| Replacing broken plastic handles? [message #22274] |
Thu, 29 January 2015 17:57  |
bmacdo
Messages: 14
Registered: January 2015
Location: Florida
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Junior Member |
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I purchased a pedal steel guitar recently off Craigslist and the woman I got it from threw in a Kustom K150-8 circa 1971, the 4x10 model. Its been closeted for over 35 years she said it probably didn't work, she just wanted it gone. Got it home, tore it down and vaccuumed out a world class mouse colony nest from under the reverb tank, hit the pots with some contact cleaner and reassembled. When I plugged her in she fired right up, even the cool purple power lamp. Reverb, tremolo and all functions are working fine and pots are clean. One small cig burn in a corner, otherwise no damage. Casters were shot from rust but I found some hooded ball type by Shepherd that appear to be exact replacements. Even came with original Kustom cover.
The one thing it needs is the black plastic replaced on one of the handles. Somebody here posted re: cannibalizing the plastic piece from a Brettuns Village suitcase handle ($15) and doing a slick repair. I was wondering if anybody can provide a bit more info about how to do this. I assume one would use a Dremel or similar tool to behead the old rivets but then what? Can new rivets be made to work inside those plastic handle pieces or do you use screws instead? I'm pretty handy but don't know anything about working with rivets in a situation like this. Any guidance is much appreciated. The suitcase handle piece does appear to be an exact match. I'd rather restore the original handles then replace them with something that will devalue the amp. Thanks.
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| Re: Replacing broken plastic handles? [message #22276 is a reply to message #22274] |
Fri, 30 January 2015 01:12  |
chicagobill
Messages: 2006
Registered: April 2003
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Senior Member |
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Welcome to the place. Congrats on the new amp. What a great deal.
The handles that I have fixed had rivets that were more like screws, where the main shaft is twisted making it sort of like a threaded screw. If you grab the head with a pair of vice grips you can try twisting them out like backing out a screw. If the head gets messed up, you can replace them with small wood screws, like the ones that are used to mount tuning machines on guitar headstocks.
There is somebody on eBay that sells wooden inserts that replace the original plastic ones. I really don't know how much a replaced handle insert would effect the value of the amp.
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