Yo, Many years ago I saw a grand with bad action brackets in it. The casting had turned brittle like a cracker. There were cracks, small and large, everywhere. They were not usable anymore. They had no strength, they were 10 minutes away from totally shattering, and I sure didn't want to try and save any part of them. I got lucky. APSCO had them in stock and so I R&R'd them. At that time I ordered one of every type of action bracket they had and to this day I still have them in stock. I keep them around for comparison purposes in case this ever comes up again. Since then, many years have gone by, and I've been contemplating the possibility of making a casting of the offending bracket, creating the mold, and learing all I can about molding, release agents, and catalyst type goopy junk that would work just as well as what ever they used originally. I've done some preliminary work along these lines and have located a supplier of such knowledge and material locally. That's as far as I've taken it. If I get any further, I most certainly will share my findings with y'all. Tooling around Metro today I had a thought. How about using very thin CA glue all over the place in the remaining good brackets, filling all the cracks with the stuff and hitting it with an accelerator. This seals all the air out of the remaining metal to hopefully keep it from crystalizing any further. Then dip or spread epoxy all over the bracket using the cut off's from bass strings for reinforcement. After the epoxy hardens thoroughly, grind off the excess at those locations where the rails and keybed touch. A few thin layers (3 or 4) of epoxy would add sufficient strength along with the heavy guage wire to get you a number of years down the road, I would think. If any of you think you'd like to take the time to send me your action brackets, or broken cast iron parts, I'm looking for designated victims. I'm presently playing with welding broken pedals back together. Lar
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