Hendie's 1971 VW T2 Bay Window Devon Conversion conversion

[Pete in Lincs]

I think that clock on the bottom of the engine is running a little slow. The rest of it looks great though.

Erm, will it still be accessible when you fit the lid? Just asking on behalf of Johnny...

[JeroenS]

Brilliant work on the engine Hendie. I built a couple of the Revell T1's this year and the engine in those kits falls way, way short of your efforts. 

 

 

I just left it out and glued the compartment shut. 

[giemme]

I'm with Johnny @The Spadgent, that engine is gorgeous!  

 

And I can't wait to see it painted...

 

Ciao 

[TheBaron]

9 hours ago, hendie said:

I hope you enjoyed your weekend folks.

Made all the more pleasant by seeing your printing results here Alan. Congratulations on that Hengine.

8 hours ago, The Spadgent said:

i know what you mean about being amazed every time you print something

Ditto Johnny. 'Amazed' is the perfect word for being able to turn a bottle of liquid into shapes...

[Terry1954]

Very impressive engine work Alan. You, Tony, Steve, Johnny and Ian, all make this stuff look so easy!

 

Terry

 

[Jochen Barett]

19 hours ago, hendie said:

 

+++ The engine though. That's what you're all here for innit? You want to see the engine and how it turned out. So did I.

Here you go then.  An engine and a selection of engine bits and bobs.  From bottom left going across we have an alternator, coil, distributor (for a FOUR cylinder engine ),  the flat four itself, and on the right, the air filter housing.  ABove that is the engine fan housing, then above that a number of hoses, duplicate parts, and a couple of transmission housings.

 

What? You can't see the detail  How's this then? +++

 

Nice, extremely nice. The intakes sure beat Revell's.

 

I like the detail and I'm ready to take your next test ("What's gonna happen when the key is turned?").

[CrazyCrank]

Wow !!!! this 3D printed engine 

[Spiny]

Do you think you could hide this until I finish my van?  You're putting my efforts to shame!

[Fritag]

On 9/18/2022 at 10:21 PM, hendie said:

I think it's a subconscious thing Steve - all those walks in the wilderness... I think you are secretly hankering for your own VW bus so you can drive and just lay up whenever you spy an interesting spot.  

 

Walks in the wilderness have to be in commuting distance from a nice cottage or hotel Alan. Mrs F’s first rule.  We went camping once shortly after we were married.  Just the once.  It didn’t suit apparently.  I seem to recall her claiming that having to dig snow holes for shelter during an RAF training course in the Cairngorms spoiled her for camping….

 

On 9/18/2022 at 11:25 PM, The Spadgent said:

i know what you mean about being amazed every time you print something. I always expect it not to work or not fit but of late things just seem to come good. But that thar engine is a thing of beauty for sure.

 

And another one for those sentiments.  More Hendie nonchalant near perfection.  Oh, and the ‘near’ is only in there for the purposes of alliteration. 

 

 

[perdu]

59 minutes ago, Fritag said:

I seem to recall her claiming that having to dig snow holes for shelter during an RAF training course in the Cairngorms spoiled her for camping….

Girls huh?

 

What are they like?

 

She gets a free holiday in the 'gorms and complains because of 'weather', tsssk.

 

Alan as you know I have spent a biggish piece of the year trying to emulate your affinity for finicky perfection, but that engine is a work of art not simply technical drawing excellence.

 

I think I'll flog my laptop.

 

 

Sublime.

[Pete in Lincs]

Mrs F was in the RAF Regiment?

[perdu]

2 hours ago, Pete in Lincs said:

Mrs F was in the RAF Regiment?

Seeing how she drags him all over the kind of places we were using for selection training I think she may have been even more roughy-toughy than that...

 

What a gal.

[Fritag]

3 hours ago, Pete in Lincs said:

Mrs F was in the RAF Regiment?

 

  We're talking about the girl who during Officer Training was voted 'the cadet most likely to fall in the river'; and who on on annual SMG training at the range at Coltishall (dunno why WRAF (as they were then) officers had SMGs to play with but they you go) managed to pepper the newly painted woodwork around the target and leave the target unafraid and unhurt (newly painted cos Princess Anne was coming for a visit the next day).

