Fat Boy Question

[DonN]

without machinists' gauges, micrometers, and/or calipers is there a way to check if the FatBoy's blade bed - measured by the thrust of those 4 small feet - is actually moving from 1-9 ? - I'm assuming the adjustment dial is fixed to the bed's shaft and via a screw mechanism raises and lowers the bed - as the bed raises there is a gap between the top of the dial and the lower part of the bed - is this how you tell ?

Are there other ways to tell ?

 

[AlanL]

When it comes to adjustables, (other than the feel during a shave) I can tell the difference only by looking at the blade, not at anything in the razor. The visual difference of the blade gap ranging between 1 and 9 is obvious to the naked eye.

 

[georgekyr]

The difference is easily both seen and felt. When at 1 the small feet are almost the same level as the rest of the razor. At nine they are almost 1 full mm up, you can see it. If you want I can take 2 photographs for you tomorrow.

 

[kingfisher]

Yep. You can see it pretty easily and you definitely feel it when shaving.

If you can't see it, try this: lather up and take a couple of strokes with it set on 2. Then, loosen the doors slightly, change the setting to 7, and tighten it back down. Then do a couple more strokes.

If it doesn't feel different, it probably isn't working properly.

 

[georgekyr]

The photographs I took with my mobile phone are awful (it cannot take good pics from very close distance), but still you can see clearly what we are taking about.

 

[DonN]

thanks for the feedback everyone and the pics are fine George - in contrast to the simple design of say the Merkur Progress these old Gillettes are not easily understood unless you take them completely apart I guess - at "1" I'm not flush & have to push the feet down just a little to get there - from there I can go to "9" and I see a difference - but when I dial back to "1" the feet stay at "9" .

It appears that the dial engages a slot in the shaft that those feet and the blade bed are attached to - that red spring rests in that slot .

I just don't have enough insight at this point to confidently know what to do to get the blade bed flush by just turning the dial and once at "9" to get it to go back down.

On another post a member talked about pushing in that red spring and turning the dial to "uncock" it - I just don't know what that means because of my lack of complete understanding of the FatBoy's design details.

But thanks again for your thoughts !!!!

 

[georgekyr]

If you push the 4 feet after dialing to 1 does the mechanism go down?
If yes, then there is just too much dirt to let it go down freely. In this case put the razor in boiling water with some dish soap and leave it overnight. In the morning leave the dial at 1 and start pushing up and down the plate. See above the dial if dirt comes into sight and clean it. After some jerking you can find the mechanism being freed hopefully. After that you can let it dry and try some wd40 lubricant and jerk it again up and down. In the end you will have a fully working dialing mechanism.
If the answer to the initial question is no, then there are two possibilities. First possibility is that there is too much dirt. Try what I wrote above first to see if you have any luck. The second possibility is an overclocked fatboy (someone in the past dialed above 9 to 1 again) and you have to put it down by pressing the small spring and turning from 1 to 9. After that you may need to do all of the above.
There is a small chance that the mechanism is completelly broken and nothing can be done to fix it, but I doubt this is the case.

 

[DonN]

thanks again George - great tips - the feet can be pushed down from the "1" spot and so will try the soak & lube - just curious, what does "overcocked" mean ? is it where the rotational movement of the shaft isn't in sync with the dial?

thanks again for your time - will post the result - hopefully a good one !!!