QD Wheel Nut Spanner

 As regular readers will know, I enjoy making things and in particular the more elusive tools for the various Ariel on-board tool kits. Some while back, I made an early version of the special tool kit spanner for removing the nuts on the QD hubs, which is an extended box spanner to reach in between the spokes. I wrote up the job here. At the time, I didn’t realise that the later bikes (after 1950) had a different spanner. AOMCC member Klaus Gerhard sent me this picture, from his 1951 NH:

Scaling off the picture gave me this drawing:

Starting with a bit of 3/4” EN1 round bar, I set the bar up in the lathe with a revolving centre to support the end of the bar and set about reducing the centre section to 3/8” diameter:

I had a 3/8” diameter round nose tool which I made last time to form this radius:

The hexagonal bit is a section cut from a cheap Melco box spanner. The holes you see are for the tommy bar - I’ll weld those up later:

In the picture above, you can see that one of the ends of the main part has been reduced in diameter very slightly to fit inside the box spanner part. The other end needs a radius and a hole:

I made the radius by turning two or three chamfers at different angles and smoothing them off with a file in the lathe. 

Best test it:

The cross drilling is 8.5 mm, to clear the 5/16” tommy bar; I drilled it in the bench drill paying very careful attention to centring the drill over the bar, and drilling in three steps (4mm, 6.5 mm, 8.5 mm). 

Apologies for the awful picture. There’s a peripheral weld around the circumference of the box spanner and two plug welds filling in the tommy-bar holes. Those with keen eyes for a pinhole will note that I used the last of the Argon on this weld!

At some point, hopefully this year, I shall set up a plating plant and deal with a long list of small FH bits that need cad (or as near as is available today) plating. This QD hub spanner will be plated - but for now, it's happy with some gloss black U-Pol.

One last thing. You might recall that the 1950 version of this spanner has an extension, 6611-50:

My interpretation on how it's used is this. With the extension on the spanner and the tommy bar pinning the two together, you use the extension to steady the spanner with your right hand while turning the tommy bar with your left - you can actually get a lot more torque on the nut like that:

Thanks for reading, and I hope you found it useful!