Hub bearing and brake mechainism
Posted: Wed, 21 Oct 2020, 12:21 pm
Hi all, i'm new to the world of Portafold, so by way of introduction......
I'm a Kit Car builder/owner, and after suffering in a tent at the 2010 Newark kit car show I decided to discard the tent! The Portafold seemed ideal, however my car is light (800kg), so I bougth some GRP mat and resin and used Conti-board as a female mould and made a mini 'homage to the Portafold' which I call a Quantumsleep - sleeping area is 6ft x4ft, converting to L shape seating area and 2 backrests during day. (my kit car is a Quantum
). It weighs just under 200Kg. I hope you'll all forgive me 
I attach a couple of photos.
Scroll forward to present day, and my friend Stuart in Essex has asked me to do a 'minor rebuild' on a Portafold he bought last year, and add facility for 240V for fridge and general power sockets/ USB charging (he'll be using self-contained battery LED lights). He delivered it to me a few weeks ago.
A couple of questions...
1) When dismantling the LHS hub, I had to use a puller to get the hub off, which I didn't expect with taper roller bearings. I can reassemble by marking the thick washer to ensure alignment with the flat on the stub axle and gradually wind the castellated nut on until achieving the correct end float, so it shouldn't present a problem, but has anyone else had this issue?. The RHS bearings simple ' dropped off' as expected.
2) The bellcrank that joins the handbrake linkages seems to just move backward/forward on its mount when the handbrake is applied or released, so looks like a lot of 'lost motion', but I'll need to crawl right under to dismantle it
- can anyone advise if it has an oilite bush of similar?
Regards, Martin
I'm a Kit Car builder/owner, and after suffering in a tent at the 2010 Newark kit car show I decided to discard the tent! The Portafold seemed ideal, however my car is light (800kg), so I bougth some GRP mat and resin and used Conti-board as a female mould and made a mini 'homage to the Portafold' which I call a Quantumsleep - sleeping area is 6ft x4ft, converting to L shape seating area and 2 backrests during day. (my kit car is a Quantum
). It weighs just under 200Kg. I hope you'll all forgive me I attach a couple of photos.Scroll forward to present day, and my friend Stuart in Essex has asked me to do a 'minor rebuild' on a Portafold he bought last year, and add facility for 240V for fridge and general power sockets/ USB charging (he'll be using self-contained battery LED lights). He delivered it to me a few weeks ago.
A couple of questions...
1) When dismantling the LHS hub, I had to use a puller to get the hub off, which I didn't expect with taper roller bearings. I can reassemble by marking the thick washer to ensure alignment with the flat on the stub axle and gradually wind the castellated nut on until achieving the correct end float, so it shouldn't present a problem, but has anyone else had this issue?. The RHS bearings simple ' dropped off' as expected.
2) The bellcrank that joins the handbrake linkages seems to just move backward/forward on its mount when the handbrake is applied or released, so looks like a lot of 'lost motion', but I'll need to crawl right under to dismantle it
- can anyone advise if it has an oilite bush of similar?Regards, Martin