After auditing my Heinkel against the "erstzteilliste" or spare parts list from Heinkel-Club I was able to prepare a pretty comprehensive list of parts required. I must admit I was just a little shocked when I tallied up the total price of the order. It was well over 1800 Euro, which at current exchange rates meant A$3600! F*ck! I can't pretend I was expecting this to be a cheap exercise, but given that most of the machine was there the cost seemed just a little hard to swallow. I thought to myself, perhaps I'm being just a little over cautious and ordering things that I don't actually need? I went back and re-reviewed. Sure enough I convinced myself to drop a few 'surplus' items, like the complete 103-a1 indicator set, which would have set me back a couple of hundred euros. I'll find some other 'after market' set up for the indicators. Indeed, problems with dodgy original indicators have been one of my main complaints with both the Vespa and Troll.
Eventually I sent the order, neatly tabled in an Excel spreadsheet to the Heinkel-Club, highlighting (colour coded!) with a series of questions and clarifications for them to review. Spare parts meister Wolfgang responded to my queries extremely promptly, noting which parts he thought I should have ordered and which were surplus. I was very impressed. One concern was the requirement for exchange parts. Wherever possible Heinkel-Club seek to exchange and repair critical and hard to find parts. These included all the brake parts, parts of the transmission and the internal engine parts (rocker arms). I was however missing all of the exchange parts - clearly they'd been salvaged by the previous owners for this very reason. Fortunately they did agree to supply the parts, but at a premium.
Although I was dreading the outcome, I was very pleasantly surprised. The end cost was way under what I'd expected. 1200 euro including shipping. Comparing the price charged for each item against their list price in the catalogue, it seems clear that there is a membership discount or something at play.
Classic motoring events, vehicle restorations, news, museum visits and other bits and pieces from Perth, Western Australia
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Sunday, January 4, 2009
The clean up
I've done this posting so I can post some photos of the clean up so far. Some of the parts have come up extremely well when cleaned, like the brake drum below.
Initial clean up. A soaking with degreaser and then the brake drum removed.
A good look inside reveals years of grease and dirt. The springs look pretty rusty and nothing moves.
A couple of hours with a wire brush and degreaser and they scrub up pretty well. Pleasingly, now that it's been cleaned up it works.
Over the New Year's break I started going over the chassis and body. The body looks fine. There is no major rust and only a couple of dings that can easily be beaten out. There were a few other issues though. The regulator is rusted to the chassis. It will take some effort to remove. The petrol tank also is rusted through underneath. Not a good sign. Also, the floor braces are twisted and one was rusted right through so that it fell off after a slight knock. None of these things in themselves are insurmountable problems, but they do mean more effort and more expense.
Initial clean up. A soaking with degreaser and then the brake drum removed.
A good look inside reveals years of grease and dirt. The springs look pretty rusty and nothing moves.
A couple of hours with a wire brush and degreaser and they scrub up pretty well. Pleasingly, now that it's been cleaned up it works.
Over the New Year's break I started going over the chassis and body. The body looks fine. There is no major rust and only a couple of dings that can easily be beaten out. There were a few other issues though. The regulator is rusted to the chassis. It will take some effort to remove. The petrol tank also is rusted through underneath. Not a good sign. Also, the floor braces are twisted and one was rusted right through so that it fell off after a slight knock. None of these things in themselves are insurmountable problems, but they do mean more effort and more expense.
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