 

44 minutes ago, perdu said:

Seeing how she drags him all over the kind of places we were using for selection training I think she may have been even more roughy-toughy than that...

 

A sort of roughy-toughy-wimp who won't go near cliff edges and demands access to a hot bath and a G&T after a day's walking.

[mark.au]

Can’t really add much that hasn’t been said already.  This build is inspiring.

[perdu]

1 hour ago, Fritag said:

 

  We're talking about the girl who during Officer Training was voted 'the cadet most likely to fall in the river'; and who on on annual SMG training at the range at Coltishall (dunno why WRAF (as they were then) officers had SMGs to play with but they you go) managed to pepper the newly painted woodwork around the target and leave the target unafraid and unhurt (newly painted cos Princess Anne was coming for a visit the next day).

 

 

A sort of roughy-toughy-wimp who won't go near cliff edges and demands access to a hot bath and a G&T after a day's walking.

Now that's my kind of gal.

[Jochen Barett]

21 hours ago, Jochen Barett said:

... I like the detail and I'm ready to take your next test ("What's gonna happen when the key is turned?").

 

Next hint: "Klemme 50"

[Bigdave22014]

16 hours ago, Fritag said:

A sort of roughy-toughy-wimp who won't go near cliff edges and demands access to a hot bath and a G&T after a day's walking.

Definitely RAF.  

[John_W]

Impressive.

This 3D printing malarkey seems perilously close to witchcraft...

[perdu]

27 minutes ago, John_W said:

Impressive.

This 3D printing malarkey seems perilously close to witchcraft...

Beyond it John. I promise you it's way beyond it.

[hendie]

On 9/18/2022 at 6:25 PM, The Spadgent said:

Well that’s Just gorgeous. i know what you mean about being amazed every time you print something. I always expect it not to work or not fit but of late things just seem to come good. But that thar engine is a thing of beauty for sure.

 Jont.

 

I think I've got past the "is it going to print or not" phase now Johnny.  I have enough confidence in the equipment and technology to know that if it doesn't print - it's obviously my fault so I just need to look at what I've done wrong and do it right next time.

 

On 9/18/2022 at 6:59 PM, Pete in Lincs said:

I think that clock on the bottom of the engine is running a little slow. The rest of it looks great though.

Erm, will it still be accessible when you fit the lid? Just asking on behalf of Johnny...

 

Lid and other hatches will be posed in the open direction - just like a Wessex being serviced.

 

On 9/19/2022 at 1:33 AM, JeroenS said:

Brilliant work on the engine Hendie. I built a couple of the Revell T1's this year and the engine in those kits falls way, way short of your efforts. 

 

<snip>

 

I just left it out and glued the compartment shut. 

 

I see what you mean Jeroen.  They didn't really do much better with this release either. Even if they had modeled the right engine I think I would still be doing my own.

 

On 9/19/2022 at 1:52 AM, giemme said:

I'm with Johnny @The Spadgent, that engine is gorgeous!  

 

And I can't wait to see it painted...

 

Ciao 

 

Just hop on a plane and bring your own airbrush. I'll supply the paint Giorgio.

 

On 9/19/2022 at 3:15 AM, TheBaron said:

Made all the more pleasant by seeing your printing results here Alan. Congratulations on that Hengine.

Ditto Johnny. 'Amazed' is the perfect word for being able to turn a bottle of liquid into shapes...

 

I used to be able to do that many years ago but the shapes were generally reminiscent of what I had eaten earlier that day

 

On 9/19/2022 at 3:23 AM, Terry1954 said:

Very impressive engine work Alan. You, Tony, Steve, Johnny and Ian, all make this stuff look so easy!

 

Terry

 

 

thanks Terry.  Sometimes it is and other times it'll rear its ugly head and bite you in the... see later in this post

 

On 9/19/2022 at 12:36 PM, Jochen Barett said:

 

Nice, extremely nice. The intakes sure beat Revell's.

 

I like the detail and I'm ready to take your next test ("What's gonna happen when the key is turned?").

 

damn... forgot the starter motor

 

On 9/20/2022 at 10:02 AM, Jochen Barett said:

 

Next hint: "Klemme 50"

 

thankfully Jochen reminded me (if my google translation is up to scratch)

 

On 9/19/2022 at 1:42 PM, CrazyCrank said:

Wow !!!! this 3D printed engine 

 

thanks CC

 

On 9/19/2022 at 3:48 PM, Spiny said:

Do you think you could hide this until I finish my van?  You're putting my efforts to shame!

