Project: ArgoCeptor!

[SARgo1]

Yeah, I know. I think its an iphone thing and supermotors doesnt have a way for you rotate it.

The lights are actually just sitting there for now. This weekend im going to cut the holes to fit and set them into the body.

[Model Citizen]

Wow, that came out really, really nice, even though I had to cock my head 90 degrees to look at it. 

[SARgo1]

Auugghhhh! My eyes! My eyes! I'm blind! I'm blind!



Hey, I can see again! But everything looks funny now:




27 watt led lights. 45 watts total. 3 amp draw total. Pretty good! Powered them up in the dark garage and they actually throw some pretty serious light. Its not going to get out hundreds of feet, but the argo is going to be slow speed driving and tops out at 18-20 mph anyways.

and the dash layout from left to right: power port panel, tacho/hourmeter, bilge pump panel, choke knob, ign cylinder and a brace of 10 "arb style" switches.



All green backlit.

Should be pretty cool.

[SARgo1]

Alrighty, pretty sure i have the dash layout.

To the right (left to right) of the levers will be choke, key and 10 arb styke switches. Switches will be things like headliaghts, winch, tail lights, L/R/Rear/Front floods, brake blower, etc.

To the left (right to left) will be the bilge pump switch panel, the combination gauge (hour/tach/clock/volt etc) and then a panel to hold a dedicated voltmeter/sual usb charger and a regular 12V socket.

All green backlit of course.

I'm thinking of mounting a gps right behind the kevers and slightly above on the dash. What that will be exactly i havent decided. Hand held gps or some type of tablet (7" perhaps) with an app. The tablet seems the more attractive of the two becuase it can do other things. A handheld will be water tight though. Have to think about it more...

So it should look good and be functional too.



Had to "pause" on the rewiring. I had to order more delphi connectors with the right number of pins in them. Not a big deal. Gives me time to put more thought into how i want to build the main harness and if i want to leave some extra "room" for future additions....

[wedge]

It take time but just look at what you have when you step back and ponder !!

[SARgo1]

Not a lot done today, but some.

Continued to rip out the PO wiring debacle. Looking much cleaner under hood now.

Installed the weatherpack connector on the bilge pumps. I wired the automatic pump to the automatic switch and then wired the manual switch to the manual side of the auto pump and put the second pump on the same switch. Reasoning being: if I'm hitting the manual pump (as long ats the float switch hasn't conked out on auto) it's probably a bad situation and I want all pumps going as hard as possible!

I also had to repair some of the engine wiring. Someone had two splices and two butt connectors on the rectifier charge wire. They also had a butt connector and a splice on the engine kill wire. All of it points for failure and increased resistance due to bad/corroded connections.  So I clipped back to good wire, soldered and heat shrunk new pieces of the same gauge wire and then used a 20A weatherpack connector on them. Left decent slack for vibration and strain relief.

still moving slow, but getting stronger every day!

[wedge]

Those Vids will sure point you in the rite direction.

[SARgo1]

5hp seems distinctly more "sprightly":



Maybe the 8Hp is the way to go.....

[SARgo1]

Hmmm, 2hp seems to do reasonably well:



Not going to win any races, but an Argo is not exactly a drag boat either.

Unless you mean a "high drag boat"!

LOL!

[SARgo1]

The Bigger the better for speed and moving around Plus the Argo's Float Nose Down due to the engine being up front so you will not have a problem of it sitting Rear down. It may work better as it will flatten the whole rig out !?!?

I was actually thinking about argo's sitting nose down int he water and believe it's probably better for the rig when swimming on the tires. Figure most of the drive is coming from the rear tires since they are further out. With them further out, they're not digging on the "up stroke" which works against forward thrust.

But with an outboard, all bets are off. More weight on the rear means more tire drag, but it may allow the hul to slip through the water easier. I'm thinking more drag is worse than any hydrodynamic advantage of sitting further down in the rear.

It may also be that more HP means more prop speed, which means more cavitation behind the argo in it's disturbed flow.

Maybe I'll just have to wait to get it in the water next year to find out....

[wedge]

The Bigger the better for speed and moving around Plus the Argo's Float Nose Down due to the engine being up front so you will not have a problem of it sitting Rear down. It may work better as it will flatten the whole rig out !?!?

[SARgo1]

So I'm trying to decide which outboard to mount ont eh back.

I've got a 2hp Johnson and an 8 hp Johnson. Both at 2 strokes.

The 2hp weights about 30-35 lbs and has an integrated fuel tank. I run it all day long on a tank using it as a trolling motor on my 12 foot tinny. Even flat out, it's not really what I would call a "powerhouse". It gets my 12 footer moving pretty good, but nothing near plane. But I've recently rebuilt it and converted to solid state ignition so it's damned near a stone axe as far as reliability goes.

