A little update on the restoration.
An easy part was oxycleaning tanks and valves sanding them and repainting.
I decided to go with traditional but sexy
black and white.
In process I have also refurbished the chasis. It took a little TLC and some car body techniques and few coats of paint.
Then the next step was the srubbers: a day long bath in vinegar helped lose all the sodalime deposits, a week long bath in CLR took care about bring metal to a shiny almost new look. Couple coats of sexy black and scrubbers look like new.
In a process of 'dry trying' the unit, I have discovered that one of the previous owners must have customized this Salvus to his size. I am not a giant(6'1" or 186cm) but that person has to be hmmmm.....tiny.
The cross chest harness should placed the chassis close to my left hip. Instead it was dangling just slightly under my arm pit. After some search I've found almost identical match in......craft and sewing supply store.
One problem solved. Another one, size related, was the length of the rubber crotch strap holding the counterlung. Well I try to put it on. Kinky! I couldn't even stand straight, now chance. For a extension piece, I have used the old fire hose. First I got rid of the outer layer of canvas then cut the appropriate piece of rubber, folded and glued onto existing rubber. Very close match in colour and texture.
Thanks to Jan Willem Bech from The Rebreather Site, I got the Salvus manual. The text confirmed, that before placing the unit underwater one has to replace the pressure gauge with blank plug. That came as now surprise for me - upon first examination of the gauges, I knew they were not design to work underwater.
Since I didn't have the original plug, my first approach was to blank the hp hose using one of the regulator plugs.
That was just temporary fix. A few days after I discover the right plug in the manifold of incomplete Amphibian Mark IV. Bing! Now I just have to make a few copys in a local machine shop.
The manual also mentioned replacing dewatering valve in the scrubber by the blank plug. The brass plug is ion order, for noe the screw cap of the pen light works great.
I have also adjust one of the regulators, from original flow of about 2l/min to a more close matching metabolism 1 l/min.
That's about it, for now. More to follow.
rgrds
Tomek