Cherokee Heater Controls?

Our 74 Archer has the standard two-lever horizontal quadrant for heater and
defroster control. The last time I flew it, the heater was stuck on.
Moving the lever had no effect. Our feet were actually hurting it was so
hot. The defroster valve seems to work fine.

Yesterday, I took the little bridge off the lower cowl so that I could get
at the flapper valve. The valve moved fine, when the control lever was
moved, and it could be moved to the closed position by pushing the valve
flapper lever directly, but it was very hard to move the last 30 degrees.
The problem seems to be too much friction in the cable, although it moves
fine using the control for the rest of its travel (fully open to 30 degrees
from closed).

My question is, how do you get the cable out to lubricate it? It was too
hot inside the cabin to let me work in there, so I didn't look under the
panel. Does the control quadrant come off, once the plastic facia is
removed? Does anyone have a drawing of how it's attached. Thanks.

--
Bob (Chief Pilot, White Knuckle Airways)

On Sat, 8 Jul 2006 16:01:15 -0400, "Bob Chilcoat"
wrote:

The first thing to do is make sure that the wire isn't kinked at
either the control lever or the flapper door. The exposed wire often
gets bent, and drags on the housing.

Examine the lever assembly and make sure that the routing of the inner
wire to the housing isn't severely bending the inner where it goes
into the outer when the lever is oeprated.

These ideas work better on enclosed cable housings, but have used them
with some success on the spiral-wound housings also. Works better if
you can run the lube "down-hill" into the housing.

http://dansmc.com/cables.htm

http://www.murphskits.com/cablelube.htm

On the spiral-wound housings, often lubing the snot out of the outside
with a penetrating lube makes a difference also.

The only way to remove the inner cable is to unhook it from the
flapper, carefully straighten out the expose inner. The lever end
typically has to 90 degree bends in it stuck through a hole in the end
of the lever. Unhook the clamp holding the housing to the lever assy,
and work the last bend out of the hole.

You can then pull the inner. Most of the time it will slip back in
relatively easily if you ensure that the very tip of the "straight"
end is rounded and has nothing to catch on the cable. However, I have
had them hang up on the way back in...

TC


Our 74 Archer has the standard two-lever horizontal quadrant for heater and
defroster control. The last time I flew it, the heater was stuck on.
Moving the lever had no effect. Our feet were actually hurting it was so
hot. The defroster valve seems to work fine.

Yesterday, I took the little bridge off the lower cowl so that I could get
at the flapper valve. The valve moved fine, when the control lever was
moved, and it could be moved to the closed position by pushing the valve
flapper lever directly, but it was very hard to move the last 30 degrees.
The problem seems to be too much friction in the cable, although it moves
fine using the control for the rest of its travel (fully open to 30 degrees
from closed).

My question is, how do you get the cable out to lubricate it? It was too
hot inside the cabin to let me work in there, so I didn't look under the
panel. Does the control quadrant come off, once the plastic facia is
removed? Does anyone have a drawing of how it's attached. Thanks.