Gauge bezel removal tool 

Send a photo of your "Ruined" rings. I am not sure if my Email address can be used here--but, interpret as needed. oddparts (AT) Vom.com We have made a few instrument rings on my lathe. Yet also REPAIRED rings on my bead roller. Rings are quite specific in details. I would need a sample, and likely the instrument to make them.

@@jamessimpson5296 I have tried to send some pics - hope your e-mail address is correct. Regards

This is a starting point. There is YOUR CREATIVITY that continues from here. Thanks for watching. Make it better.

There is little that we do not do in terms of auto parts restoration. We consider your project our challenge. Contact us on anything in parts repair, procurement, and restoration at. www.oddparts.net. Gauge repairs are just some small part of our scope.

Awesome news and thanks for the super fast response! We are working on a 1927 Buick and have a speedometer that we need the bezel removed properly and then put back on....

@@TreadTalk247 Yes, I am happy to do so. If you send to me your Email address, I can send to you photos of 1935 Buick gauges that I have restored in the past. I added internal parts that upgraded several components to modern, and redid the number graphics on an insert. The original gauge faces--as I remember---were Etched Bronze- where the letters and graphics are actually raised off the background.

Ours is a highly modified Harbor Freight unit with an Eastwood auxiliary motor. I have adapted the original harbor freight tool to have extendable shafts- and modified ends to accept nearly all companies offered tooling. We built it over years - making it conform to whatever weird project needed specific shapes, yet I am no Ron Covell ! HA! For bezel bottlecap removal-- all is needed is the minimal tool from harbor freight and two parallel rollers that we use more often than any others. Good Luck, and happy creativity.

Thanks for asking. It really is as simple as modifying a screwdriver on a grinder to put a "spoon-shaped Tip in it. Still, as mentioned late in the video, the bezel looks like a bottle cap lid when finally removed. Not shown is the Harbor Freight Eastwood Tool modified bead roller that smooths out the variegated edge, and makes the bezel thinner, and easier to manage when re-folding it later. AND, the re-folding is complicated by the (typically BRONZE alloy) work hardening during manipulations requiring annealing the chrome plated bezel to soften it a little, and make it more responsive to re-folding. In SOME cases, it is better to simply cut off the folded section to the desired height, and simply use E3000 clear adhesive from a syringe to glue a bezel back into place after removing the intended lip entirely. You do not see the back side of the folded or glued lip once the instrument is mounted. and E3000 is removable with some minor effort- like pulling rubber bands out of a slot. We recently did this for Stainless Steel bezels offered for Fiat 124 Veglia gauges--where the stainless steel was so rigid- it only made sense to trim and glue them on. Nothing is ever as easy as it looks- and every case is different. Be creative- make your own tools.

@@jamessimpson5296 ive been redoing gauges for trucks for 4 years now and just been on the hunt for something to make it go quicker. 20 gauges to a set and a guy gets cramped hands in a night very quickly. I've made a few tools that get the job done but this looked so much slicker! I'll def look into that bead roller. Was looking all over your videos and didn't see one that showed what you got rigged up for the re-folding. Did I miss that one or is that a KFC secret? LOL

@@ChrisMosesNiemann Refolding the tiny lip is challenging, and different on every gauge. Yes, I should do a follow up on the bead roller. Basically, the bead roller flattens the bottle-capping and forms a smooth vertical wall- bringing the bezel back to a uniform "top-hat-without-lid" shape. Yet, many bezels are formed from brass or bronze alloy that "Work Hardens" actually becoming more resistant to reforming . I have annealed many bezels without discoloring the chrome using a heating and quenching, or heating and slow cooling technique. Which technique for which alloy is never known without trial and error. If you drop the bezel, or twang it like a musical triangle, and it rings, it is hard. If , after an attempted annealing it has lost its ring tone, and sounds more like a lead bell- you have softened it, and the bezel lip folds more easily. I start the folding with a tool that presses the lip inward-folding right angles against the metal canister edge at perhaps eight equally spaced points around the perimeter. Then, play "Whack-a-mole" on the remaining raised spaces between the spaces until the the bezel retains the glass and other laminated baffles and lighting components that may be in the "sandwich" of retained components. Sometimes, I am forced to insert a lathe cut "dummy" form into a bezel that allows me to initiate a fold seam off the gauge that can be followed with a roller tool. I use another homemade tool. It is a tiny ball bearing race screwed to a pistol grip bent shaft. This tiny roller also has a steel, and phenolic plastic shield on one side that acts as a mare-free guide- allowing me to exert downward pressure as I roll it back and forth along the folded edge of the perimeter of the face-down- on -table gauge. Depending upon the bezel material and softness of the alloy, this finalizes the fold--either perfectly, or in a wavy form that is functional, yet unseen when remounting the gauge. I recently purchased NEW bezels fitting Veglia Fiat 124 gauges. Claimed "Chrome" these were actually formed polished stainless steel- and actually impossible to fold the lip. I simply cut all lips to the same "Off-the-dash" height, and put some E3000 ( shoe goop adhesive) into a small syringe, and injected into the area that would otherwise be covered by the folded lip. The thick clear adhesive has good capillary action, and simply filled the space. Gravity and a second application after curing made an excellent dash contact flat retaining system that, again- unseen when installed- revealed perfect chrome gauge bezel seating reveal. There are a thousand ways to skin a cat. My walls are covered in cat hides! ( so to speak) HA! I do not know if these videos are attached somehow to my web site, or even if allowed contact through You tube. Yet, I am happy to send photos of other tools and ideas. A little searching will likely reveal my contact information. This video forum works pretty well, and more viewers are accumulating fast. Mostly I post as "Proof of work" for my customers- not really as instructionals. Yet, sharing ideas is the most important thing. Best of luck. Contact if you desire.