The whole idea for the heating method is to get the old potting material as soft as possible. I checked for softness by sticking a wood stick into the potting in an area where nothing would be damaged (corner). Once it was soft enough, I simply scooped out the potting compound with a large flathead screw driver. The top of the potting material was thicker than the bottom and more difficult to scoop out. At some point, The core was moving in the case. I grabbed the core and lifted it out of the case and finished getting as much gunk off as possible. Like a few others, I used gasoline to clean it, but as you know, this is not recommended as gasoline is highly flammable. Just an old bad habit I inherited from my dad who was a mechanic. Actually, for the clean up, Kerosene would be a safer choice and would work fine for clean up of parts.
I've heard some on the TCML mention they've soaked the NST in Kerosene for unpotting. I've never tried that, but it sounds to me from your experience that method doesn't work too well. Maybe if you can clean the Kerosene off real good with soap and water, you can try the heating method again. If a barbecue isn't available, give the round oven element a try. Worked ok for me. It does take a 2 or 3 hours to heat up, but it gets there eventually.
Take care, Bart douglas smith wrote:
i have been trying to learn how to re-pot nst's with very poor luck. i hate the small secondary wires i keep breaking them i tried the barbecue thin it didn't work well. I've been soaking it in diesel for 5 days doing OK but very gooey. is kerosene best or is there something better. my next try is to peal off box to expose brick. then soak it for as long as it takes. i don't dear smacking it with a hammer with my luck
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