FMK4A4 Magneto Teardown, Cleaning, and Reassembly
K - Fairbanks Morse Model FMK
4 - Four Cylinder
A - Base Mount - a B here would designate Flange Mount
4 - Originally shipped to Minneapolis Moline
The reason it wouldn't turn can now be seen
Tar from the old coil had run down and hardened
And moisture got the rust going
This basemount housing could be Clockwise or Anti-Clockwise
after a lot of scraping and bead blasting the housing is ready
The gauss meter lets me know which way to orient the rotor in the magnetizer
Mounted on the magnetizer it's ready to be zapped
The old Tungar tube diodes still light up - Tungsten filaments and Argon gas
The FMK had a wider bar in the coil, the narrower FMJ coil can be used but must be manually centered
The marked tooth pointing straight up it's ready for the fiber gear
If you're lucky the fiber gear has markings, the C needs to be lined up with the right edge of the plate
In an Anti-Clockwise mag the A needs to line up with the left edge of the plate
With the C Lined up with the right edge
It's difficult to see the markings once a few things are nounted
The points are adjusted and we can see the FMK needs a longer wire from the coil
A weather proof butt splice attaches a bit longer wire
Fully assembled on the inside it's ready for the cap
The cap needed a lot of TLC but had nice graphite brushes with good spring action
The camera captures a moment in time showing only one spark, the eyes see all four sparking
This 35° lag angle clockwise basemount mag is ready for service agsin
