[arnie]

Don't know if anyone is interested in what these cylinders look like apart but here are some pictures of one that the ram broke so I wasn't out anything but time to see what was the problem. POOR weld from manufacture.

(Message edited by kkortman112 on December 01, 2010)

 

[alan]

In some of these cylinders, maybe it depends on the date of manufacture, the pushrod was not welded to the piston. It was retained by mushrooming the hollow end of the pushrod, riveting the two parts together. IMO, it is chancey welding the piston to the pushrod. The pushrods are usually quite hard, the pistons are probably just cold rolled, mild steel stock. That does not make for a good weld. I have one of the riveted kind apart now, it was the rockshaft cylinder on my 400. In the next few days I will be opening up a lift cylinder from a 49 blower, it will be interesting to see how that one was assembled.

 

[arnie]

Alan, I would like to see some pictures of what you find. this one is out of the blade of a 400 a 1978 model. Arnie

 

[jacsam]

Arnie, I've rebuilt some of these cylinders, and none of them were ever welded like yours.

All had a threaded end, and all were Loctite'd and some were peened on the end so they wouldn't back out of the piston.

Some have had 3/4" threads, others 7/8".

All had an aluminum piston also, if I remember correctly.

Is the piston on yours threaded internally? Hard to tell from the pic.

Here's a couple of different ones that I made new rods for.

Bill.

 

[arnie]

Bill, No threads at all. I will try and get another pic of the rod.

 

[arnie]

Bill, here are some pics of mine:

(Message edited by kkortman112 on December 02, 2010)

 

[charms]

Arnie, have you had that cylinder for a long time? There was some discussion maybe a year ago about some reproduction cylinders for sale that were giving similar problems.
I have a factory rockshaft cylinder from a 317 that failed, and it was as Bill described, an aluminum piston with threads. The shaft had been peened for a mushroom effect, but it still pulled out of the threads. Doesn't seem like a great design. Larger farm or industrial cylinders have a nut on the far side of the piston.

 

[arnie]

Cliff, Yes I put this one on about 1 1/5 yrs. ago

 

[alan]

I opened the cylinder off a 49 blower today and the pushrod is attached to the piston with a threaded and staked connection, like what Bill showed.

The cylinder out of my 400 is attached by swaging over the end of the pushrod. The rod was bored out on the end to make it thin enough to swage.

Bill, the piston in my 49 cylinder is aluminum, the 400 steel. How did you get yours apart especially the one on the right? The staking on mine is such that the steel is expanded into the aluminum. I'm debating how to approach getting the staking out. I'm afraid that if I don't get it all it will ruin the threads in the piston when I break it down.

If I sent you the rod could you make another one and what would it cost? I don't want to junk the cylinder, I'm stealing one off a non-running tractor for the short term, I don't expect to need the snowblower soon but this is the season for the white stuff and that cylinder is what controls the deflector. It is missing in this pic but you can see the brackets where it goes.

 

[jacsam]

Alan. I put the rod in the lathe and cut the end of the rod back to remove the staked area. You can see a slight bevel on rod on the right.

I have new chrome rod here. I'll send you an e-mail.

Bill

 

[arnie]

can parts be gotten for these cylinders? how are you guys taking them apart? and welding back together?? This is the first one I have taken apart. I put it in a lathe and cut it open. don't know if I am a good enough welder to put it back together but wanted to see what they were like inside. Thanks Arnie

 

[alan]

Parts are available in the form of raw stock for the pushrods and machined pistons. I'm not sure if they are available with threaded bores or not.

At some point I'm going to be buying from http://www.crconline.com/ I want to experiment with making some welded cylinders in custom sizes. The design of these garden tractor cylinders is just about as good as it gets for minimizing the closed length and overall size.

I haven't figured out how to mount them up in the only lathe I have access to so I'm doing it crude, cutting the base off with a angle grinder. Not pretty but it works.

It's hard to hold them in the vise, sometimes high spots on the weld don't allow solid clamping. A strip of lead flashing wrapped around the cylinder makes the problem go away.

I haven't welded one back together yet. I had bought a TIG torch, planning to do a nice root pass with TIG. Unfortunately when I fell and wiped out my shoulder 13 months ago it put us on a really restricted budget here so I haven't had the money to get the TIG consumables and buy or lease an Argon cylinder. I'm using flux cored wire in my MIG, can't justify the cost of gas for that either. Flux cored is a bit fussy to throttle down but I think I can make it work in this application. Given normal conditions I would MIG it with .023 solid wire and sew the root with a nice small bead, then follow up with a couple fill passes.

Either way it will be a slow process by necessity of keeping the cylinder cool enough to not burn the new innards out of them.