who does babbit in starter snout?

[NY John T]

Hi all,
Took out the starter and found that the babbit bearing in the snout of the starter is almost gone. Does anybody use babbit material or do people use a bronze bushing? Who can I send it to be restored? Thanks,
John

[Ron Patterson]

To my knowledge no one is doing babbitt?.
The current procedure is to replace the Babbitt Bendix drive head stop nut running area

with a bronze bushing.
Brent Mize can help you.

[Model T Mark]

David Woods does the same he could help you also. He follows the forum some. His forum name is Woody.

[Moxie26]

Woody23 ..... David Woods is your answer. Look in membership for email contact.

[Woody23]

Good timing! I was actually doing a batch in my shop this afternoon.

I bore out the Babbitt and press in bronze bearing material then bore that for the bendix. This will last the life of the starter and much stronger than Babbitt.

Happy to help.

David Woods
517-927-9232
Williamston T Works (Facebook)

[Dan McEachern]

For those of you replacing the bushing, remove the babbitt and a Model A wrist pin bushing is just the correct dimensions for a nice press fit and leaves enough material to be bored to size. No need to make up special bushings.

[John kuehn]

Thanks Dan for re -reminding us about using the Model A wrist pin bushing for the T starter babbitt replacement. This has come up before and I remember reading about it in maybe Tinkering Tips or maybe years ago on the forum.

[BRENT in 10-uh-C]

For those of you replacing the bushing, remove the babbitt and a Model A wrist pin bushing is just the correct dimensions for a nice press fit and leaves enough material to be bored to size. No need to make up special bushings.

So, I have two questions;

1) What does the wrist pin ID bore need to be?

2) What is the fastest way to find the center to bore the wrist pin with a lathe? (In a vertical Mill, I think I could pick-up off of the OD of the wrist pin, but not sure of a good way using either a faceplate or a 4-jaw chuck in my lathe. Thoughts or Suggestions??)

[speedytinc]

For those of you replacing the bushing, remove the babbitt and a Model A wrist pin bushing is just the correct dimensions for a nice press fit and leaves enough material to be bored to size. No need to make up special bushings.

So, I have two questions;

1) What does the wrist pin ID bore need to be?

2) What is the fastest way to find the center to bore the wrist pin with a lathe? (In a vertical Mill, I think I could pick-up off of the OD of the wrist pin, but not sure of a good way using either a faceplate or a 4-jaw chuck in my lathe. Thoughts or Suggestions??)

You wouldnt bore the wrist pin bushing in an A piston, you hone it.

For this job on a T STARTER nose. You could also hone. The ID is very close 1" +/_ for bendix clearance. However the nose MUST be in near perfect alignment. Will require some bending of the snout. Most are out a bit.
The method of using a thicker bushing can cheat the perfect realignment procedure, but it better not ever turn in the housing.

[RajoRacer]

My Stevens gen. & starter repair kit has the alignment reamer that centers on the starter snout and align reams the front end bushing in perfect alignment to the snout - I also use Model A w.p. bushings honed to fit the Bendix.

[Allan]

It is reare to find an end cover which is not bent somewhat, so fitting a bush that is bored/ reamed/honed to size is somewhat fraught
Fitting a thicker bush and boring it to size helps to correct slight bends in the snout.

Allan from down under.

[Woody23]

I do find some are off center more than others but haven’t really had issues. This summer I did have a starter with an alignment issue but it was the sealed bearing in the brush cap was off a bit and caused the bendix to drag a bit. This was corrected by replacing the brush cap and sealed bearing.

I also made an alignment jig I made to ream the center bushing using the new nose bushing so everything seems to line up nicely.lastly they get an oil seal was everything is fitted and bench checked.

If anything is dragging you will see it in the free spin test. The starter should draw about 70-75 amp at a RPM of around 4000. The starters that have drag due to alignment will draw more and have less RPM’s so it does show up when testing.

Hope that helps.

David Woods

[BRENT in 10-uh-C]

Ok, I get it now, ....kinda.

To begin with, I get it where the Piston Pin is sometimes erroneously called a "wrist pin", -but Ford's engineers (-and most engine supply companies) call that bushing an A-6207 Connecting Rod Bushing since it is a part of the Connecting Rod, -not a part of the Piston Pin or 'wrist pin'. That is what caused my confusion. I apologize for misreading that the pin itself was what was being used instead of a bushing.

So, ...with the above said, I am still unclear as to how to verify the snout is bent. How is this determined?

As I mentioned above, if the end-plate is clamped to a Mill table, and the armature bushing is swept to find the ℄, it then makes sense (-at least to me it does!!) how to bore the Bendix ("nose") bushing to centerline using a smaller ID bushing to begin with. However, how is this being done on the lathe? Does David's lathe fixture have a pilot that locates the housing to the ℄??

