Unobtainium 348 light switch work - very happy !

SWEEEEET!!!

That's good news, and thanks for the info!

 

Nice!

 

Simon,
Thanks for the praise!!!

Also, even more thanks for bearing with me for so many weeks while I developed a molds & a way to get the cam to go onto the shaft w/o breaking. I lost a lot of hair scratching my head on the way to a solution!


In case you're wondering, here's a picture of the key parts I had to make.

The light colored 5-lobe cam sits inside the black 'yoke' with the headlight stalk's shaft's metal core going thru both parts. The metal headlight stalk core is swaged to form raised ridges that keep the cam from turning. The yoke has several complex shape holes in it that take odd shaped mating pieces, and the yoke's holes for the shaft are elleptical to let the headlight stalk be pulled back for 'flashing'...
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Mad skills Verell, MAAAD skills!!!!!

 

Wow, awesome work man.

Mine is ****ed also, but I picked up a good used one that I am yet to fit.

When you start selling that little part, let me know mate so I can buy one to fix my original one.

 

Excellent work, Verell, way to go!

 

I'm pretty sure mine is on the way out, so I'm glad to see this!

 

Send me your stalk & yoke & old cam i'll return it assembled with a new cam. The cam has to be mated to the stalk when it's cast so it's not something your can install yourself afterwards. That mating proces is one of the things that I gained a lot of experience[1] with.

Or send me the entire switch & I'll do the tear-down, clean all the old lube off, clean the contacts, & make any necessary repairs.

BTW, you have to drill the swaged ends off of rivits to disassemble the switch, then use screws specially made for plastic to reassemble it.


[1]experience: What you get when things don't work the way you expected. ;^)

 

Hi mate,

Not a problem. When I get around to it I will let you know and send it over to you.

Thanks again my friend.

 

Bumping this up . My light stalks getting flaky / intermittent . I have pulled it out , it comes out easy and re inserts easy .

It feels like it’s not fully connecting to the cam . With twiddling I can eventually get the cam to rotate .

Any one found a fix yet ?

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The cam is broken, or stripped out inside. This is the most common failure for the 348 & Testarossa column switches.
Send the switch to me. I fix 10 or more of these ayear.
Packing & shipping instructions are on page 5 of my catalog.
Catalog is in my web page: www.UnobtainiumSupply.com

 

Thx ^ .
I am in the U.K. currently.
Here is where iam @
Marenello parts around £2 K and an Italian parts supplier quotes €3500 .
The cam is two halves and it’s yoke fractured in two places .
So I thought I would have a crack at a repair for the benefit of others .

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i have the black plastic bit the stalk threads through.

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Remove the covers 6 screws underneath.
Whereby you can access with a larger drill bit the copper rivets . The two halves of the light switch are riveted together.
It’s quite easy to separate them in situ ….thus alleviating the phaff removing the steering wheel with the special ring nut and then the cradle ( risk if # ) with puller .

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The other side is just an empty case still attached .^ There is tiny ball bearing in the flash to pass detent ….see it’s spring .

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So I have bonded the cam initially with cyanoacrylate glue , then a dab of epoxy without interfering with the lobes .
when this is set ( give 24 hrs ) I am going to wrap some nylon upholstery thread i between the cam lobes and epoxy the thread to prevent the two halves re separating …..well that’s the plan ?

I have also reattached the broken yoke bit and reinforced its join with epoxy to beef up that weak area .


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Theses spring s I think dropped out when I opened the switch . Q - where do they go please ?


How it works . Image Unavailable, Please Login
It’s a relatively simple 4 way light switch. There are a few generic on .
1-Off ,
2-Side lights
3-Main beam
4- Full beam

There is flash to pash in some markets but that’s not important .
As it is without the cam the 3 fingers spring closed and contact making a circuit .
The inner nearest the column as you can see powers the other two , it’s the side light . It’s needed for the others to work .
Middle one is headlight on and pods up .
Outer one ( top of pic ) is full beam .

As you turn the stalk the cam rotation opens and closes the fingers .

The design error is the stalk eventually lets go, of griping the cam , or it fractures .So it can’t rotate , or sticks in one position jams .

Delving deeper any 4 way light switch could work looking at the existing wiring .
Eg not exclusive … mounted else where sympathetically and reversible . Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
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So how did the plan go?

Responses to earlier posts:

The springs mount inside the cam cage. When twisting the stalk they provide the detent function Ie: make the cam click into place.

UNOBTAINIUM PRICES
There are 2 options for cam repair:

1. Send entire switch]
   TR or 348 Column Switch Full Service & Headlight Stalk cam replacement - $395 USD
   
   Remove headlight switch rivets, Remove Turn & wiper housing screws, disassemble clean & detarnish headlight, turn & wiper switch mechanisms, Mold a new cam onto the headlight stalk, lubricate mechanisms & Reassemble w/custom made plastic friendly screws
   
   
2. Send just the stalk:
   Column Switch Stalk Svc 348 & TR series Stalk Repair Service (Mold 1 new CAM onto a stalk) You remove/install stalk.

-- TR & 348 headlight stalk cam cage - Mold a new cam cage around cam on headlight stalk - $155 USD

-- Return S&I - market price

Hope this is useful,
Verell

 

It’s going fine .
Gottcha with the springs , they fit the triangular 3 lobed smaller diameter cam .

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I have added wire ( telephone wire ) to enhance the repair .
Waiting overnight for the epoxy repair of the gate / yoke .

Tomorrow I will instal it using 4 tiny mechano bolts in lieu of the copper rivets .

The stalk is tight now , a lot better than before the cam fractured . Iam going to glue the stalk
in too so the inside shell of the cam pieces grip from the inside . I have also roughened up the part of the stalk that inserts into cam .
I can see special care needs to done pasting up the stalk so s not to get adhesive in the wrong places ..ie the bearings in the yoke / gate .

 

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Set the cam s by rotation to max protrusion of all three on the side that presses on the fingers to open them .This is OFF .

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Roughen up the stalk end . I have already roughed up the inside of the cam halves before gluing them together.
As well as adhesive bond we are looking for a mechanical lock ….to prevent future rotations of the stalk within the cam ….the raison d etre why I am here with this !

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So we know which is OFF , there’s a tabs on the far RHS cam it rotates through 270 degrees …you will see it .limit stops .
Smear Vaseline to the rhs bearing on the gate and a bit on the stalk where it passes / rest on the LHS . Paste up a thin layer of adhesive to the part of the stalk that inserts into the cam and insert it .^ I used a cyanoacrylate ( claimed to stick metal + plastic ?) that has 10 mins working time . Also alcohol cleaned the surfaces to degrease.

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Vasseline this detent spring hole and place the ball bearing in it will hold .^ not shown .

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place the gage + stalk in this half ( careful not to displace the ball bearing in the other half .
The stalk needs to be up . There are two possibilities, keep it up as the lights are camed for OFF .

I used tiny mechano bolts which perfectly went through the drilled out rivet holes …..and obviously easy to retrace my steps .
It’s a phaff read lining the column covers , as various bits of the loom interferes with the fit .

VIOLA