Your Mission, Mr. Phelps, should you choose...

[Brian D]

to accept it.Attached is an image of my steaming light on my mast. It is not working and I have plans to work on it. First thing one will notice is the dome is missing. No doubt the very reason why it does not work. I am guessing that the light fixture is all rusted out. Won't know until I go up the mast and look.If I choose to replace the whole unit, my dilemma is how to remove the housing from the mast since it is riveted. Do I drill out the rivets? Based on the size of the bulb, I am guessing that one of you will be able to determine the size of the rivets and therefore, tell me what size drill bit to use.Of course, if one of you recognizes the housing and can ID the manufacture and find a replacement dome, that would be cool. I'm sure I can replace the fixture if it is no good. Again, won't know until I get up the mast to take a look.Comments and suggestions greatly appreciated.

 

[Joe White]

Dome Light Removal

The removal of the light fixture is very easy. Use a 1/4" sharp drill bit and battery drill machine. Start drilling untill the portion of the rivette that you see falls off. More than likely the hole in the mast is less than 1/8". Once the visible ring falls off, use the back end of 1/6" drill bit to push in the remaining body of the rivette which will fall into the mast. Install a new light fixture. Do not use rivetts when you install a new light fixture. Use 6X32 machine screws and tap the holes, that is make threaded hole for the screws. You can remove them easily in the future. To protect the contacts of the bulb agains corrosion, go to an autoparts store and buy a tube of the vaselline-like compound that is used to waterproof the sparkplug high voltage wires in your car. Put them arround the light bulb contcts and screw holding the wires that brings the current. You will never have to fix this again. Good luck. Let me know how it goes. By the way- you may want to test your skills on the ground with another rivette in your bench first.

 

[Ross]

It all depends on how many trips you

want to make up the mast. Before you decide to rap the holes for 6-32 machine screws check to be sure that 1/8 inch holes will except a 6-32 tap. Otherwise you may as well plan to use rivets.

 

[Andy]

Rivet rivet..beud wiser

Mast have a fair amout of vibration from wind (good vibrations beach boys) and motoring (bad vibrations). If you take note of the type, model, brand, etc of new light this time the next trip up (5 years from now) may be much less painful.Besides, in five years there will be better lights available (LEDs are getting even better and cheaper). You don't want to go up the mast just to tight some screws, make it an adventure!

 

[Larry Wilson]

Shade Tree mechanic's response

Before you get all aggressive with a drill, check the bulb, and take a good look at the fixture. Did the old glass screw in ? If it did, measure the diameter and the size of the threads. You may be able to use a baby food, or peanut butter jar as a replacement. Not elegant, but far less work than replacing the whole thing. Most of the fixtures allow for replacing the bulb socket, and they're pretty universal.

 

[muised]

Consider LED

I am rewiring my mast this spring and plan on replacing my lights with LED bulbs. They are expensive but should outlive me - and I am not keen on replacing these any time soon.

 

[Bill Roosa]

LED and rust

Well the LED element will certanly outlive all of us but alas that is not what makes the bulbs go bad. It is the base and socket that rust and cause that problem.Soooo while LEDs are great for life and current draw the weak point is still rust.I have only found ways to slow down rust not stop it.

 

[Alan]

Yes remove the whole thing.

Drill out the rivet heads to remove. You will notice the corrosion on the mast at the site of the rivets. This is caused by two dissimilar metals (SS & aluminum). When you install the new unit, use aluminum rivets to eliminate the problem.