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I recently found myself without a welder to remove a check ball staked into the end of an oil passage of a crankshaft. So I applied a different technique to remove it to clean the crank. I clamped some pieces of steel together to form some “caps.” I had to place some spacers between them to leave me enough material at the tops of the radius. I drilled them on end and then bolted them together like you might 2-rod caps, still with spacers in the middle. Then I bored the centers on my mill – one was machined to the diameter of the rod journal and the other the main journal. The one for the main was drilled and tapped for a zerk fitting, which you can see in the photo. Before clamping the caps to the crank I ground away the staking around the ball. Then I clamped the small diameter caps to the rod journal around the oil hole. From the main journal side I dripped some oil in the hole to displace some air. Then I clamped the main journal diameter caps around the oil hole in the main lining the zerk up with the hole. Using pressure from a grease gun the ball came out of the end of the journal throw with ease. I believe these caps will work again as well if the crank has smaller journals.

Steve Morton
R & R Machine Company
Warwick, RI
August, 2015