Heater door cranks

[The Veg]

'Right then, gents!

Any advice, before I do something stoopid and destroy something, on how to remove these cranks from the doors on the heater? I need to get the thing apart for some serious cleaning and then painting.

[Robbie693]

I just used a punch to knock the shafts out...

Robbie

[john.p.clegg]

They are splined on the shaft and a tight fit and break easily...

John

[Bud English]

Bicycle chain tool worked well for me for removing them. Take a good picture of their relative position to the door flaps before removal. Be sure to align the splines when putting them back on, then tap them lightly into place. Tread lightly. :D

[Matt Elan]

I've just finished refurbing my plus 2 heater box. I left the arms on the spindles and worked round them. You can get the other end off the box easily as its held on with self tappers. The arm end is riveted and welded so a bit more of a struggle to get off. You can get at the flaps though. I've replaced all the foam on the flaps, and there are little rubber flaps on the edge of one of them, which are held on with rivited on plates which I replaced using rubber from a motorcycle inner tube. I bought a new Chinese Lucas pattern fan motor as well as mine was knackered. A good coat of black smoothite finished it off.
Hths
Matt

[john.p.clegg]

Thought for the day
It is imperative that the foam and rubber seals are a good fit as air will always take the path of least resistance ,rather than flow through the heater matrix..

John

[The Veg]

Mine at some point served as a mouse-condo, so I do need to get good access to every last bit of the inside to remove contamination, treat rust, repaint, etc. It's really nasty inside.

[Matt Elan]

If you take the end plate with the flap arms on it off the main body without removing the arms, you can then get at the flaps and replace the foam and rubber seals while the flaps are still attached. I also took the fan motor mounting plate off the main body by drilling out the rivets which gave me enough room to clean up the inside and re-paint it. I'll post some pics up on my restoration thread at some stage.....

[The Veg]

Thanks Matt for the suggestions! Tonight I finally got around to getting the box apart. The spot-welds held so tenaciously that I really wonder why they even bothered with the rivets! I wound up drilling out enough rivets and welds to fully dis-assemble the thing, which is great as it's going to get one HELL of a cleaning! The PO said that the heater worked well despite the mouse-nest that blocked most of the core's surface on top (which she didn't know was in there until I showed her the picture), but I can't believe that the air from it didn't make anybody sick. Even now it smells nasty inside.

[KevJ+2]

I used to own a Mercedes transporter lorry that I kept on a farm. One day I started it up and heard a ding ding ding dong. I looked underneath and found that a rat had tried to escape through the fan blades. I opened up the front engine cover and found a big nest and a lot of chewed wiring.
I must have been taking the rat family out for day trips without realising
I washed out the nest, but the smell lingered on. I thought a good idea would be to place some urinal channel blocks in there to mask the smell but it was like driving around in a public toilet. I was probably better off putting up with the rat nest smell

[The Veg]

Since I have a little bit of rust and paint-damage as well as seal-replacement to deal with, I'm in for more than just a good washing. The sheet metal is going to get lots of attention before it goes back together, and the core is going to get some professional attention too.

[bg109685]

If you are turning your attention to the metalwork you might want to consider adding a radio friendly reassess in the heater casing. See http://www.lotuselan.info/images/IM001324.JPG to see what I mean.

I have my heater in pieces and I'm currently playing with a template to see if I can make up a similar mod.

Just a thought...

Brian

[The Veg]

Very cool Brian! I'm also looking at the RetroSound radio, which allows the font panel and body to separated and mounted remotely of each other via an extension cable.