 

I've seen your van and there's nothing to be ashamed about - that is a damn fine looking result.  I'd have that in my cabinet any day of the week

 

On 9/20/2022 at 2:04 AM, Fritag said:

 

Walks in the wilderness have to be in commuting distance from a nice cottage or hotel Alan. Mrs F’s first rule.  We went camping once shortly after we were married.  Just the once.  It didn’t suit apparently.  I seem to recall her claiming that having to dig snow holes for shelter during an RAF training course in the Cairngorms spoiled her for camping….

 

 

And another one for those sentiments.  More Hendie nonchalant near perfection.  Oh, and the ‘near’ is only in there for the purposes of alliteration. 

 

 

 

any more of this and I'm going to start blushing

 

On 9/20/2022 at 3:08 AM, perdu said:

Girls huh?

 

What are they like?

 

She gets a free holiday in the 'gorms and complains because of 'weather', tsssk.

 

Alan as you know I have spent a biggish piece of the year trying to emulate your affinity for finicky perfection, but that engine is a work of art not simply technical drawing excellence.

 

I think I'll flog my laptop.

 

 

Sublime.

 

and now I'm blushing

 

On 9/20/2022 at 3:33 AM, Pete in Lincs said:

Mrs F was in the RAF Regiment?

 

 

On 9/20/2022 at 8:09 AM, mark.au said:

Can’t really add much that hasn’t been said already.  This build is inspiring.

 

thanks Mark

 

On 9/21/2022 at 6:36 AM, John_W said:

Impressive.

This 3D printing malarkey seems perilously close to witchcraft...

 

John this is way more fun that burning innocent young maidens at the stake

 

 

Back from my travels again and after a goods night rest I descended into the Hendungeon this morning to see what I had to play with.  

It's alway nice to start with the easy less challenging things on the list so I dusted down the printed grill and tried it on for size after cleaning up the gaping hole I left behind last week.

I think I can say I'm fairly pleased with the result. The hole needs a little tweaking but the grill is a pretty good fit.  The hardest part of the job will be fitting the grill to leave a nice even gap all around, so I shall studiously avoid that task for many weeks to come no doubt.

 

 

After humming and hawing for days on this I bit the bullet and went ahead and fixed the two divider/seat/support panels in place

 

 

I'd been arguing with myself about when was the right time to fit these and what problems were going to arise once they were in place.  Painting will be a little more awkward but I think I can work around them.  I think I just glued them in to convince myself that I was actually making some progress

 

 

Then finished off the interior renovations with the fuel filler cover - which I had previously marked in the wrong location - hence the nice little line of filler in the sidewall.

 

 

It was time to start work on that engine though.  It had been sitting staring at me all last week so the challenge was accepted.  I gave the lump an overall coat of satin black.  It looked really nice in that satin sheen and it was almost a shame to begin destroying it.

 

 

For reasons best beknown to anyone other than me I had opted to print the inlet manifold as an integral part of the lump.   This made for a rather interesting masking challenge.

Can you see what I'm doing here?  Nope?

 

 

Is this any better? Nope?  Thought not. 

 

 

Well, here it is all painted up.  Can you tell the difference? Probably not.  

 

 

I use pale burnt metal as a base then followed that up with exhaust manifold (both alclads), but got a bit heavy fingered on the pale burnt metal at the center. If things go accordign to plan it shouldn't be too noticeable once it's all busied up.

I'm going for a well used look. Well used but maintained I hope, at least that is the target.  I'm using a couple of reference shots I have of my old engine for the "weathering" at which I am usually less than adept, but I'll give it a go anbd see what happens.  At worst I can always close the engine lid. 

This is th fan housing that sits at the rear of the engine.  I tried dry brushing testors "rust" but it looked terrible so I resorted to using pastels and scraped a few rusty browny colors over the housing.  My camera is well past it's sell by date and this is about the best shot I could get of the housing. Honest guv - it looks way better in the flesh

 

 

DIstributor.  Not really a lot else to say about it is there. It's a distributor. It's got a wire on it. and 5 holes on top.

