Help! Maintence Team, Help!

OK, so yesterday was another NMRA working bee with me playing Picasso again.  

So I had my paint colours already mixed and ready to spray.  The battery in the Airbrush was fully charged, so I was ready, willing and able.

Yeh....

Right...

So I got a few tracks painted and all was going well.  

The airbrush was going well, sorta.  She would brmmm along happily and every now and then glitch and get temperamental. Bang her a few times and she was good to go again.  But then...  she wouldn't respond to me, no matter what I said to her. A few more bangs and then, nothing - she stopped responding at all - not even a whisper...  Dang.  So a quick cleanup of her and I put her away.  Our host for the day, Paul, had a couple of spare airbrushes fully charged and ready to go, so I got on with the job.

So last night I ordered a new unit, as two is better than one, in particular if that "one" is not working. So after lunch I had a look at the old girl and determined it is the on/off switch at fault. So a lot of mucking around to desolder it and get it out, as it is a very tight fit in there. A look in the web of all things and I can't really find a replacement switch anywhere - bugger!

When I looked at the airbrush, I could see what had happened - paint had run down the side and into the switch - oh no! 

So looking at the switch I can see that it might just be able to be pulled apart. Delicately I handled her and got her apart - yep... paint... over the contacts.  No wonder she was coughing and spluttering at me.

Luckily she can be fully disassembled. So with a small brass wire pencil, I was able to clean all the contacts up.  

Then to reassemble - mightly small hands must make these things and my big man hands had fun and games getting her back together and soldered up ready to go.  But I did it.  

Then the moment of truth... click... brmmmm!  She's alive!  With a nice and consistant brmmm at that.

So some cleaning fluid into the paint cup and away she sprayed - wunderbar :-)

So now I just need to clean the outside a bit to make her shiny again so she will be ready to meet her new companion when she arrives.  I'll then have a pair of girls to do my bidding in the paint department :-)