[speedytinc]

Re: How do you know if the snout is bent?

After assembly I test run the motor & confirm the shaft has no bend.
Then slide on a bendix unit. If it goes in easy, ok.
If misaligned, the snout gets re-centered with a brass hammer.
Nothing fancy. I must have got this method from the service manual.

[Brent Mize]

Hello All,
All of our rebuilds (Coil Doctor -Model T Medic) have newly rebabbited bendix stop nut races. I have them done by a friend of mine.
I’m not a machinist so I have to have them done. Since Ford used babbit and it lasted 100 years, why not.
Getting the shaft dead on straight is a must wjth new snouts, whatever the type of material used.
Just our 2 cents worth,
Brent Mize

[Woody23]

If you look at the inside of the nose that seats with the body you will see a rim that centers the nose to the body. So I made a jig to mount in the lathe that uses that rim to center the nose on the jig that I use a dial indicator to center the entire assembly on my lathe. The nose is almost a press fit into the jig so the tolerance is tight enough one can push the nose into the jig by hand but not so tight you actually have to press it.

Ounce that is centered you can determine if the nose is bend or not.

Next I bore out the babbitt, which also recuts the center. Then cut a piece of bronze, press it in and bore the bronze to the 1.00 +/- the tolerance you want for the bendix.

The middle bushing is pressed out, press in the new and line ream it to the nose. In the photo you can see a spacer to simulate the bendix, now the middle bushing is reamed to fit the armature shaft and centered to the nose.

I have done this many times without issue or drag.

So I’m sure there are several ways you can go about this, this works for me and the bronze will last much longer so shouldn’t have to mess with again.

Hope that helps.

David Woods

[speedytinc]

Very nice work.

[OlGeezer]

I've heard some folks use bronze bushings as a replacement for babbit bearings in starters. It's a durable option. As for restoration, you might want to check with local machine shops or auto repair shops.

[ABoer]

David W.
I do nearly the same with the snout of the starter as you.
But sometime I have some problem to line up all the bearings :
The brushcap , the bronze bearing , and the new bronze n the snout .
Do you have a solution for that ??
Is there a reamer to make all three in line .
Thanks for your answer . Toon
Toon

[speedytinc]

The brush cap can be knocked out of alignment & commonly is.
Line reaming wouldnt fix the problem properly.
Besides, dont you use a sealed ball bearing for the front(brush cap)?
I find it frequently necessary to bump the brush cap during the assembly process.

[RajoRacer]

The Stevens starter & generator repair set has an indexer for the brush end of both pieces then the new bushing is reamed. The long reaming tool centered in the top tray has the align reamer for the snout - photo above for that.

Addendum: the circular tool removes & reams the starter brush end - too early & not enough coffee - gen. takes a bearing but then one can use a bearing in the starter brush end also.

[Woody23]

That’s a nice puller. I had to make one. Same function basically drill
and tap the old babbitt or bronze bearing and pull it.

As far as the brush cap. Yes I use a modern sealed bearing and found the same for the alignment.

You typically need to bump them to fit. This cap is not in place when I ream the middle to the nose. So you’re correct this has no effect on the rear bearing alignment in the brush cap.

David

[AdminJeff]

If you look at the inside of the nose that seats with the body you will see a rim that centers the nose to the body. So I made a jig to mount in the lathe that uses that rim to center the nose on the jig that I use a dial indicator to center the entire assembly on my lathe. The nose is almost a press fit into the jig so the tolerance is tight enough one can push the nose into the jig by hand but not so tight you actually have to press it.

Ounce that is centered you can determine if the nose is bend or not.

Next I bore out the babbitt, which also recuts the center. Then cut a piece of bronze, press it in and bore the bronze to the 1.00 +/- the tolerance you want for the bendix.

The middle bushing is pressed out, press in the new and line ream it to the nose. In the photo you can see a spacer to simulate the bendix, now the middle bushing is reamed to fit the armature shaft and centered to the nose.

I have done this many times without issue or drag.

So I’m sure there are several ways you can go about this, this works for me and the bronze will last much longer so shouldn’t have to mess with again.

Hope that helps.

David Woods

I use exactly this same process and have on 100's of starters with great success, and bronze is far superior to the original Babbitt. I used to use A bushings in the nose, but if you do as many starters as I do, bronze tubing stock is vastly more cost efficient, has more material, and it's not split like the A bushing. If you finish bore the bronze nose bushing on the lathe and then use the alignment tool correctly when reaming the shaft bushing, you won't have any binding or alignment issues.

If there's interest I can list out all the parts to create the tooling to do this without that rockin' Stevens tool that RajoRacer holds so close

Jeff