DIY ... Old bulkhead compass internals in good condition.

Refueler

Refueler

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My SR25 - the old bulkhead compass ... the plastic 'glass' clouded up ... fluid leaked when the rear section cracked with old age. I replaced with a Contest 100.

I took the old one apart and am left with a perfectly good gimballed dome card ....

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The 'glass' and rear section are well past useable ... you can see the 'glass' in the photo is clouded up completely. I even tried 'mirror polish' to try and get back to clear ...

The question is whether the card and gimbal can be fitted into a suitable mount and fluid added to damp.

Its not by any means an exercise to create a compass for serious use, I already have enough - but an interesting game to see what can be done with it.
 
Look at various sized glass jars to see if one will fit. Than you have to fill and seal it. Fun fun fun.

Do let us know how you get on. Write it up and submit an article to pbo. They might even pay you for it.
 
Reviving an old thread I started ...

The Compass has been tried in various plastic and glass containers .. but nothing has been successful yet. My next project with it - is to try a 3D print bowl and then find a clear top to apply. Question being whether I can get the 3D print to be 'watertight'.

It would be neat if I could get it sorted - then mount it on one of my dayboats ..... just for conversation piece.
 
I would not give up on the 'glass' before having a serious go at it with something like 400 grit w&d.
If it looks clear when you're running water over it after this, then it can be polished with higher grit numbers followed by metal polish/t-cut/whatever.
 
TernVI said:
I would not give up on the 'glass' before having a serious go at it with something like 400 grit w&d.
If it looks clear when you're running water over it after this, then it can be polished with higher grit numbers followed by metal polish/t-cut/whatever.
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Bit late now TBH .. I may have ditched it after trying many ways to try clear it ... I'll have another look for it .. and give it a go as you say.

The dome is pretty crap plastic though ... but if I find it .. wont hurt to try.

Might be a bit hard to reseal though. it literally fell apart when I removed it from bulkhead.

Its more a project to see if it can be set up ... rather than a serious attempt to fix ...
 
Get a bit of perspex turned to match the cloudy original then spend a lot of time polishing it. Depending on the shape it might be possible to vacform sheet perspex.
 
Spirit (of Glenans) said:
The glass on my compass has become somewhat cloudy, but thankfully not yet unuseable. I have bought but not yet tried out, a plastic headlamp restoration kit, from a car accessories website. I will report my results to the forum when I get around to doing the job.
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Interested in results .........

One of the problems with my old BH compass - was the clouding was not on outside - but on inside of the 'glass' - So I had to dismantle it. That as I posted before - was easy as the whole affair pretty well fell apart once released from the bulkhead. The unit though as original is a sealed affair ... so will be interesting to see if I can find the parts again ... clean and put back together.
 
DownWest said:
Having an aviation compass with a big bubble, the CAA area inspector suggested filling with gin. I did.... and the numbers fell off. Bit surprised as it was French. Prob baby oil would have been safer :)
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Inspector said Gin ??? It was an old wives tale on ship to have a bit of gin on the side to top up the mag compass ......... not a good idea !

Generally the proper fluid, as in Naval Hand compasses etc, is Iso-Propyl Alcohol often with secondary name on label 2- Propanol.
Depending on the damping rating - that would often be mixed with distilled water in varying ratios.
But you need to check with the Brand / model specs.

Some people change hand compasses to Baby Oil to increase the damping ... I have a Naval Compass that I did that for ... but you need to be careful ... some cards / magnet attachments do not like other fluids than what designed for.
 
RAI said:
My Sestrel compass uses oil - Bayol IIRC
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It's very difficult to find anything absolutely concrete, but I found enough to convince me that Baby Oil is the same stuff - white oil. On that basis I've used it in two Sestrel HB compasses that I've restored, and they work beautifully with damping as per the others I've used.

A friend thought he knew that I was 'into' restoring compasses and snapped me up an 'absolute bargain' of a Sestrel steering compass at a boot sale (which I had to pay £50 for). Gawd knows what the previous owner had filled it with but it smelt like an alcohol and had bubbled all the paint on the card. Got £30 for it on eBay with very honest pictures.
 
Refueler said:
Yes it can ... in fact you can bring back old CD's to play with it .. but don't try with the baking soda variety.
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Farecla G3 followed by the Autoglym version of T-Cut worked perfectly on the MoT-failed headlights on my son's car. It was actually my first real success in proving to him that doing what Dad says can save beer money. He got his money back on the new ones he's bought.
 
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