Steve and I in the workshop today moved towards getting Laddie (the other East Sussex tractor) started and continued with the process of testing Daisy May (the diesel with the series of problems).

The latest of these was the annoying diesel leak which persisted despite tightening every junction. Steve settled down to an investigative session.

(While I'm writing this I can hear Steve driving Daisy May out into the yard in the dark to test the brakes after another dismantling and inspection.)

By a process of elimination he identified to leak as coming from the entry into the bottom of the auxiliary tank itself- you can see the wet patch above the butterfly  in the photo.

Phonecall to owner offering options of taking tank off and repairing it, leaving it, bypassing it.

In the meantime I was getting Laddie's block out for its final inspection for clean-ness. I used the engine hoist to lift the block out of the cleaning bay then lowered it until I could bolt it onto the engine support which can be turned to make access easier on all sides. Our only complaint about our super Clarkes equipment is that the engine support won't fit comfortably inside the engine hoist and the heavy block has to be man-handled a bit as well.

It looked pretty good.

Cleaning every liner seat, oilway and face is vital so our cleaning is very thorough.

However our last inspection is out in daylight as things show up which can't be seen in artificial light and as I turned the engine over I caught a glimpse of something moving in the orifice leading to the oil filter (the black hole in the photo to the left of the oil pump mahined face) which turned out to be a a lump of oily clag camouflaged in the darkness.

This is what came out.

Out in the open we give a final high pressure clean with paraffin leaving it ready for rebuilding.

This next picture is Steve giving a thorough trialling of Daisy May's brakes. He was not satisfied and so she went back into the workshop to have the whole brake assembly dismantled and checked again.

On the final test run mentioned earlier he expressed himself satisfied with the one side but the side with the bent back plate (just one of the abuses this poor tractor has suffered) is still under discussion. My preference is to fit another plate altogether but this tractor has had to have so much more work done on it than was originally planned that her owner is quite understandably muttering about budgets so we'll have to see.

Being Friday Steve and I are going to knock off prompt at five and head for the Hill House to have a quick half so have a good weekend , everyone!