through the shaft and out of holes under the rockers .

Compression achieved !!! quite a lot as well !!

Carb next , it was in a right state .

no. It looks more like inlet gasket than a head gasket .
I can only assume the compression/heat/timing is so low that is doesn't need
a "normal" head gasket. I've not heard of any one having running problems with this type, I've seen folks having problems getting the head off when they've had a composite one fitted for a bit ...but hopefully I won't have to do that for a while .

After I had compression and fuel sorted next was spark..it had none .
The plug was rusty and super old school so I bought a new one .
I could hold the HT lead whilst spinning it over and there was a tiny tickle but curse word all really.
Everyone says the mag coils go when they've been sitting for years ...and the condenser.
Here's the old coils and condensor :




Looks a bit swollen maybe ??

here's the points :



I gave them a file and they're good to go .

I found a chap on ebay that was doing rewound magneto coils for Lucas RS 1.2 ( which is what I have ) and had to bite the bullet and fork out £70 for a new one ...which was a bit harsh but I got the engine for nothing so I could justify it ...sort of . he had condensers as well and a new HT lead so I got everything I needed.
Here's the new gubbins:






The little output nipple was in the the wrong place on the new one which got me for a bit , I had to modify the cap to get it to contact.

With all that done ...fuel,valves ,plug,spark there was nothing to stop it firing !!!

All that was left was to just give it a spin ...and hey presto...
it fired on the first try . This vid was legit the second try where it ran for more than a second :



That was a proper result .

Where a little one showing the mag chain :


That how she sits right now , I start it up every could of weeks and watch it for a bit   .
I've had water in it a couple of times and run it for half an hour to see what happens when it get properly up to temp but
it'll run for 5 mins without water and still be barely warm .
I need to get something for it to do to give it a bit of load.

Got a new toy !
Frankenhealey yours is a bit nicer than mine !!!

 It's a Lister domestic water pump .


She's rough but not seized . I think I'll do this one shiny and green and mount it to the trolley.
 I got it for free from my cool old horder collector uncle ...got a couple of other bits off him too :



Who doesn't love a MAMOD traction engine ,an old grease gun and some dinky VW's !!!!

I've done a bunch of work to my lister pump .
It wasn't looking too good initially:







But it  got a bit better once everything started getting cleaned up. I thought the valve plate was going to be destroyed but it's all made of brass, all the rust was from the inside of the top bell bit ( which is about 10mm thick cast iron)


I pulled the whole thing completely apart







Some of the bolts needed a few day soaking and heat but it all came apart in the end.
It all got either blasted or wire bush stripped then rust converted and painted with enamel "mid Brunswick" green(lister green)

I did the top hat bit first to test the process






Looked good .

Long story short...everything got cleaned stripped, rust treatment where needed and painted green.

Here's the main body treated,masked and ready for paint :



All the bits painted:

You can see the rebuilt valve plate and new gasket set .

Here's the body in paint :


Everything had 3 coats with a day in-between .


When it was all dry ( enough) . I finished cleaning up all the internals and started re assembly .


The water piston got a new pair of leather cups that were soaked in veg oil prior to fitting .



and all together:





and finished:




On to the old wooden trolley next so I can mount the engine and pump together to run .
Annoyingly, I think the pump needs to spin the wrong way to just sit next to the engine...will have to check that and come up with a solution .