Thursday 7 November 2013

Fixing the control lever

Way back in May I mentioned that the control lever on Jubilee had come loose. I shall now describe what the problem was and how I fixed it.

Here is the control lever. (Can I call it a "Morse" control, or does that imply a particular make or style?)

In order to disengage the gears and yet open the throttle (for starting the engine) the lever has to be pulled two or three millimetres away from its mounting, in other words, in a direction normal to the woodwork. Eventually the force required to do this caused the screws to pull out of the (thinnish) wood of the cupboard door.

Looking the other side of the control, inside the electrics cupboard, I could see that there was a gap of about 3/4" between the back of the door and the backplate of the mechanism.

All I had to do, then, was cut a couple of bits of wood of the right thickness to pad out the gap. There were even four very convenient holes in the backplate for securing the bits of wood. The notches avoid parts of the mechanism.

An easy fix, without having to do any dismantling. And it's now solid and better than the original.

That's the sort of job I like!

Now, if only I could work out why our home dishwasher has stopped working ...

5 comments:

Nev Wells said...

Halfie,

A good fix, I agree satisfaction when it goes to plan !! I fixed our dishwasher by taking her to the pictures..... sorry couldn't resist that one. In fact I did fix our dishwasher We had been away on the boat and I left a tea towel hanging over the door to stop it being closed by no 2 son. He still closed it and in doing so jammed the door switch in the so the dishwasher always thought the door was open and refused to start. took it apart and set it how it should be and was a star for the day !!

Good luck

Nev

Nev Wells said...

.... another option to check there is a float switch on ours in the base. if water builds for whatever reason the switch rises and makes to stop the dishwasher running and adding to the leak....might be worth checking that ? Now I must sleep !!

Nev

Halfie said...

Thanks for your suggestions, Nev. For the last few years the door on ours has needed to be pushed closed with some force in the right place - near the selector switches - for the mains light to come on. When I took the door panel off I found that the spade terminals where the incoming mains connects, and the surrounding terminals, were blackened. It looks like there's been dirty switch contacts - arcing - burning. I've hard wired the switch but now, despite mains present, there's no life at all.

Work continues ...

Tom and Jan said...

I wonder why the morse controller wasn't correctly secured when first fitted?

Halfie said...

Perhaps it seemed firm enough at the time. Or, possibly, the "pulling out" action has got stiffer - I'd have to compare with another lever if the same type.