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Potmetal... made small sections from some other potmetal piece and muggy welded them in, redrilled, and contour/finished with dremel. Just don't overheat!!!!!!!!!! Below link shows couple pictures of crack and hole repair.
It’s pot metal and can blow apart if you get too aggressive with it. If you post pics of the issue other solutions may work. I repaired a C2 pot metal cluster without welding.
Pot metal. Interesting. I had never heard of that before.
Muggy Weld seems to be the perfect solution to this problem!
Thanks!
Aaron
I recommend you practice on a piece of pot metal scrap so you get the technique of applying heat and flowing the rod. You don't want to directly heat alloy just the surrounding area. On cracks that you can see on top and bottom I found it best to heat from below and flow the rod from the top side. It will draw through the crack to the bottom side and not build up on top. The alloy has a very low melting point but it gets extremely hard when cooled so you don't want to have to work too hard when finishing. On holes I used wooden sticks as a backer material and just let the alloy fill the hole. I suspect most folks might try to blob the alloy on in areas such as the tab repair areas. If you do it right it doesn't take much to make an extremely strong bond. To me, more is not necessarily better. Best way I can describe heating technique is to heat surrounding area, remove heat, touch the rod to repair...if rod doesn't flow, repeat with a little heat and test for flow. Patiently keep doing this. I also cleaned all my repair areas with a stainless steel brush before I started.
Ran across these photos in my phone and immediately thought of you. Maybe they will aid you in your repairs.
Wooden sticks clamped on underside to keep the small piece I made from a bad speedometer frame aligned on cluster when I clamped it on. Note I choose to enlarge the broken area a little to better fit the piece I am welding in.
Here is the clamping of the small section used for the actual welding. Get the weld area real clean with a stainless steel brush right before repair.
Here is the tab welded on before I redrilled hole and finished shaping the outside profile. Some small files (flat and round) are very useful besides a dremel. I DP90 epoxy primed and will ultimately high build prime and block before shooting "Signet Red".
When I watch the TV car repair shows, it's always the metal fabrication and repair skills I envy the most!
Guys like Edd China, Ant Anstead, and... you!
Too right - I watch those pros roll out a sheet metal piece on an "English wheel" and hold it up to the car and it looks right and fits right and I can only think how badly I would screw that up...
I've always looked up to guys who could fabricate metal work with English wheels and bead rollers, and top it off with perfect welds. Because I certainly can't! It's not nearly as easy as it looks, at least to us mere mortals.
Nice work tgtexas01!
I purchased the Muggy weld ($70) +Blue ice ($70) + some Zinc test metal and practiced for several hours.
I did OK, but I was too chicken sh-- to actually put the torch to the instrument housing. I ended up using JB Weld thinking that if the results were not up to par then I could always go the Muggy weld route as a last resort.
The JB weld is ugly, but seems to be holding. I am a bit worried how it is going to look after it is painted.
If you use true JB-Weld (not the Quck stuff with 1/2 the strength) it should be fine, sand and prime and you should have an invisible repair. I've repaired clusters with JB-Weld and nobody will know the difference if you're patient.
Nice work tgtexas01!
I purchased the Muggy weld ($70) +Blue ice ($70) + some Zinc test metal and practiced for several hours.
Aaron, I feel somewhat responsible for you spending all those dollars. If you don't think you will ever use the stuff I would buy it from you as I will end up using it. Someday when I finish restoring the water damage on my camper side, the wife's house remodels, travelling, golf and my 58...maybe I will find the time to help others by repairing these types of problems for them. When folks thinking about retirement tell me "I am afraid to retire because I don't have any interests to keep me busy", I just tell them I don't have enough time to do all things I choose to do. Anyway, the JB should work fine and just private msg me on the muggy weld/ice!
I just went outside to have a relaxing morning cup of coffee with the wife while gazing upon the pontoon boat, jet ski, riding mower, 72 convertible and her 84 corvettes. Thinking about exchanging the coffee for a stella?
12-14-2019, 03:20 PM
Instrument cluster housing
