Vintage Double Hose

A board member has ask me if I had material to replace the relief seat in a US Diver pressure tester, see photos below. I thought I did but I just had to remove the one in my tester to see. As it turns out the seat is not what I had expected. It is some sort of hard (or at least mine is....make that was, it's powder now ) plastic that refused to come out of the holder. I expected it to be fairly thin and easy to get out- not. It is about 1/4 inch long and at least mine had to be ground out with a Dremel burr. If yours works, I would not suggest trying to remove it, odds are you will distroy it. Anyway, since I have had to make one for myself and another for a board memeber, does anyone else have one of these tank testers that needs a seat? I might as well make several while I am at it. If you need one, let me know and I will turn a few extra. Here are photos of the tank tester and the new seat.

Thanks Herman! There are a lot of that style checker out there and having a spare seat would keep most of them going another 50 years.

What are you making the seats out of.

Teflon rod stock. What I have on hand is 0.500 but the seats are 0.25 so I was cutting them down to size. I am going to order some 0.250 stock and cut it to length (so don't be in a hurry ). Anyone who wants one or 2 just PM me. I will send you my mailing address, you send me a SASE and I will return it with a couple of seats in it. They will only cost a few cents apiece so my gift as long as you sase me.

Very nice. thanks for the seats being made. I will need those.

Ok ladies and gents, I now have 3 feet of 1/4 inch teflon seat material...comes in 3 ft lengths... so I can make quite a few seats for these tank pressure testers. It fits perfectly into the thumb screw of the tester. It may fit others, just measure the diameter of the seat, if it's 1/4 inch (0.25)then odds are it will fit, if it doesn't you are out a whole 2 stamps. If you would like 2 or 3 all you need to do is send me a PM and I will send you my mailing address. You send me a SASE that I can put them in to return to you. No charge, the cost is so little that it's not worth the trouble....consider it an early Christmas present. Allan,Luis, Bryan I already have your addresses if you want any, just let me know.

To remove the existing seat, if you are lucky, all you have to do is push it out with a small drill bit through the small hole in the thumbscrew. If you are unlucky like I was, I had to resort to using a dremel tool with a small burr on it to grind most of it out then use a dental pick to pull the remaining parts out the seat. Try not to grind the metal but if you do, it's not a big deal, there are no sealing surfaces inside the thumbscrew. Mine was some form of light brown plastic, it ground out easily into a fine powder. Installing the seat is just a matter of pressing it in.

Just take a picture and I'll put them in the store with your tools so in the future people that might need one can contact you. It's one of those parts you never think of till it's too late....Thanks Herman

Nice work Herm!

Will do Bryan, them little beggers are hard to photograph.

Robohips77 wrote:Very nice. thanks for the seats being made. ...

Ditto!