Lopi Pioneer Bay - Spring Hopper Lid Latch Fix?

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Don2222

Minister of Fire
Hearth Supporter
Feb 1, 2010
9,192
Salem NH
Hello
The hopper lid latch in this Lopi Pioneer Bay Insert has a plastic tube around the spring with a nice bracket that holds it to the hopper lid. The bottom of the spring is pop riveted to a Flat trim piece that sits right over the heat exchanger Grill. The trim piece is notched on the right side and has a support angle bracket under it. The bottom of spring broke and came off of the pop rivet and the plastic tube covering the spring got brittle, broke and fell off. Stove is approx 12 years old.
So we got the new spring latch piece and drilled out the old pop rivit. The spring Latch comes with one new pop rivet. So we tightend the new latch top bracket to the stud welded on the inside of the hopper lid and along with the final twist was a snap and the stud broke!!!
So we removed the trim piece and notched the other side and drilled a 1/8” hole to hold the bottom of the spring down with a 1/8” bolt, nut and lock washer. It seemed to work well and maybe better than a pop rivet. I also gave the trim piece a touch up spray with satin black after cutting the notch and that made it look professsional. Cutting the notch was a bit tricky with a jig saw and metal blade but tracing the notch side and hole onto a piece of paper and then cutting it out and flipping it on to the other side of the trim plate and tracing it with a pencil worked a lot better and faster than trying to measure and draw it out!
So after putting the trim piece back and attaching it, I just used a self tapper for the Support bracket and snip a small corner off the stove’s side panel curtain so when the hopper lid closed and the spring pushed into the notch it did not hit the sharp corner of the side curtain and cut the plastic tub around the spring!
Not simple but we did it!!!
See pics
Pic 1-2 old spring with broken bracket at top and
Broken spring loop at bottom
Pic 3 - broken stud on right side where latch was!
Also see notch and hole we had to duplicate on the left side. Had to bring it back to the shop!
Pic 4 - new spring latch on left side. See notch cut in trim piece behind the bottom screw!
 

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