Saturday, 19 August 2017

FHC resto nr. 58; Heater rebuild Part 2

It's been rather quiet concerning the restoration of the '76 FHC. And as usual this was caused by other commitments that needed my time, attention or money! But that doesn't mean I have been completely idle to that respect. For instance I picked up some parts for the heater's rebuild last week, a new heater matrix. The fact that it was a month overdue was completely compensated by its looks:



As you can see it is made from aluminium, using an of the shelf matrix block and normal ø16mm pipe ends. As such the infamous original heater matrix seals will be replaced with normal heater hoses and clips. And the two alloy pipes in front of the matrix will be used to construct a new passage through the front bulkhead. But not completely certain how I will design that, more on that later! At least I can now start with assembling the heater, though that might have to wait till later in the year ...

But also been busy with searching and collecting ever more parts that need to be cleaned and galvanised;




The original plan for this was to drop all the parts of @ Habraken in Best to put them in the oven and have them shot blasted in preparation for the galvanising process. This was prompted by the fact that during the restoration of the DHC some parts were not cleaned well enough before galvanising, thus giving a rather poor surface finish.
But due to the fairly high temperatures used to strip paint, grease and road grime of in the oven (±425°C), there is a real chance that parts made from spring steel will get damaged by the heat. So a problem for the springs, clips and some of the parts containing springs. So I needed an alternative method to get the grease and grime of these parts. Enter the dishwasher! It won't come as a surprise that I had to wait some time before I had the house to myself long enough to use the dishwasher's most thorough program! But the result was pretty good;


But as with the heater, further progress here will have to wait till after my holidays!

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