vyacheslav
Senior Member
Greetings,
I have restored about a dozen vintage Speed Kings over the years, and I am very familiar with how they function and I consider myself an experienced Speed King restorer. The one I have now has one of the spring tension screws underneath completely stuck/frozen (the other came out fine with a little bit of "coaxing"). I imagine it is probably due to rust or corrosion, however the pedal still functions "normally" (normal for a gunked up Speed King, anyway), so I'm not sure it would function as well if there were rust and corrosion on the spring/inside the post, especially with the other spring removed. Sometimes the pedal gets dropped or damaged and the post the tension screw threads into can become out of round, making the screw very hard to get out or turn. This is not the case on this one either.
I've tried 3-in-1 Oil, Liquid Wrench and even a product called PB Blaster, which is supposed to work very well in freeing stuck screws/parts. I have applied all of these liberally and kept the pedal upside down (leaning against a box) to let the various products soak in overnight (as much as they could soak in...it's a pretty tight seal). It still won't budge, and I'm using a heavy duty, well built slotted screwdriver that is a good 16" long from end to end, so I have plenty of torque. I turn as hard as I possibly can. Nothing.
This one has me stumped. I've never been able to not get one out before. Any ideas or suggestions? For next steps, I was thinking about either:
A)-Heating the post with a heat gun to maybe loosen up some of the gunk or rust (and using a pot holder to handle it!). It would expand the post slightly, but would also expand the screw as well.
or trying the opposite
B)-Leaving it in the freezer overnight. Again, it's a Catch 22, because the screw would contract slightly, but so would the post.
Do either of these ideas sound reasonable?
Thanks for your help!
V
I have restored about a dozen vintage Speed Kings over the years, and I am very familiar with how they function and I consider myself an experienced Speed King restorer. The one I have now has one of the spring tension screws underneath completely stuck/frozen (the other came out fine with a little bit of "coaxing"). I imagine it is probably due to rust or corrosion, however the pedal still functions "normally" (normal for a gunked up Speed King, anyway), so I'm not sure it would function as well if there were rust and corrosion on the spring/inside the post, especially with the other spring removed. Sometimes the pedal gets dropped or damaged and the post the tension screw threads into can become out of round, making the screw very hard to get out or turn. This is not the case on this one either.
I've tried 3-in-1 Oil, Liquid Wrench and even a product called PB Blaster, which is supposed to work very well in freeing stuck screws/parts. I have applied all of these liberally and kept the pedal upside down (leaning against a box) to let the various products soak in overnight (as much as they could soak in...it's a pretty tight seal). It still won't budge, and I'm using a heavy duty, well built slotted screwdriver that is a good 16" long from end to end, so I have plenty of torque. I turn as hard as I possibly can. Nothing.
This one has me stumped. I've never been able to not get one out before. Any ideas or suggestions? For next steps, I was thinking about either:
A)-Heating the post with a heat gun to maybe loosen up some of the gunk or rust (and using a pot holder to handle it!). It would expand the post slightly, but would also expand the screw as well.
or trying the opposite
B)-Leaving it in the freezer overnight. Again, it's a Catch 22, because the screw would contract slightly, but so would the post.
Do either of these ideas sound reasonable?
Thanks for your help!
V
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