Hello & Thanks

[LeChatNoir]

I wanted to finally join so that I could make an introduction and post a hearty "Thank You" to all the members of this forum. 

First, a brief introduction.  My screen name was given to me years ago by a friend who felt it appropriate since my two shop cats were coal dust black.  I've used it on other forums for so long that I see no need to change it now.  At least it will make for continuity in web-presence, I guess.  I work a lot in metal, with a focus on blacksmithing and machining.  Hmmm... when I type that out, it seems an odd combination, but there you go.  Odd and yet sums me up.

I've lurked here for a while reading and reading in preparation for getting a Changfoid ZS195.  I've watched the smaller Hp ones drop off in availability over the past two years and figured the time to jump was pretty much now or never.  So there's one sitting in the shop and I'm tickled.

Thanks to you lot and the wealth of information in this forum, I was able to go through the engine, inspect and correct any problems that I found.  I discovered the upper counter weight was 180 degrees out of time, a bit too much endplay in the crankshaft, and (Yikes!) a loose flywheel nut.  The latter was found after tracking down a quite peculiar noise that wound up being the flywheel slapping back and forth against the key with each power stroke and echoing the *clunk* around within the cast iron gut of the engine.  Oh, and the radiator was the first thing to come off after the initial inspection and a thermosiphoning evaporative cooling system has been roughed out and seems to be working great.

Other that those problems, which honestly seems to be due to a hasty assembly of a what seems to be an otherwise well made engine, things are looking good.  The new addition is purring along happily and smoothly... well... as smoothly as a single cylinder diesel can at least. 

So Thanks again to each of you.  I'll be around and popping in and out.  Numerous projects on the table, but I felt it time to speak up and be a part of things.

LCN

[billswan]

welcome aboard LeChatNoir

Good to know this forum helped you out.

Billswan

[rcavictim]

Welcome!  You got lucky with that loose crankshaft to flywheel nut.  Same happened to me on a JD175 and just 45 seconds of running cost me a entire crankshaft replacement.  Split and peeled the crank where the key was.

[LeChatNoir]

...Split and peeled the crank where the key was.

Oh, my... that's awful.

The nut had it's lock ring bent over as if it was properly adjusted, so I never thought about it until I tracked down the noise.  The taper on the crankshaft had some galling on it, but nothing that couldn't be stoned off. You make me feel very thankful RCA.  Also that I should remove the flywheel nut and use some locktite on it, even though I put the lockring back on and bent it over properly.  I think that's the project of the evening.

[rcavictim]

Luckily my flywheel was still good enough to re-use despite a huge amount of metal dust come out of the taper area in just a few seconds.  Just to be sure, as you suggest, I used locktite when I installed it back onto the brand new crankshaft and made sure the nut was tight.  It has been trouble free since however I have not tried to remove it yet.  I recently had a small end bearing failure and left the flywheel attached to the crank when I removed the crank.