Broke or what

[Johnjo]

Left the compass on board for the winter safely tucked away in a locker, Dug it out yesterday
to test whether the tangs in the rudder were stainless or mild steel by laying it alongside
the rudder to see if they were magnetic or not!

Problem is/was it had a huge air bubble in it, And the bezel would not rotate, gave it a shake,
but it would not move,
Went home with it and had a good moan to SWMBO about it, felt better! Anyway ordered a new one
last night,
Just now had a look at the old one, yes you've guessed it, bubble gone, bezel turning no problem
all working as it should.

What went wrong? And why should it correct itself?

mike

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[dk]

The oil got too cold maybe? Has it been topped up with the wrong stuff? Neat oil is no good - it needs some alchohol in it for cold nights alone on board!

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[Johnjo]

No, its all sealed, never being tinkered with!
like you say could have been the cold, cause after a few hours left indoors
it revived itself. strange where the air went though!

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[tom52]

" .....strange where the air went though......"
Maybe the fluid had contracted because of cold. If the unit is sealed it would not have been air but a vacumn which disappeared when fluid expanded in the warm back to its normal volumn. When contracted because of cold maybe the fluid is too thick for the card to float.

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[Johnjo]

Hmm better not use it in the winter then, must be a summer use only model/forums/images/icons/smile.gif
does not really matter as I have ordered a new one to fit in the bulkhead, interesting though
because on other boats I have owned and used all year round, never happened before!

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