Worked on the bogies this evening in hopes to finally finish them... only to find out that there is a step down from 35mm to 34mm where the bearing seats to where the seal face sits.... who the hell did this? why? so much more work!
Chucked them in the lathe, took off about .044 to give the seal a fighting chance of not being destroyed... and at this point, this is a guessed number; seeing as the only axle I had has already been assembled and I cant measure the actual surface
After 6 hours on the lathe, its all done. I fit one together real quick just to make sure its all going to fall together like it does in my head; and it does. Clean up shop, and continue this friday.
A little note for those who are trying to pull the remains of their seals from the bogie hub: I turned my plasma cutter down to 10 amps and just gnawed at the seal and bearing race that remained; just to give them some wiggle room to collapse and come out.
After the notch was made, I fashioned an extended chisel for my air hammer from a random scrap of really goddamn hard round bar I had from an old laser. Hacked the end off of a good chisel, bored the new bar to fit the chisel blank, drilled a hole in the side for a side lock bolt, heated the end up to yellow and hardened it. (those bearing races are harder than HSS)
Pictured is a seal and bearing driver tool I threw together... I swear I cut that plate out with my eyes closed.
Oh, I also found out that the plates I had made for the outer wheels; he got in a hurry and the plasma torch deflected and made conical holes that wont fit the fasteners. ITS ALWAYS SOMETHING!