Simple is good.

Was doing some welding yesterday while the weather was nice and holding there. An upgrade to another piece of gear: new bottle jack for the press.

$35 from HF. Gotta love it!

Torched out the parts, ran a grinder for clean up, then 6013 rods to bind it all back into a different form. No worries, the Lincoln is a danged good option for this (might be a little fuel hog, but it works!)

Most of the way done, one last seam to run and I see smoke coming from the generator housing. WTF?!?!

Do the sniff test; not electrical in nature, more a dusty/musty kind of smell. Ok, finish up, but check this out ASAP.

Last weld done, the rain broke again. Grrrr. Well, it isnt smoking now, so can wait.

Today, I pulled the cover to the small genny/exciter coils, found a leaf, but nothing burned. Ok, next, pull the cover to the main unit.

And found

Yuppers. Packrat nest. An old one for sure, but there it is.

Finish pulling the cover and you can see where this nest caught a spark and started smouldering.

Anywhoos, since I was in there, I checked over the brushes, commutator, and ran a fine grit stone to polish ’em up.(didn’t need it but, I’m there, why not.) Brushes barely show wear, and the usual black oxides on the commutator, all cleaned now. One nasty packrat nest now gone, and my mind is much at ease. Granted, brushes, which are still available, aren’t very pricey ($140 for the whole set of 8) but it would be several days/week before I’d have them, and that would make me sad. LOL. Actually, I am ordering a set soon, just due to the fact that these brushes are 42 years old and, well, ya just never know. That whole ‘rather have ’em and be looking at them, then be looking for them” thing.

She might be old skool, but I’ve never had a better welder (stick welder that is.) and I intend on hanging on to this one.😁 (and there are other aspects I want to check out, like the whole scratch start TIG thing. She’s perfect for that.)