is the cylinder of a foot pump supposed to be oiled, greased, or simply run dry? I just took mine apart to beef up the worn-out plate through which the plunger shaft runs, and it was completely caked with yuck inside (a mixture of years of dirt and who-knows-what).
I cleaned it all up, but I'm not sure what if anything it should be lubed with.
cheers
Jules
Neither was I. I happened to have a jar of silicone lubrication for assembling plastic gutters and push-fit pipe, and so I used that. That was 5 years ago, and it's worked perfectly ever since.
I guess you need to avoid lubricants which attack rubber, as some will probably get into the tyre inner tubes.
Thanks... I gave it a little multi-purpose grease, and will see how that goes. I only use the pump* on one of the lawn tractor's tyres which has a slow puncture, so it's probably no big deal; worst case it trashes a tyre that already had problems anyway.
Oh, for the end-plate I drilled and bolted a 1.8" thick washer to it which had just the right diameter hole in the middle for the plunger shaft. Seems to be working like a charm - before that there was so much wear in the end-plate that the pump used to jam partway upon release. Cheapo Chinese junk...
cheers
Jules
maybe the tyre's repairable with a bit of offcut inner tube plus rubber cement. Coat the tube well all over, and push it most of the way into the hole with a tool. Let set & trim.
NT
TBH, I've not checked it to see where the leak is - so I don't actually know if it's a puncture or a beading problem.
I might motivate myself to look at it this year, although the wheel's jammed onto the axle rather well (I even had a brief go at it when I had the whole axle off to do some work on the reversing gear last year). I suppose I could improvise some kind of puller though.
Or I could just get a tube for it - the local farm supply place does them (I'm pretty sure it's tubeless, although I suppose it might have a tube in there...)
cheers
Jules
Used to be graphite grease in my old dirty pushbike pump using days.
The leather still wore out fairly quickly though.
Still, could be worse: Brunel almost had a pneumatic railway working, but for the lack of modern sealing materials and lubricants that wouldn't freeze or get eaten,,,
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