In praise of good machinists

[JDP]

I've been dealing with a local, old time machinist for over 20 years. Not only will he accept old car work, he prefers it. His shop in full of every manner of 20-60's engines and will often make a part if he can't find a replacement. I took him Skip's 37 LaSalle water pump to rebuild since I did not have the correct reamer or a press.
When he took it apart he found one of two split shaft retainers were apparently lost at the last rebuild, so he machined one from a old valve retainer. The total cost for the work was $90.00, but I gave him a $10.00 tip. (Sorry Skip) The media blasting was a nice touch.

[warrlaw1]

Nice to hear, John, and I enjoy your eBay listings and the links from your page! If I was closer to you I would have bought some of them

[sweetolbob]

John

As Gunslinger said yesterday, They are out there we just don't credit them often.

We still have a couple of those types of folks left in the Bay City area and they are worth there weight in gold. One does machine work and engine/tranny/rearend assembly and the other does front end/alignment work. Needless to say, I've taken advantage of their presence on occasion.

Thanks for posting, Good thoughts.

Bob

[Lothar]

Good machinists were never common. Now they're nearing extinction. You're lucky to have a good, concientious one to work with.
On a different note, can you explain why that water pump was designed with an exposed impeller shaft? Was it simply that the shaft was so long?

[Skip Lackie]

$100, huh? Well, I guess you're forgiven this once.

Interesting about the missing retainer. As far as I know, no one has ever done anything to the engine of that car until I got it -- and I didn't rebuild the water pump.

[JDP]

Good machinists were never common. Now they're nearing extinction. You're lucky to have a good, concientious one to work with.
On a different note, can you explain why that water pump was designed with an exposed impeller shaft? Was it simply that the shaft was so long?

It's the only way to install the rear bushings, seals and snap ring.

[JDP]

$100, huh? Well, I guess you're forgiven this once.

Interesting about the missing retainer. As far as I know, no one has ever done anything to the engine of that car until I got it -- and I didn't rebuild the water pump.

Maybe it popped out years ago. BTW, we saved a big two dollars and a months wait by having it done locally, even with the tip. You have modern seals and bearing now, and she's got fresh water pump grease, good for another 1000 miles. I'll install it tomorrow and see if the squeak goes away.

[BRUCESTUDE]

We have a good machinist here in Yakima, at Yakima Grinding Auto Parts. Not only does he do excellent work on Studebakers in the area, but I recently had some major head work on my '99 F150, and I was able to get great info. from him for the reassembly (aluminum heads).
A couple years ago, after I reassembled a 232 that he machined (everytihng but the cam) I drove it by the shop and he was happy to see and hear how smooth it ran! So, yeah, these guys are few and far between!

[bams50]

I've been wanting to share with you the story of my own local machinist. His name is Bill Marsh. He's a second-generation machinist who has right at 70 years' experience. After the service he opened his place and worked nights while working as a machinist for GE. During those years he went on to build some amazing race cars, and became known in the racing community worldwide. He has done projects for NASCAR, CART, and hundreds of racing teams and businesses all over the world. If you own a pipe bender from Irvan Enterprises, Bill made the shoes. The number and range of projects he's done are just staggering. Now in his mid 80s, he looks and works much younger- still works every day in his fully-equipped, old-school machine shop. He's 7 miles from me, and I deliver his mail every day. Here he is with his race car, which is THE top car in the antique class, driven by a friend of mine, Bill Kisselstein:



Bill's the guy who figured out the process to exactly repop the body streamer tags. We've done many, many projects, like making our own flywheel to mate a SBC to a 1-ton BB trans. He custom-builds torsion bars for race car suspensions to whatever specs desired. The race car above is an amazing marvel under that scrapyard body shell and cast-off wheels: GMC 6-cylinder for which he MADE his own cylinder head, pistons, and an amazing hand-built trans. (case and all!) I could go on and on with the things he has designed and made, and is working on to this day. We have been friends since I was about 10 years old. Bill is more than a treasured friend, he's truly a national treasure!

I intend to do a thread with a story and pictures about him when I can convince him to let me take pictures of his fabulous, old-timey shop. In the meantime, if you need ANYTHING made that no one else can figure out, let me know and I'll set you up with the solution