So I've got the body machined for the new relief valve. I started with the actual relief valve chamber/hole, and within about 30 seconds I hit a major roadblock when I snapped off my 3/16" drillbit deep in the hole. An hour of tedious frustration, and I was able to continue.
I measured the relief valve chamber of a spare TCV and drilled this as closely to those measurements as I could. About the only tricky part is the beveled lip down deep where the steel ball will have to seal against. I used a drillbit to create the hole, then ran the drillbit backwards in an attemp to kind of burnish it to a clean finish.
Next I drilled one of the outlet holes, and tapped and beveled it for SAE #6 Female. Then I drilled its deep passage that reaches all the way into the relief valve chamber. I wanted to pressure test the relief valve, and I needed this hole to be in place, so that my pressure test air had a place to escape.
Then I drilled out the first of the two inlet check valve chambers, so that I could fit the rubber tip of my blowgun in there for a tight seal, and assembled the pressure relief ball, spring and screw stud.
Then I went ahead and shot 120 PSI air in there. I was hoping to hear and feel no air esacaping at the lower right outlet hole.
That didn't happen. It was putting up meaningful resistance, but there was clearly a good amount of air hissing out of the lower right outlet hole. Which meant that my relief ball wasn't making a good seal against its seat.
I thought of a couple possible solutions: 1. Try to grind the seat with a beveled stone in a dremel. 2. Tap/pound the ball bearing down into the hole to deform the steel into a shape that makes close contact. I decided the first option is more predictable and less risky. And the second option could damage the ball bearing and I don't have a spare of that size. So I decided on option 1. However, I don't have a beveled dremel grinding stone of that shape and size. So I chucked up a similar one in my dremel and used a grinding wheel dresser to dial in its diameter and give it a 45 degree bevel. Worked like a charm. But when I stuck it in the hole I found another problem, that the shaft is too short. It wasn't even reaching the top of the hole, let alone leave enough sticking out to grip in the dremel chuck.
So I chucked up some 3/16" rod in the lathe and drilled a 1/8 ID hole in the end of it. I put some green loctite in the hole and rammed in the shaft of the dremel stone. So now I had extendED the shaft of the dremel stone by an inch, but it wouldn't fit in the dremel anymore. No big deal. The slower speed of a cordless drill is probably safer/better anyway. So that's what I used.
After I ground that inner seat for 20 or 30 seconds I cleaned/blew everything out again and reassembled the relief valve components.
This time it held 120psi of air without any perceivable leakage. If it can seal air this well, it'll be fine for 15w-40 oil.
Finally I went through and drilled/tapped/reamed the final holes and passages, as per the drawing.
I have 4 ea. SAE 6M X JIC 6M adapters on the way. I'll ream a seat for the check ball seat into the SAE 6Male end of the two inlet fittings. The check ball seal will be a lot easier to seal, because the harder the fluid pushes, the harder it seals. The relief valve is just the opposite, you have only the spring pressure to keep the fluid contained, so the ball to seat mating surface has to be super clean/smooth.
So now I wait for my fittings to come in the mail. But it's basically finished. Hooray!