Ambulance Fan Faceplate. A self-inflicted wild ride!

[matthew henricks]

Thought i would share a story about failure. Not all jobs go as planned.

I was finishing up a face plate for a fan set i had. I had just finished painting it and set it out to dry on the back of my wife's truck. (That was the mistake) About 30 minutes later she left and the face plate left with her.

In a panic i call her and no face plate.

I re-trace her steps praying to find it in a gutter somewhere with minor damage.

I found it. It was not pretty. My heart sank...

What do you do? It's not like i can go to the dealership and get a new one. You can't just go to Ebay or even The Samba and get a face plate for anything reasonable and for sure not by itself.

OK. We can fix this. We have the technology. (At least that is what i was telling myself...)


Have you ever heard of Cerrosafe? It has many commercial names but it is low melting point metal. This stuff melts at 165F. It is basically Bismoth, Tin & Lead.

What if I make some dies and try and press the plate back into shape using my hydraulic press?

Since i have a number of fans, I took one and use it to make the dies. I need both sides. After casting i machine them flat and test fit things. They fit great. Alignment is a bit tricky but this is one off so it worked pretty well.

Not too bad. Not going to win any shows but maybe, just maybe with enough body work...


Next was the recovery of the fan supports. Remove, straighten, weld up the torn holes and re-spot weld in place. Still need some grinding but looks ok.

Now to fix the bend. I located a suitable radii "stand in" and give it a try. That worked pretty well. (These images also show the re-attached fan arm.

The next step was to repair the small motor tabs.

What is left is alot of body work. It is not going to look perfect but it will be usable and for someone who has nothing, well it will be better than nothing. You can see that one imprint came out great. The other is not as good but…

So… I wonder if we could make a whole plate? Hmm. I know i cannot as there are many tools i do not have but lets play a little and maybe...

OK. What if we made a new set of dies with both imprints?

That last image was a mess. That is what happens when your mold blows out and drops liquid metal all over your mill.

The metal filled ever void including the mill “T” slots. That was 4 hours of clean-up I could have done without. The saving grace was that it was low melt metal so a torch helped me along.

Lets try again.

That is as far as I have gotten. It is an interesting side project but at the end of the day something that can’t really be done in a home shop.

Nowhere near enough pressing power and not sure how to properly control the shrinkage. Heat is the solution but then that flies in the face of low melting metals.

The real elephant in the room to make a plate is the edge beading and text for the faceplate.

It was a fun experiment.

Would really love to hear feedback and ideas if you have any.

Also, anyone have a face plate in worse condition?
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1964 Original Owner build Thread. https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=702135&highlight=

Ambulance Fan's. https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=627707&highlight=

Parts i am looking for:
64 bug nice used front/rear Black LHD floor mat.

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Link


I think if you sandwiched the metal as above you'd get a good result without the puckering

[Mr Margaret Scratcher]

Also, a pair of 3d printed dies could work on something this size:


Link

[Bobs67vwagen]

Ouch, have you suspended your wife's driving privileges?

[matthew henricks]

[ezcamper]

The soft metal is an interesting idea. Apparently there are 3d printed plastics that can be used for die making as well. I have thought about reproducing this part but the switch seems to be the issue. I was going to 3d scan a good unit and have dies machined. I think you did pretty well. How much pressure did you press with?
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I make HWE style roof racks, Jim-Dandy racks, SO-33 metal parts, Dormobile racks, HWE style ladders, engine crank start handles, Westy rack tags, Binz tags, Sundial badges, State of California tags, steering lock electrical covers and single / double cab gate latch friction blocks.

instagram is http://instagram.com/bullidriversteelworks

[campingbox]

Inspiring work Matt. Keep it up.

[matthew henricks]