picked up a bird chair along with the ottoman recently and the areas where the shock mounts are had been repaired in the past. the chair is functional structurally so to speak. unfortunately, the weld job was not a good one with quite a bit of excessive "rod remanant" around the welding points. it looks like it was done with MIG.
if i take the chair to a good welding shop, can they clean up the botched area and re-weld it with "fusion" weld?
is it a bad idea to do so since it might further weaken the chair's structural integrity?
the foam of the original upholstery is petrified, has anyone used the original upholstery as pattern and have an upholster to create a replacement upholstery with new padded foam successfully?
thanks,
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If the chair is structurally sound...
...I wouldn't re-weld it. You could file down the welds if they're really sloppy and/or you have OCD, but no one will notice them once you have a cover on the chair.
And speaking of the cover... Sure, your upholsterer could use your old cover as a template, but if he needs that template, it probably means that he hasn't done a Bird chair before. They're not terribly difficult, but they do require specialized fabric-laminating and foam-cutting skills. The fabric isn't cheap, and once it's laminated to the foam it can't be reused, so I wouldn't want to be my local upholsterer's guinea pig even if he did the work for free... Especially since Knoll still makes the covers.
I think the best option BY FAR is to buy a new cover from Knoll. Wait for their 15%-off sale if you can.
The second-best option -- which I'd do only if I had my heart set on a fabric that wasn't in Knoll's truly vast selection -- would be to get a custom cover made by one of the very few upholsterers who have experience producing them. I'd suggest either Mike at Hye Quality in Berkeley (California) or David at Comfort Upholstery in Chicago.
By the way, there's a small issue with new Knoll covers on vintage chairs: The old chairs have a slightly different shape -- a narrower "neck" at the base of the headrest -- so new covers will fit, but they'll overhang the frame of the chair by a little bit right at that point. It isn't a big deal, just something to be aware of.
Also... I don't know whether this was fixed in the later chairs (mine is a very early one), but the cover tends to wear through at the upper corners of the headrest and at the point at the front center of the seat. You can prevent this wear by buying vinyl tubing at your local hardware store, slitting it lengthwise, and wrapping it around the frame in those areas, under the cover. You'll have to notch the tubing so it'll bend around the corners without buckling and wrinkling. It's a bit tedious -- buy extra tubing so you can throw away your first couple attempts -- but the effort is worthwhile.
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There's no real problem re-welding it, it's actually a two minute job.
Clean up the previous 'slag' with a dremel grinder as they are smaller and have better access. Better to do this yourself as I wouldn't want a welder with a 4 inch grinder going at my chair!
If it's the chrome variety bird chair, just buy a pressure pac can of chrome spray to touch up.
Hi I have offered my...
Hi
I have offered my advice on repairs to numerous people. So if opt to repair, here are some tips to get a quality, long lasting fix. My repairs last for years. I live in Eastern Iowa, USA if you want to know, I am not currently seeking repair jobs either.
On welding... I would not weld one of these unless it
was done with a TIG welder, and then you need a backup
piece of metal to keep the wire from melting and
dripping away from the original contour. Its extremely
time consuming, and there are usually more broken
welds than you first see. I recommend looking for all
the broken wires, and fixing them all at once. That
will give you the most durability.
A TIG welder is used in micro welding, aerospace, and in race car applications. I build race cars, and am a metal worker by trade. If you find a good metal worker locally you could save shipping. You could probably get by with a mini MIG weld, which are more common. The MIG's offer less control of the weld size.
Is your chair chrome, painted, or rislan coated? Rislan is the really hard plastic like coating that doesn't hardly even cut with a knife. The coating needs cleaned off before welding.
Large diamonds are usually broken along the front edge. Bird chairs start failing around the rear shock mounts. Small diamonds are the least worthy of spending money on, and you should probably just replace them.
Click the link below for repair pics.
Don
http://s228.photobucket.com/albums/ee243/mod_metal/Checking%20for%20brok...
it is the real deal, ball
the mis-aligned wires are due to the poor welding job done to it. in other words, there are parts that the 2 ends of the broken wires are not 100% aligned with each other, hence, there is a slight slope at the welding point. that's why i was wondering if those welds can be removed and then re-welded again by TIG.
thanks for the great info and photos, donsof. can you give me your contact info?
thanks,
fb
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