Todays Project - What did you do today?

[stevec]

Had a little fun today, A while ago I rolled some rubber tires off some fixed (not swivel) casters because they didn't swivel. took them apart and set them aside for future attention (I do that a lot). I tried warming them up in boiling water to see if that would soften them up enough to be able to urge them onto their little hubs . No dice. so I thought of cutting a tapered "mandrel" to force the tires onto, stretching them out enough to then be pressed onto the hubs.
Here's a shot of the casters, tires remounted and reassembled.
   
Here's a shot of the PVC "expander" I made.I arbitrarily chose a 5° taper and there's a ¼" of 2"D lead in and ¼" of 2½ at the end .
   
I cut a "pilot" into the PVC taper that aligned the plastic hub for the "last push" to slip the expanded tire onto the hub.
I used my lathe as a press, the chuck with its jaws clear of the tire was the "base" of the press and the tailstock ram was the press ram.
I held the tire on the face of the chuck, inserted the 2" pilot of the PVC taper into the tire, couple of drops of lube and advanced the tailstock ram until the tire is at the 2.5" exit diam., back off the tailstock ram and insert the caster hub centered by it's hub extension and continue to advance the tailstock ram and watch with glee how the tire is seated back on it's hub.
Sorry I didn't step by step with the photos but I was experimenting and had no Idea of acheiving recordable success.