Bendix/Philco boots and random musings
First off, congrats on your Duo! One suggestion I can offer is - patience.
Some members have waited years to find a donor machine to finish a restoration of a prized machine, or decades to locate a hard to find replacement part in the bowls of a long forgotten appliance store. One part of this hobby is finding the machines, and the other is finding parts to fix said machines (and some may argue the third part is time, which we are always lacking). To be honest, it is often times harder to locate and find parts than it is to find the machines themselves, which is why many folks will look for donor machines and make one good one out of several. Many of the machines we are collecting have been out of production for almost 40 or 50 years, and a lot of the appliance shops that sold this stuff new shutter their doors years ago.
With that being said, you may want to consider hunting for another Duomatic to either combine two to make a good one, or one as a parts donor for yours. It may take a considerable amount of time to find one in the wild (see above), but it will take a certain amount of patience if you are willing to do so.
I'd also suggest doing some more research if you are so inclined. There is a treasure trove of information scattered about many threads over the last 15 years of this group talking about these amazing machines. There are also several key pieces of literature on AE.org, that I have found useful. The first is the 1962 Philco Parts Catalog**, which allows anyone to cross reference parts and model numbers going back from the very beginning of Bendix up until the 1962 models, as well as the 1961 - 1965 Duomatic service manuals. Hopefully soon, Robert will be able to add the 1958 Duomatic manual to AE.org that I lent to him, as the absence of a service manual for the 36" Duomatic is a missing piece of ephemera that many would find useful.
Using bits and pieces of what I've learned over the last ten years of studying Bendix/Philco and Duomatics, I've put together a few quick reference guides that I'm happy to share with others. I'm constantly updating a master spreadsheet as I continue to learn more as time goes on, but here is what I have gathered on the boots.
Please note the so-called British Boot you mention WILL NOT fit the 1951 through 1955 Gyromatics and Duomatics, of which you have. A friend has had good luck using the small door Speed Queen boots for the 1951 through 1955 machines, and I really need to order one to test on my 1955 Gyromatic. The 1956 through 1963 Duomatics use the Philco 9118-23 boot, which if you do some digging on this site, you'll find several mentions of the European item number GSK599 or DBT-07. Google search those and you will probably stumble upon the item number 114200620, and you'll find a few eBay auctions in Italy and Spain.
As for your missing shifter rod assembly, I'm sorry it is missing. I don't have any spares on hand and you may need to wait it out for a donor machine to come along. Dexter redesigned the shifter assemblies for the transmission at some point, and I believe you are missing the intermediate assembly, and that assembly is still available from Dexter but it is pricey. The hi-speed shifter assembly is NLA.
I hope this helps.
Ben
** There are a few typos and incorrect groupings within the 1962 Parts Catalog, but the errors are corrected within the document itself, regarding the diaphragms for the 1956 through 1959 Duomatics (9118-9 diaphragm does not fit the Duomatics and is corrected when looking at the fast moving item tables).
[this post was last edited: 10/31/2017-12:21]
