RC10Talk - The Net's Largest Vintage R/C Community

Often the back "curl" of an RC10 tub gets the corner tweaked. Also on a DS, I have 4 of 6 nose plates with tweaked corners. Even some RC10 Nose plates can get a bad tweak from a hard it. But especially for my DS nose plates that are so hard to find a replacement for, I'd like to straighten them out a bit.

Anyone have experience straightening them out? I was thinking getting some steel angle iron for over the vice jaws for a smooth surface, heating up the aluminum and then clamping it and letting it cool. Or would cold/clamp pressure be enough? Or clamp it and then heat it? Or am I missing another idea? Thanks.

nothing a good rubber hammer (not sure how they're called in proper English) can't fix

Yes a plastic hammer works great. Something like hardwood or plastic works as a backer to prevent gouging on the back side. For bent chassis, you can use a combination of vise, wood blocks or even suspending across some boards and applying some foot weight to reverse the damage.

I'd avoid using heat on alloy as it could un temper it , aluminium needs to be accurately heated to a temp then cooled slowly to retemper it after heating , it's kind of the opposite to steel and you don't want to end up with it soft as cheese .