Kirby 508 Restoration Complete

[charles~richard]

You may recall that a month or so ago, I posted photos of a Kirby 508 (vintage 1948) that I had taken apart with the intention of restoring it <br
Well, that work has been done. See link <br
(btw I posted this message once but it disappeared. Maybe the Vacuumland central vac system swooped it up. So here it is again - sorry if it turns out to be a double-posting.


http://www.137.com/kirby508

 

[lux1521]

Your link is dead. It works if your take the extra character(s) off the end.

 

[constellation86]

Wonderful job Chareles! It looks like new
I'll have my tradition in the mail monday. J
I'm sure it was a labor of love
Nicholas

 

[compactelectra]

The Link

Has been magically repaired by the webmaster.

Fred

 

[compactelectra]

By The Way

Charles - you did a fabulous job!

Fred

 

[luxg]

Thank you so much Fred for doing that!!! Charles another beautiful job! It is truly amazing what can be done to these machines to bring them back to life!!!

 

[charles~richard]

Hm, don't know what I did with the link, but thank you Maestro Webmaster for correcting it!

 

[lux1521]

One of the biggest questions that comes to mind when I see an artical like this is how do you get those scratches out? For me it takes a very long time. I'm just wondering if there is a special trick to it.

The results are fantastic and you can't tell that it was ever scratched that bad.

 

[mihi]

just a fantastic job!

You really did the job on this one. Very, very nice. I've got to get me a Royal someday.

 

[mihi]

whoops.....

I mean older Kirby!

 

[hygiene903]

Excellent Work, Charles!!

The end result is BEAUTIFUL!! Congratulations on a job well done!!
Jeff

 

[charles~richard]

I posted two videos of the 508 to YouTube. Here they are!

 

[charles~richard]

 

[crevicetool]

Just beautiful Charles....

Just love shiny metal! You did a great job! Another machine once on the brink of junk now restored to original classiness! (If there is such a word)!!!

Rick

spellcheck says we're good to go on the classiness.

 

[normvac]

Awesome job Charlie, thanks so much for sharing the process with all of us !
Norm

 

[charles~richard]

how do you get those scratches out?

I have a smaller version of this:

 

[charles~richard]

(thx for the photos, compactelectra!)

 

[charles~richard]

Here's my rig:

 

[charles~richard]

 

[lux1521]

Yeah, but how much sanding do you need to do before you start buffing?

I have to sand out all the scratches, right down to the smallest ones, and then move on to fine sand paper before I even think about using a buffing machine. Even on a buffing machine, after all that work, I'm still spending a serious amount of time getting to the finished product.

I just get the feeling that I'm not doing it quite right. I get there eventually, but it takes a very long time.

 

[charles~richard]

Well, I do not sand at all! One of the things I learned when rebuilding machines for a Kirby dealer is that the buffing wheel will do 99% of the work if you let it.

The trick is, you have to have a motor that's powerful enough and with lots of torque so that you can, when necessary, really bear down on the metal.

You don't want to bear down hard too much or all the time because that just makes the work more difficult, and indeed it's easy with a powerful wheel to heat up a piece of aluminum housing hot enough to burn a hole into it! I've actually done that!

For most of the work, you only want to bear down hard enough to just let the buffing wheel and the polishing compound gently burnish away the tarnish. But when you need that extra power to buff out scratches and "liver spots," it has to be there.

 

[lux1521]

Sounds like I need an equipment upgrade. I can actually stall out my buffing machine, which is really a converted bench grinder.

I might have one more trick up my sleeve before I start saving up for a new machine. I've been tempted to use greaseless buffing compound. The claim is it will turn your buffing wheel into a flexible grind stone. I'd only use the milder 300ish grit and not the 80 grit stuff. I don't think it would be a good idea to try it for the first time on a prized machine, but I think it might be worth a shot.