1930's "Zero" Electric Fan Complete Restoration

This McGraw Electric Company "Zero" electric fan was manufactured somewhere between the 1930's and mid 1950's. In the 1957 the McGraw Electric Company was bought by the Thomas A. Edison company and became McGraw-Edison. I purchased this for $8 from a local antique store that was going out of business. It was being sold just as a rustic decorative piece and the cord had been completely snipped off. _______Timestamps _______ 0:00 – Overview and Disassembly 4:10 – Cleaning the small parts 4:51 - Cleaning the rotor 5:38 - Mastercraft logo cleaning and nickel plating 5:56 - Mastercraft badge cleaning 6:13 - Base and housing rust removal and painting 9:03 - Fan blade rust removal, sanding, polishing, nickel plating 10:47 - Rear housing sanding, polishing, nickel plating 11:55 - Fan cage rust removal, sanding, polishing 13:11 - "Zero" badge cleanup 13:28 - Motor restoration 15:39 - Reassembly 19:39 - Before and After 20:16 - Testing 21:29 - Thanks for watching and please subscribe! _______Tips for restoring your own "Zero" Electric Fan _______ Please leave a comment if you’re restoring your own fan like this and need any advice along the way if anything in my video was unclear! The disassembly is fairly straightforward. As you remove every screw you can find it'll start to come apart pretty easily. Be very careful with the delicate motor internals. If you're lucky the coil windings will still be intact. For restoring the motor internals, I first tested the coils with a multimeter to make sure there was at least a continuous circuit. Fortunately there was. The only other alternative is to wind new coils, but the armature of this fan was manufactured cheaply and was never intended to be disassembled to put new coil windings into it. If you notice the coating wearing off on the wires in the coils you can spray them with a fresh coat of varnish or brush on liquid electrical tape. I used friction tape (heavy duty double-sided fabric tape) to re-tape the coil windings, which is recommended by the Antique Fan Collectors Association. _______ Social Media _______ Instagram: @catalyst_restorations MERCH SHOP: https://my-store-cae4fb.creator-spring.com/ #restoration #Fan #antique