Watch Your Step. This Place Can Be A Little Rough.

We are marching ever forward, though sometimes I feel like we're standing still. I've made a little bit of progress on a lot of things. First, the front and rear wheel supports have finally been mounted to the frame!

Now we just need mountable wheels! 🤔 The front wheels are still a bit of a question mark, so I worked on the rear wheel. I tried rebuilding the 26" rear wheel to use a rear hub (the tire originally had a front hub). It wasn't too bad for my first time. I watched a video on building bicycle wheels a few times and referred to it while working.

Then an issue revealed itself. The video I watched was for a regular wheel, but we're using fat wheels on the Falcon. The spoke pattern is slightly different than a regular wheel. Suddenly, I was lost and the wheel was in pieces.

Luckily, I had two of these tires. The second wheel was a great guide for placing the spokes correctly into the rim. And I was able to finish installing the spokes. However, the original spokes turned out to be about 10mm too long for the new hub.

I had measured and compared the original and new hubs and thought it would work, but I thought wrong. And so it goes with kinetic sculptures: expect modifications to the modifications. New, shorter spokes were ordered. And I rebuilt the wheel with the correctly sized spokes.

Now I have to true it. There is a truing stand in Lowell Makes' Bike Shop and videos on how to use it on YouTube. Once it is balanced, I will finally be ready to mount the rear wheel!! Yay!

Stiff Knuckles

I also addressed the problem of the stiff knuckles on the front, left side. The knuckles allow the wheels to change direction while allowing the wheel to spin. This is key to the front-wheel steering. I discovered during the first dry-fit that the front suspension had warped a bit during welding and the space where the knuckle sits shrank by .150".

The knuckle brackets have ledges where the bearing plate attaches. At first, I thought I could mill those ledges down, but I realized that wouldn't work. Doing that would also require modifying the bearing plate. Too much work.

Instead, I lowered the counterbores on top of the brackets. I hesitated doing it this way initially, because I thought it would be harder. But it only took 5 minutes to make the change to the 3D model and another 5 minutes to run the update on the Tormach. Easy Pease.

The knuckle moves so well now that I'm going to do the same thing to the knuckle brackets on the right side.

Hyperdrive Assembly

We made some strides on the Hyperdrive, the heart of the Falcon's drive train.

I finished making the pulley frame and additional parts on the Tormach last week.

All the bearing cups were pressed into the frame and tensioner blocks. Our machine shop captain then welded the cups to the frames.

After welding, I pressed the bearings into the tensioner blocks to confirm that the axles actually fit through the blocks. So far, so good.

I also drilled 1/2" holes into all the pulleys, so they can be mounted on the bearings.

However, I realized while I was doing this that the pulleys do NOT have set screws. This means they cannot currently be locked to the axle. smh. I've been staring at these things for months--MONTHS--and still I missed it. Sigh. It's not world-ending. I just had to drill and tap holes in the pulleys for set screws. But it's another step that takes time.

I almost finished putting set screws into all the pulleys, but then I managed to break two taps in two minutes. And it broke low in the holes I was tapping, so they are sticking slightly into the axle hole. Now I have to drill out those holes to remove the offending tap material. Yet another step.

Differential Alignment

Also during the first dry-fit, I mounted the bushing plates I designed for the modified lawnmower differential. I eventually got it to spin freely, but I had to tune its alignment like a drum--turning nuts a bit at a time while checking the spin. The alignment was so sensitive that I know road conditions would definitely knock the differential out of tune.

I realized that all the bushings had to sit on a common surface. They would then stay aligned to each other without needing fine adjustment. This is actually how the original differential case works, so that should have been a clue.

I then designed a single plate that attaches to the existing brackets and has mounting holes for all the bushing blocks. But it couldn't just be a plate with holes in it, right? It had to feel a little more Falcon than that.

Once I was happy with the new design, I used the Tormach to make it.

Because the shafts are longer than the mounting area, I had to first place the bushings on the shafts and then bolt the bushings to the plate. It works pretty well now. There's still a slight stiffness, but I think lubrication will correct that.

After this test fit, I had to take the differential off one more time, all because of Marisa Tomei.

My Cousin Vinny was on the other day. Marisa Tomei is giving her testimony that saves Vinny's cousin and it ended up saving me, too.

LOL, she's right. The Falcon has a regular differential. So, the Falcon's front tires will do the same thing as a '64 Buick Skylark. One wheel will spin while the other one does nothing. Well, we can't do a limited-slip differential, but we can do a locking differential.

To make it spin like one solid axle (locking), I modified the design of the sprocket adapter plate (the plate bolted on the left side of the sprocket in the image above). I added another hub on that side then drilled and tapped holes for a set screw.

Now when I want to turn the Falcon into a mud crawler, I just need to screw down the set screw and Viola! And it's all thanks to Marisa Tomei! 😁

Watch Your Step. This Place Can Be A Little Rough.