January 29, 2013

I fixed the fader control tonight by soldering a lead onto the rheostat pin and using a butt connector to join the original wire that broke. The original wire was too short to reach after breaking off but this method seems to have worked.

The fader control works perfectly, smoothly adjusting the sound between the front and rear speakers. I also put a little light lube on the dual switches that power the reverberator. They switch a little more smoothly now. I put it all back together in the dash and polished the chrome control knob.

The cool thing I learned is that the reverberator isn't totally dead. At low volume, when the reverberator is switched on by pulling out the fader knob, the rear speaker simply shuts off. I found that if I turn the volume up very loud, the speaker kicks back in. It sounds horrible with lots of distortion, but the noise definitely has a concert hall echo to it. I'll tackle the reverberator in the next week or so.

I removed the trim pieces from the glove box and buffed them up with some steel wool. Wow, they look much better. The Custom 880 logo piece will also need some flat black paint touch up when I get to that point.

In anticipation of removing the radio for cleaning and easier access to the front speaker, I also removed the ash tray and its hanging bracket. I buffed the bracket with steel wool too. I'll get to the ash tray tomorrow.