Truculent Teenager's model 'nitro' car is in bits on his bedroom floor
again and we've found that the pivot pins for the suspension wishbones are
bent. They're about 30mm long 3mm dia screws with a horrid little
self-tapping thread at the head end and the rest is plain shaft. Option 1
is to keep on paying silly money for replacements from Apex Models (no
doubt the replacements will suffer the same fate ...). Option 2 is to get
a bit of 3mm dia steel, silver steel or even brass, cut it to length and
fix it in place. Options for fixing it seem to be (a) threading the ends
and loctite-ing or lock-nutting nuts on (presumably a 3mm rod will take an
M3 thread?) or (b) finding a source of those fasteners that look like
crinkly washers and push onto a shaft with tangs so they won't pull off
(anyone know what they're called?)

I can get rod and dies from e.g. Folkstone Engineering Supplies
www.metal2models.btinternet.co.uk but does anyone know anywhere in Reading
or environs? And any clue where to get those push-on clips?

In article ,
John Stumbles wrote:
Truculent Teenager's model 'nitro' car is in bits on his bedroom
floor again and we've found that the pivot pins for the
suspension wishbones are bent. They're about 30mm long 3mm dia
screws with a horrid little self-tapping thread at the head end
and the rest is plain shaft.

Exactly 30mm long? I have a few M3 hex tapped spacers,
(the hex is 5mm A/F).

One spacer is 20mm long, threaded M3 all the way through.
The other spacer is 10mm long, threaded female at one
end, with an M3 male thread sticking out at the other.

They screw together to make a 30.3mm long spacer, with
M3 female threads at each end.

I've found three sets. Email your snailmail if req'd.

--
Tony Williams.

John Stumbles wrote:

[...] finding a source of those fasteners that look like
crinkly washers and push onto a shaft with tangs so they won't pull off
(anyone know what they're called?)

"Push-on retainers" seems to be the generic term these days - well
that's what RS call them anyway (try stock no. 172-329). They also used
to be known as Spire clips (as did many other kinds of spring clippy
widgets).

--
Andy

On Tue, 01 May 2007 14:32:47 +0100, Tony Williams wrote:

Exactly 30mm long? I have a few M3 hex tapped spacers,
(the hex is 5mm A/F).

I don't think what you're offering would work: we need basically a bit of
3mm dia rod with some means of fastening something bigger to each end to
keep it in place. Thanks anyhow.

In article , John
Stumbles writes
Truculent Teenager's model 'nitro' car is in bits on his bedroom floor
again and we've found that the pivot pins for the suspension wishbones are
bent. They're about 30mm long 3mm dia screws with a horrid little
self-tapping thread at the head end and the rest is plain shaft. Option 1
is to keep on paying silly money for replacements from Apex Models (no
doubt the replacements will suffer the same fate ...). Option 2 is to get
a bit of 3mm dia steel, silver steel or even brass, cut it to length and
fix it in place. Options for fixing it seem to be (a) threading the ends
and loctite-ing or lock-nutting nuts on (presumably a 3mm rod will take an
M3 thread?) or (b) finding a source of those fasteners that look like
crinkly washers and push onto a shaft with tangs so they won't pull off
(anyone know what they're called?)

I can get rod and dies from e.g. Folkstone Engineering Supplies
www.metal2models.btinternet.co.uk but does anyone know anywhere in Reading
or environs? And any clue where to get those push-on clips?

B&Q Warehouses (Paisley certainly) have started stocking small rod and
other metal stock, don't know about the dies though.
--
fred
Plusnet - I hope you like vanilla

In article ,
John Stumbles wrote:

I don't think what you're offering would work: we need basically
a bit of 3mm dia rod with some means of fastening something
bigger to each end to keep it in place. Thanks anyhow.

Ok. Note though that round bar is the worst to thread
and use, because of the difficulty in gripping it.

--
Tony Williams.

On Wed, 02 May 2007 10:56:16 +0100, Tony Williams wrote:

Ok. Note though that round bar is the worst to thread
and use, because of the difficulty in gripping it.

Er, so what section bar would you thread? :-)

In article ,
John Stumbles wrote:
On Wed, 02 May 2007 10:56:16 +0100, Tony Williams wrote:

Ok. Note though that round bar is the worst to thread
and use, because of the difficulty in gripping it.

Er, so what section bar would you thread? :-)

Now, now. Don't be sarky.

Threading can require a surprising amount of torque,
so holding a round bar requires a decent 3-jaw
chuck, or collet. The same problem occurs if trying
to tighten up nuts on a round bar.

--
Tony Williams.

On Thu, 03 May 2007 07:02:06 +0100, Tony Williams wrote:

Threading can require a surprising amount of torque,
so holding a round bar requires a decent 3-jaw
chuck, or collet.

ISTR having to back off and go sort of three steps forward two steps back
last time I tried (which was (mumble) years ago)