Fixed up a stamped Westinghouse (Thanks David Kilnapp!)

[Aleksandr Krawczak]

Hi Fan Fans!

Last month, I posted this topic about wanting to fix up a stamped steel Westy that I've had kicking around for a couple of decades. It was a basket case and had several parts missing. I was a little overwhelmed at first, but David Kilnapp sent me a whole box of goodies to get me started. With his generous gift of a headwire, power cord, plug end, acorn nuts, rubber grommets, bottom felt, and -- most importantly -- a speed coil to replace the missing original, I was ready to tackle this project.

I never intended to do a showroom-ready restoration. I wanted to retain the antique patina, while stabilizing any rust/flaking paint, replacing missing parts, cleaning and lubricating internal parts, and getting the machine running again, hopefully for another hundred years. Since I was able to access the rotor and gearbox, and since I didn't want to strip and repaint, I did not have to deal with the headache of pulling the stator from the case. There was enough headwire left for me to solder new conductors to, as well.

David sent me a speed coil/switch unit that worked, but it was from another model (an R&M 2410) with a different mounting pattern and overall form factor. I had to caaaarefully swap the coil onto the Westy's switch. The old, brittle cloth insulated wires were a challenge. Designing a new mounting system was fun. My solution involved homemade brass hooks and wooden shims -- it's not pretty but it's solid and nobody will ever see it anyway.

With the fan mechanically up and running, It was time for a gentle surface cleaning and missing part fabrication. I cleaned it with distilled water, resorting to odorless mineral spirits for stubborn grime. A previous owner had rattlecanned the cage struts. Fine with me, I'm carefully rattlecanning individual parts where necessary too, but this chump sprayed over rust, and as soon as I started working on the struts the paint started chipping, revealing the corrosion underneath. So I used a wire wheel to strip the loose paint and rust, hammered out some bends, prepped the surface and carefully resprayed them. Much better.

Two case studs were broken, so I carefully tapped the ends of some steel rod, threaded on a square nut and ground the nut to size. Once I had the new parts installed, I realized that since it's all internal, I could have just used off the shelf threaded rod cut to length. Oh well.

The struts clamp to the cage with a little plate and a fillister-head screw. One of these assemblies was missing, so I filed a new one out of a 90 degree aluminum extrusion I had laying around, and painted the head of a new screw (hard to find the right screw but I did it). I don't think the aluminum is going to hold the paint well, someone might have to do something about it in 60 years or so.

The headwire strain relief spring was too narrow for the new headwire, so I wound a new one out of music wire. This did not come out as tidy as I would have hoped, but black paint hides many sins.

 

Anyway, it all came out nice, it runs quiet and moves a ton of air. My wife and I have been going back and forth over where it will live in the house, as it's kind of large and we already have a lot of stuff. Last night her uncle came over and went crazy over it. He is extremely hard to shop for, so we've decided it will make a nice gift for him. I'll give it to him once the replacement oil wick arrives and I install it.