 

 

This on I am really rather pleased with. This is the air filter housing. Once again I used the pastels to create the rust effect and it really seemed to work out this time (as did the macro lens on the camera for once)

 

 

Then I got sort of carried away with the construction side fo things and fell into a trance, completely forgetting to take any photos along the way.

 

... until I got to this point

 

 

Mostly dry fitted at this point.  I was just testing the waters to see how easy difficult it is going to be to wire this little lump. Moderately difficult for the most part I'd say, and downright nasty for a few bits once more wires get added.

Note the shiny corrugated air hose in the shot above.  In the last episode I had printed those hoses as plain hoses without any corrugations, and they looked boring.  I had avoided the corrugations as  when I tried to add those a week or two back, it proved to be very difficult. This time however, I decided I was going in for the kill.

Once I had figured out the method - i.e. watched a few videos on youtube - I had a go.  In SolidWorks it was not at all intuitive.  I had the basic shape, essentially a circle swept along a 3 dimensional curve. I then had to add a helix, another circle normal to the helix, and then force the helix to follow the 3 dimensional curve.

 

 

The first two hoses were straightforward enough but the third one put up a fight.

Eventually I blew SolidWorks brains' out.  Whenever I forced the helix to follow the 3d curve, it did as I asked - but managed to lose the original swept hose. Or bits of it as it would appear from this screenshot.

 

 

 

Eventually I gave in and created an assembly from the original plain hose, and dropped the corrugated wotsit right on top of it and created an STL form that assembly.

Then Chitubox wouldn't import the STL.  I faffed around for a little bit before just choosing the easy route.  I dropped the plain hose into Chitubox and then dropped the corrugated hose on top of that. In essence I just overlaid two separate models in Chitubox and it printed the model fine.  I probably wasted a good couple of hours figuring that one out.

 

A little bit more playing around brought this. I think the corrugated hoses really bring it to life.  The big rubber tube running from the air filter to the carb intake is still wet so I will tone that down later when it's dry

 

 

It's still early days for this old lump and there is still a lot of work to do with this, but this is way better than I Imagined it would turn out so I'm very happy.

 

 

Now I just have to remember where hoses ran from, and where to, and all the other little wiring strands.  It should be a fun endeavor 

 

 

To close out - I got fed up trying to get a decent shot with that camera so tried my phone to see how that turned out

 

 

until next time... 

 

 

 

[mark.au]

2 hours ago, hendie said:

This on I am really rather pleased with. This is the air filter housing. Once again I used the pastels to create the rust effect and it really seemed to work out this time (as did the macro lens on the camera for once)

 

How do the Olympic gymnastics judges handle a situation where they have already awarded a 10 and then see something better?

 

2 hours ago, hendie said:

but this is way better than I Imagined it would turn out so I'm very happy.

 

12

[The Spadgent]

By gum!!!! That’s looking rather smart.

I saw the hose and thought. Ohh the crafty so & so he’s wrapped wire around it. Then not being sure scrolled through previous pages to see that the pipe indeed was smooth, must be wire. To then continue down just one picture to get the answer or how the magic was created. 
Lovely print and brilliant paint too.

 

 Johnny

[TheBaron]

I think the corrugated hose is my favourite bit so far Alan - though the whole engine looks fantastic in colour now.

7 hours ago, hendie said:

I probably wasted a good couple of hours figuring that one out.

It seems to go with the territory of moving between the design and to printing environments: Tuesdays are usually fine for exporting stls as a rule but complex assemblies won't mirror in Fusion of a Friday evening.

[JeroenS]

That's on its way to become a rather lovely engine!

[perdu]

VW engines for sale...

 

Blimey Alan that set of air pipes is beyond amazing, beyond even Thunderdome.

 

And we've got another hero.

 

Bravo sir, bravo.

 

Are you going to add the starter behind the fan housing or will it stay invisible on the model?

 

I still own the scars earned from removing a camper van starter in the dark under a T2.

 

I was lucky in that the man who owned it was having it refurbished and didn't need me to help him refit it when it came back from 'Lectroparts Handsworth.*

 

 

*Name 'imagined' to protect the guilty, their idea of refurbishment oftentimes consisted of a flash over with a gloss black aerosol and a squish of WD...