I have just returned from Luxor, Egypt with my latest acquisitions, an Anchor 999, 350cp and an Egret 950, 500cp. the Egret looked reasonable, just some some roughness on the chrome and lots of dust and dirt. The Anchor looked terrible, somebody ha painted it black (very badly) and I suspected that the black paint would hide all sorts of damage. WRONG! It stripped off the paint using oven cleaner (I know from my experience of restoring engines that mother EU had "improved" modern paint strippers to the point where they no longer remove paint) and found the chrome to be perfect, just a little discoloration on the hood from the heat. The pump needs a new leather (I had replaced all the other seals) and the pricker needle was broken. A couple of orders will see it working again, I'm sure. The Egret was another matter, the pump was a large diameter one (24mm dia screwed hole in the fount). The chrome on the lamp was pretty bad, with lots of pock marks everywhere. The manometer was broken, as was the rapid preheater. The big problem was the pump. The NRV was the wrong one, screwed onto a thread of the wrong type, resulting in it's splitting. The threaded part had been soldered on to the end of the tube, which means that I can unsolder it and solder one of the correct thread in its place. The other end had an adapter soldered in place to take the correct lockable screw cap. I had to put it in the lathe to turn the excess solder off it. Now my question, is anybody familiar with this model of Egret and can tell me if pumps are available from some source? The 23mm hole it screws into does not correspond with a Petromax spare and I would like to avoid the work involved in replacing the NRV screw. Any advice would be appreciated! Jim.
Not got round to taking pictures as I was working on the Pump. I unsoldered the existing NRV and found a hole a bit smaller than the new NRV. I put the new one in the lathe and turned it to a press fit, leaving a narrow flange to give more surface for the solder and soldered it in place. I took the leather off my Petromax and fitted it in the Anchor pump, but I noticed that the tube was distorted. I tapped my no.2 morse taper into it and it seemed right but the washer behind the leather was too tight, so I put that in the lathe and turned a couple of thou off it, it now works fine except that I have to pull it back rather smartly before any air gets past it to the lamp side. Anybody have suggestions as to what might cause this? JIm
