Bugatti T57/59 engine

[Not-a-number]

On 19/02/2025 at 10:57, lowlancer said:

Keep going, I have nothing to add of actual value aside from encouragement.

Thanks!

Encouragement, discussion, questions, ideas from you guys is motivating. 
 

I’ve made the call to find more time to do this so I hope to have updates more often.

 

[Not-a-number]

On 19/02/2025 at 21:18, BobbyBreeze said:

Nice to see ya on Ivans shed! Keep up the good work! If you need anything investment cast let me know, I'd be happy to help. 

What type of investment casting have you done?

Do you do it at home or work at a foundry?

Im considering doing it for parts like the water pump, oil pump and maybe even supercharger. 

[BobbyBreeze]

13 hours ago, Not-a-number said:

What type of investment casting have you done?

Do you do it at home or work at a foundry?

Im considering doing it for parts like the water pump, oil pump and maybe even supercharger. 

Home foundry, Ceramic shell, generally lost-PLA though I'm starting to play around with wax a bit. I've got a mate who helps with resin printing and he has some burnable casting resin to try out so that's the next mission. 

Most my stuff is intake manifolds for my own product line but can do anything really, as long as I can get into internal cavities to remove the ceramic. 

Pumps and blower would be a good use case for investment casting for sure! 

 

 

[Not-a-number]

13 hours ago, BobbyBreeze said:

Home foundry, Ceramic shell, generally lost-PLA though I'm starting to play around with wax a bit. I've got a mate who helps with resin printing and he has some burnable casting resin to try out so that's the next mission. 

Most my stuff is intake manifolds for my own product line but can do anything really, as long as I can get into internal cavities to remove the ceramic. 

Pumps and blower would be a good use case for investment casting for sure! 

 

 

Those look really great. Nice work! Id be really keen to talk about the process if youre open to it. Ill send you an email.

[NickJ]

Still my favourite build here, even better now some serious machining set ups are on the go!

Keen to see how you plan to set up the raw castings into the machine and process, will there be a pre-machine step to make a datum or have you allowed plenty of material to come off? Will the trunnion get all the critical stuff done in one op?

Nice clean machine shop too, very inspirational.

[Not-a-number]

4 hours ago, NickJ said:

Still my favourite build here, even better now some serious machining set ups are on the go!

Keen to see how you plan to set up the raw castings into the machine and process, will there be a pre-machine step to make a datum or have you allowed plenty of material to come off? Will the trunnion get all the critical stuff done in one op?

Nice clean machine shop too, very inspirational.

There is ‘mostly’ a lot of machine allowance. But the ports have no allowance. So they will be where I need to datum in a way. 
I’ll start off by setting up out of the 4th axis trunnion and machine the face that mates to the crank case. That height will depend on the port positions and primarily the valve seat position. There’s not a lot of play there and it’s a hard thing to get to to check if it’s going to have allowance.

Then when it’s in the trunnion it would just be determining port/valve positions along the length. 
 

It’s going to take a lot of measuring before starting. 

[flyingbrick]

I haven't been on old-school for maybe a year.

I was just standing in the shower thinking about your build and decided I better come have a look to see if you had updated at all. Not disappointed!

[JustHarry]

@Not-a-number is that just for your car? Or are you reproducing blocks for sale? Can't be many people around making blocks from scratch 

[Not-a-number]

On 14/11/2025 at 17:38, JustHarry said:

@Not-a-number is that just for your car? Or are you reproducing blocks for sale? Can't be many people around making blocks from scratch 

Yeah I have a couple more to do. I’ll start on them once this one has valves seats cut.

Not many people doing them but also not many people needing them.

[CUL8R]

Well done on all the parts. Always enjoy your updates. 

How much of those parts there are Genuine vs Reproduction? Either way Im sure the bank account has been thoroughly drained!

[Not-a-number]

Only a few parts are original. Theres a couple of rear spring hangers, brake levers, cam caps and a front hub. Id use the cam caps but the rest are good for reference.

There were only really 6 cars (in various forms its probably 8 cars) and they are all accounted for. It was a race car so there were obviously extra parts around though theyve been scooped up years ago. All major components are with those original cars. Its not like the Type 57 road car where they made close to 800 cars so there are old usable parts out there.

 

Original hub on right.

Original cam caps. But they might be from a T57.

Original drilling jigs for the crankcase and cam box.

 

1 hour ago, CUL8R said:

Either way Im sure the bank account has been thoroughly drained!

Yeah pretty much. But isnt that what we're supposed to be doing? Spending all our money on car parts!