Decompression gear

[jenevers]

My manual photos show the decompression gear at fully clockwise (position 3), for Normal Running, fully anti clockwise for Maximum COMPRESSION! (position 2) and in between (position 1), for Decompression. Is this correct, cos I would have thought position 2 would have been Maximum  DE compression?

Edited January 17, 2018 by jenevers

[martyn 1]

What model Gardner do you have?.  I ask as that sound like the decompressor lever arrangement for an L2. If yours is an LW you have the wrong manual as there are only two positions. decompressed and not decompressed.

[jenevers]

23 hours ago, martyn 1 said:

What model Gardner do you have?.  I ask as that sound like the decompressor lever arrangement for an L2. If yours is an LW you have the wrong manual as there are only two positions. decompressed and not decompressed.

It’s a 4LW and my manual is for an LW (instruction book No 56). 

Defintely has 3 positions.

No.1 is like halfway position of the quadrant (decompression for easy turning), No.2 fully anti-clockwise (maximum compression for cold starting at low temperature), No.3  fully clockwise (for running; used also when starting from cold under temperate conditions.

Strange!

[jenevers]

Just checked my other old Gardner manual and the same 3 stages are shown. HOWEVER my modern manual shows only 2 stages. So it looks like someone at Gardner’s never realised the error for years. 

[PeterG]

Yes looks like an old version of a cut and paste error before you could cut and paste!

[RLWP]

57 minutes ago, PeterG said:

Yes looks like an old version of a cut and paste error before you could cut and paste!

Actually, having done a bit of time in an old style technical publications department, cut and paste is exactly what they did. 

Cow gum was the paste of choice

Richard

[PeterG]

I was trying to think what the equivalent printing term was then, bur that depends on what was used for printing the manual?

[RLWP]

2 minutes ago, PeterG said:

I was trying to think what the equivalent printing term was then, bur that depends on what was used for printing the manual?

So, technical writers would take an existing manual and cut out the parts they needed. They would paste those onto blank pages to make up the parts that were the same, have new parts typewritten (on a typewriter - yes, that long ago) and paste those in together with any new diagrams, then pass the whole lot to a printer to typeset and print

Copy and paste predates computers

Richard

[David Mack]

On 19/01/2018 at 13:35, RLWP said:

So, technical writers would take an existing manual and cut out the parts they needed. They would paste those onto blank pages to make up the parts that were the same, have new parts typewritten (on a typewriter - yes, that long ago) and paste those in together with any new diagrams, then pass the whole lot to a printer to typeset and print

Copy and paste predates computers

Richard

Quite. Cut or copy and paste describes the activity as it used to be done. Computing has simpy adopted the same terminology, although it doesn't actually involve the use of scissors or adhesives.

[Split Pin]

In LW spares book 518.5 published in 1955, it shows the dual anvil rockers and the cam that moves the rocker to a second position to increase the tappet clearance, thus giving max compression as the valve would close earlier than normal, this would coincide with the lever being in the No 2 position.

It was probably fitted to engines supplied with hand start only. 

As Martyn comments it was more common on L2'S.

Its also worth remembering that the manuals are pretty much backwards compatible in that the information they contain applies with small variations back to 1931

Steve

 

Edited January 21, 2018 by Split Pin