noglider 

My wife's piano bench got really wobbly, and she asked me to fix it. Some rods had fallen out of the mechanism and gone missing. Figuring out how to disassemble the bench and get the mechanism out was hard work. There are dozens of screws and rods and brass bushings. The bench is the kind that can go up and down when you turn the knobs at the ends. I don't know how old it is. It is immensely heavy. Turning it over and bending over it were some aspects of the difficulty.

I managed to do it. The construction and materials used and the workmanship on this thing are impressive. I wonder if they are this well made nowadays. The pantograph rods appear to be brass. The steel base of the mechanism is massive, as is the threaded rod.

The hardware didn't have brass rod, so I used steel. The guy working there cut the rod into the lengths I needed.

I cleaned up the hardened grime from the places where metal moves against metal and added lubrication.

due ruote 

Nice job!

I just refurbed some c. 1970 KLH speakers; completely rebuilt the crossovers etc. Easier than your project but rewarding, and they sound great now.

Do you know this one?

Mend it, fix it,
Wear it out.
Make it do
Or do without.

squirtdad

C&V skills translate to other areas, clearly.

markwesti

I have been working on this little but capable Craftsman/Atlas 618 lathe it's from the 40s' .

exmechanic89

JB Weld is my friend..

noglider 

Thank you, @squirtdad. I'm not actually that confident, because my skill set isn't all that broad. I'm a lousy carpenter, and I totally failed at hanging sheetrock.

@markwesti, I love machines from that period.

I suspect this piano bench is from the 60s or 70s because it has the label that certifies that the material is all new and the label can only be removed by the consumer, i.e. the same label that comes on mattresses and pillows.

oddjob2

My favorite C&V work


Sweating cooper pipe is cool too, but now pex is so much faster.

Just put this circa 1923 home under contract and hope to start upgrading in March. Four car garage!

noglider 

Hey @oddjob2, that's really cool. So is there a homeforumrepairs.net or something like that? I need to pick up skills.

Roger M 

I've done a crapload of repairs on this 1988 Volvo. It's pushing 450k, so replacing parts is to be expected.

Struts and Ball joints



This was the biggest pain in the ass job to do on any car I've worked on... Heater core and blower motor

Mike from Iowa

Don't you mean 34 bike garage?

oddjob2

I used to learn a lot watching Bob Vila and Norm Abrams. Now, TOH is more about RE porn, although they are beginning to cover Detroit's Renaissance.

Lots of video on youtube.
The Sunset series below are a godsend and cheap;
https://www.amazon.com/Basic-home-wiring-illustrated-Sunset/dp/0376010940
Also, Fine Homebuilding Magazine DVD

Tom, your cool West Village loft doesn't appear to need work. If you need help in the Hudson Valley, let me know as I must pass by it 4 times a year.

thumpism 

I need to test my fuel pressure on my '87 VW Vanagon Westy. My van won't run long enough to get me to the FLAPS so borrowing one of their tools might be out. I did price a set at Harbor Freight yesterday but it appears that all the connection fittings are clamp on or press on, no threaded ones to fit the fuel T in the engine compartment. Hmmm, is that safe?



Removed the little bolt (see above) to check the size and checked against my stash of bike parts, figuring what I need is a bicycle brake barrel adjuster to use as the thread-in piece to clamp a hose onto. Knew immediately that the size would be a problem since most adjusters are 6mm diameter by 1mm threading. Too big. I also remembered that old French 10-speeds used very small adjusting barrels so it was off to the co-op to check out the scrounge boxes. Bless their hearts, I found two Huret Allvit rear derailleurs with adjusters intact and scavenged them. I'm working in a gravel driveway and I will drop one of them. That's the law.

Anyway, now that I have the piece I can buy a gauge and do my testing, fully aware that my "Goddam, I'm freakin' brilliant" feeling might well come crashing down on me.

Below: Typical adjuster on top, with screw from my bin that matches the threading on the T bolt that I used to search for the smaller barrel.


Hooray for French bikes!


It has since been recommended that I only need to press a test hose onto that barb once the bolt is removed, so my "freakin' brilliant" glow is turning to "Oh, never mind."

