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Last week was another productive week for restoring my small collection of GI JOE's.
Things that I learned last week:
1. It's not too hard to remove the shoulder rivets in order to replace the shoulder pivot and bushing.
2. Replacing the talker's pull string is tedious but not difficult
3. Remember that these are very old toys and that stuff may break
4. You can make small bald spots not as noticeable with paint
5. Repro parts are pretty good if you don't care about having original
Things that I learned last week:
1. It's not too hard to remove the shoulder rivets in order to replace the shoulder pivot and bushing.
I was able to use small needle nose pliers to straighten the end of the rivet enough to remove it. I bought replacement joint parts and rivets from Cotswolds. I found that the holes of the repro parts did not match up and had to be modified. I also found that the repro rivets are about 1/16" shorter than the original. They barely stick through the arm. I ended up re-using the original rivet. In a short time, my Talking Commander could hold his arms up again.
2. Replacing the talker's pull string is tedious but not difficult
I found very little on the internet about how to replace the pull string. I was shocked by this since I would assume it is a common repair. I found a video, but that involved breaking open the mechanism and taking out spring, etc.
It was easy enough to just unwind the string from the spool. The tedious part was feeding the end from the front of the mechanism to the back for each time around. Feeding the new one in was the same: feed from front to back, fish it out with tweezers, wrap on the spool, repeat.
It was easy enough to just unwind the string from the spool. The tedious part was feeding the end from the front of the mechanism to the back for each time around. Feeding the new one in was the same: feed from front to back, fish it out with tweezers, wrap on the spool, repeat.
3. Remember that these are very old toys and that stuff may break
My Talking Commander has not been fully functional in a while. He would say the same things over. I found that the old string was much shorter than the new one. It didn't allow you to pull it far enough to find the grooves that direct the needle. I had the mechanism in hand for the first test with the new string. I pulled the string and was so happy to see the guide-grooves. My JOE started to talk, and then I watched in horror as the vinyl strip with the recording on it tore off the spool and proceeded to tangle with the band-spring that powers the mechanism. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH. After calming down, I was able to separate the recording strip from the spring. Needless to say it looked very bad and I was feeling pretty bad. I couldn't mess it up any worse. So I cut off about 1.5 inches of the end of the vinyl. I didn't lose any recording, but I did have to patch a partial tear near the recording. It took a while but I got the recording strip reconnected and he works. Hopefully, it will hold together. I am considering buying another talking mechanism just in case he breaks.
4. You can make small bald spots not as noticeable with paint
The commander had a couple small bald spots. I had already mixed paint to redo all the figures eyebrows. I used the same paint to cover the small scalp areas. It doesn't look bad. The Air Adventurer has larger spots and the lighter color hair makes it more obvious. I only painted one small bald spot on him and it's not great. I am considering sending his head off for a re-flocking.
5. Repro parts are pretty good if you don't care about having original
These guys are never going to be perfect. I don't really want them to be. It was cost effective to get tall brown boots, bayonet, shoulder holsters, and pistols from Cotswolds. They look complete but I didn't have to fiddle around finding decent vintage parts at higher prices. Now I wish I had bought the dog tags and the AT stickers too.
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