The 8 hp is closer to 60 lbs. It needs and external tank. for an 8hp it's fairly impressive. Digs my 12 footer out of the hole and on plane in nothing flat. On plane, it gets the tinny really flying. The 8 HP is solid a s a rock too. Runs on first pull ever time and has never even missed a beat.

The argo is never going to plane, duh right?



I'm trying to decide if double the weight (8hp +tank) is worth it. The argo is only ever going to move so fast, under 5 mph I'm figuring at best due to the tire drag. plus, there's the inconvenience of having to drag around a separate fuel tank with the 8hp.

Neither are long shaft motors. But I'm planning a scissoring mount to get it nice and low.

Opinions?

I won't be getting them out on the water any time soon so I can't give 'em both a try right now. The Argo is torn apart to rectify the PO's electrical sins and upgrade the wiring.

[wedge]

One step at a time Brother !!

[SARgo1]

Little more fiddling with the carb and throttle cable today. Runs slick now.

The clutch spacer is doing its job just fine. No drive at idle and trans shifts easy now, even with the idle turned up a touch to make it a touch smoother. There is just a little too much hesitation before drive engagement for my liking. Works fine, just a little delay. I may spin up a half sized spacer compared to the one in there now and see if it works a little better for me.

That all done, i started digging into the wiring. What a freaking mess! 

Once again, the PO was well meaning but he was no better an electrician than he was a mechanic. Wire splices, twisted together ends, butt connectors, wire taps, wires all over and taped over doubled up for length, and vinyl tape everywhere. Some spots that I took the tape apart, water actually ran out!

The automatic bildge pump he thought didnt work turned out to be a crap wiring job combined with hooking up the auto/manual switch wrong. I pulled the bildge pump out, opened it up, cleaned it out and tested it out on a battery. Worked perect. Turning to the switch assembly revealed incorrect wiring and the switch was wired to run a negative switch scheme. The pump didnt like that and none of thei indicator leds worked. I tore it apart and rewired it to switched positive and fixed the led indicators. Test run showed eveything working perfectly.

One of the old headlight/floodlights burned out. I dont think i'm going to bother replacing the lamp though. I'm just going to wait and replace them both with led units instead. When I get around to that, I'll prob toss on a couple red led tail lights as well since it doesnt have any at all right now and you he d them to run after dark here on the trails.

Tomorrow, i'll look at redoing the entire under hood/ dash wiring. I'm going to swap all the crap/corroded barrel connectors for delphi weather tight connectors and probably do a few things like add a power distribution block/busbar. I plan to add a fuse box also and the only things i can see that even remotely look like fuses are a couple in line glass fuse holders. I can do much better than that.

I am also supposed to get a decent back pay check in the next month or two. Should be enough to buy a new set of tires that will swim. Maybe enough for the chains and a few other bits as well.

[SARgo1]

Pulled the driver clutch apart today. Rusty and dry as a fart.

Sanded it down (not the sheaves, just the covers) and shot it with a coat of rustileum.

Everything got a good shot of brake clean and then the moving parts got a good graphite lube.

Then i spun out an 11/32 spacer for the clutch spring on the lathe.

Put the driver back together and popped it back on to the crankshaft.

Then i took the broken engine shrouds and hit them with the mig. Not the prettiest job, but its solid again.

Put the muffler and assorted other bits back on and fired it up.

Just about perfect!

Now the belt doesnt move at idle (or barely turns) and shifting is as smooth as you can expect on an argo box. Throttles up and grabs just fine.

Rest of the engine went back together and then it started funny throttle behavior as soon as i would put the air filter on. The throttl would hang when  blipped.  But it wouldnt hang if i lifted the air filter off. Chased my tail on that one a bit and finally discovered when i pushed down the filter, the throttle would hang. Turns out the governor arm was just rubbing on the bottom of the air cleaner housing. I went theough thoughts of clearancing the housing and machining up spacers, then i realized the governor arm is just stamped sheet metal. I gave it a few mm of downward bend and problem solved

I celebrated by buying a new brake duct. Mine is split, one end has ripped wide open and hanging. I also ordered an hourmeter that does tach, clock and programable maint reminders. Useful when an argo calls for maint at the 30 hr mark.

Im thinking if we're in to the new house this winter i may just strip it down to the frwme and do a complete overhaul. Have to wait and see on that one though. I'd do it at our current house but I don't have the garage space. Single car garage full of my tools, the mustang and two motorcycles just doesnt leave much room!

Getting there. Slowly, but surely.....