TiHabanero

Roger M, we just picked up a 1988 Volvo 240 with 38000 miles on it. Literally looks like a new car, but I am doing a full service on it before we start using it. Including shocks and struts because it is so old. Had two 240s years ago with over 200,000 each, and they were easy to work on. Very happy I never had to replace wiper armature or blower motor. Two nightmarish jobs.

francophile 

Wish I would've taken before/after pics of it. 9yo came to me today, got one of those infernal fidget spinners from a classmate. Covered in some mystery paint, top to bottom, in every groove. "Please fix this, I see what you do with the cars and the bikes. This is the same stuff, right? Mechanical."

Challenge accepted? The thing was chunky, spun like a badly indexed headset. Was hoping the crap painted on it was water-based, so I soaked it in dish soap and hot water for a couple hours. Nada. Didn't even soften it.

Took it into the shop. Took a smidge of PB Blaster and rubbed across, *shloop* my finger saw a slurry of whatever it was, we have a winner. So I slathered on some more, let it sit, brushed it, let it sit, brushed it. Repeated 'til clean. Turns out this thing was actually blue at one time in its life.

The PBB got in there enough to loosen the center pivot, so I unscrewed the two halves, got access to the unsealed bearing, 3-in-1 in there, spin-spin-spin, flush, Finish Line'd it, blue Loctite on the fastener, screwed it back together. Took a little extra work to clean out the slots in the arms, but everything was pretty well softened from the PBB.

There's still some little traces of white, blue, yellow and green paint in some of the nooks and crannies, but the thing spins for 2-3 minutes straight with one good throw. My kids' smiles were priceless when they saw how long it'd run for. Just gotta let it sit up overnight for that Loctite to harden. May replace the blue with some red. Not sure yet.

But yes, C&V definitely translates to other things.

dedhed

Replaced the rotted out blade on my vintage plow truck with a bit better one. Of course every time I get it that truck it might be the last.





All Done


Got it off.


Old one was already patched a few times.

francophile 

PS:
Hell yes!

(PPS: ZOMBIE THREAD!!!)

thumpism 

I knew that, but at less than three years since the previous post it's more of a Nap Van Winkle thread.

francophile 

I'm not mad! Former owner of several VWs too, so I'm not mad about that either

easyupbug 

Could not agree more. This summer I re-plumbed our 1940's hand hewed log cabin pulling all the galvanized pipe out of the crawl space. I love copper having spent 32 years in the copper industry, but will never touch it again after using PEX and Sharkbites, no doubt saved me days of work. Sweating copper on your back in a 18" crawl space full of spiders is a slow go.

oddjob2

Glue Lam in place and temp support wall framing


New joists and 8' opening.


Final copper rough in


New DWV to be boxed in with soffit.


Risers
Moving my parents in 2018 to Grosse Pointe so that I can assist them in their twilight has been an overwhelming time suck; daily housekeeping, cooking, financial management, transportation, and income tax matters. That's just for dad as mom is in memory care. Time has been scarce for remodeling.

The 95 y.o. house in my earlier post had a crappy 1950's bath remodel that compromised the floor framing and caused tile cracking. It is a small house with one full bath and an obsolete basement full bath. The original supply pipes were iron.

In the process of remodeling, I removed the wall between kitchen and dining room and framed new joists for the upper bathroom. As a repipe project I removing two ill configured closets to make room for 2 baths upstairs, added a powder room on the main level in a minimal dimension closet, and repiped the basement bath for dog shampoos. Since I am not an expert in laying out DWV, I hired out the rough plumbing, which was completed yesterday. It took 6 months to find a decent plumber and ended up working with my S.O.'s sibling's outfit.

CV-6 

Don't you mean two cars and a bike workshop?

Ooops I have been zombied.

David Newton

I use a lot of my bike-repairing skills to augment my guitar-repairing skills, and vice versa.

oddjob2

An opportunity to buy my next door neighbor's home came up. Living with my dad in a 2 br/1 bath is not cutting it. So now I have 2 projects within a block. This house needs new kitchen, interior paint, floor refinish, new lighting, wiring, central AC, and a new driveway. Bathroom updating too, but not likely to the studs. With 2 more garages. Finally, enough real estate to accommodate my furnishings, the MCM furnishings from my parents, four vehicles, and too many bikes.


Powder room

squirtdad

I hate when that happens....which is all to often for me.....at least I as brilliant for a bit

ascherer 

Another zombie thread rises!
When I was a kid I put myself in the "all thumbs" category. After I was taught how to wrench and build wheels at age 15, I became confident in my ability to disassemble and reassemble anything. My parents must have been surprised when I stripped my other prized object, a vintage Hasselblad camera. Yes, the skills transfer.