12 Days of Christmas: Day 10, fixing a wheel

Day 10: Thursday morning, bright and early, and it was time to start working on the Prinsenhout Staphorster wheel which had followed me home from M's house on Tuesday.
The problem: a footman that hops off.... all the time.....
I started by going online on Ravelry and posting photos and asking questions, and then after an answer or two I took matters into my own hands.
It seemed to me that for some reason the white plastic bearings in the hole at the top of the footman was protruding too much and not giving me space to put a washer on the end of the crank to keep the footman from jumping off. So I got a hammer and gently coaxed off the white plastic from one end.

I cut off a small ring from the plastic, with the thought that I might put it back on now that it was shortened, bu only if it turned out to be necessary. I tried the footman first with only one plastic bearing on and a black rubber tap washer to hold the footman on.
I also retied the cord at the end of the footman which had tied it to the treadle. Now both ends of the cord go through the treadle and that means less wobble and jerking around of the footman as I spin.

And then I sat to spin - and it spun!
Only minor problem was that the knot under the treadle worked its way up through the hole and now the treadle fell to the floor. I used the tiny ring that I had just cut off to anchor the threads together under the treadle to eliminate that problem, and retied the knot.
I had already noticed that the one and only bobbin was missing a bushing at one end, and that the existing bushing at the other end looked identical to the white plastic piece I had taken off the footman, So I tried it, and yes it fitted. Waste not, want not!
I tried again, and yes, the spinning wheel spun without any problem.
Later that evening I spun on it again, and yes it still continued to spin.
 All I need now is a better, more permanent solution than the rubber washer, I am thinking that if I can find a C-clip or a lock washer with teeth, diameter quarter inch, that I could use that to hold the footman in place, especially if I could get somebody to just cut a shallow groove in the crank for the clip to catch on to.

And the wheel ideally needs two or three more bobbins, so that the spinner can ply with it, with relative ease. (Otherwise, with only one bobbin, the spinner has to wind on the singles from the bobbin onto kitchen roll cores and then ply using them. Possible , but not easy)
The bobbin on the wheel seems to be about 16.8cm long, and the bobbins I see for sale on www.wolplantage.nl/ger are 17.5cm long, sadly. Nevertheless, I will send a message to Marianne on that site and see if she has anything that would suit.

I have started an Instagram account and I aim to post mostly spinning stuff on it. Rest assured that there will be no photos of my children doing funny sweet things! You can find me there, under the name spin_me_a_yarn_ie. There is a 30 day photo challenge for spinners, #wemakeyarn. I am trying to post one photo a day for that challenge. Let's see how that goes, once I return to work next week!