Office of Steam Forum for Model & Toy Steam Gas & Hot Air Engines

My little ET-1 has a serious problem....  I just got my Et-1 in Saturday from Banggood and it started right away and after a few minutes it started squeaking and stopped solid after less than 5 minutes run time. More like 5-6 short runs all less than 1 minute each thus far. Never even warmed up yet. I was using Coleman fuel with MMO to tint it a bit pink and oiled the moving parts and the back side of the piston with some 3in1. Mine is stuck pretty darn tight, Pulled the cylinder head for inspection and it looks oily and perfect and it had no effect on the tightness. So I loosened the right main cap and it was still tight, torqued it back down to feel correct and loosened the left main cap and bam it is loose again !  Main cap measures 12mm spot on across the open end but the crank reaching down as far as the saddle will allow with the points of my Mitutoyo vernier calipers, which should be close to 1/2 way point I am getting consistent 12.06-12.08mm across the main journal... I have to back the main cap screws off 1/2 to 3/4 turn for it to rotate smoothly, obviously not a fix in that. I know it sounds crazy but the crank seems over size.  The only other thing that can be is some galling in the saddle but still the crank measures large and I have not lifted it out as of yet due to not having a good plan to maintain the timing to put it back together. I can likely use my optivisor and a fine point scribe to mark it somehow. Let me know if there is any good ideas on what to do with it. I am considering shimming under the main cap or scribing the gears somehow and disassembling it to turn the crank or bore that main journal if necessary

P.S. It did roll over smoothly as expected at first and there is no galling at all inside that left main cap, I can see some slight rubbing in the anodizing and that is all

EDITED after some inspection....

Doug in Indiana