Armour Dreams

[Jonathan Moore]

I have been busy making the track return roller hubs. As usual, I have been using materials that are locally available, rather than ordering specific sized materials, so a little bit of adaption is required. The main hub starts as a piece of tube cut and machined to length, then a flange is welded in each end of the tube and then set on the lathe so that the rings can be bored out to suit the centre bearing housing. This bearing housing is then welded in place. A ring is then welded on to the outside of one end of the tube for two reasons. Firstly to give the impression that the material is thicker and closer to the originals dimensions and secondly to give the polyurethane tyres something to bond to when I cast them in place. This assembly is the reset on the lathe and bored out to the bearing diameter size and correct internal lengths. A separate ring is then welded on to the opposite end of the hub, for the same reasons as the first. Reset on the lathe and then again faced to the correct lengths. Each time the hub is reset in the lathe, for each operation, it has to be adjusted so that the assembly rotates true to within 0.02mm, so you can see its a time consuming process.