My Latest Rescue

I needed a quick project last night, so I got back to this.  I thought I had a before picture, but you’ll just have to trust me.  This thing was easily the worst looking engine I’ve ever tried to restore. Seized up solid.  This thing looked like it had literally been left sitting out in someone’s back yard for the last 10 years.  It was miserable.  But, because it looked like trash, I got it for about $12.00 I think.  This is the old venturi body I pulled off:




Luckily, the piston was on an upward stroke, so the cylinder was protected and the inside of the crank also.  I tossed the engine in a jar of glow fuel last month to soak and left it for some future date.  Last night it came out for restoration.  The soak loosened the gunk up enough to get the crank moving and the glow head off, but that’s about it.  A quick trip to the garage and the vise was in order.  I clamped a .09 wrench in the vise, and took a small torch to the backplate to heat things up.  The heat loosened up the backplate and the cylinder for disassembly.  Then it was the normal steps of complete disassembly and cleaning after another few hours in the mason jar.  The piston rod was very loose in the ball joint, so it got a reset also.  I thought about polishing up the metal, and may in the future, but settled for buffing it out with a Scotch-Brite pad.  Since MECOA is out of venturi bodies, I used up my last NOS .09 venturi body to reassemble this.  Now to just find time to test run this puppy.  Luckily, the glow head is still good.





The Trustworthy Mark