[NTLUG:Discuss] mounting an image of an entire drive

[Robert Citek]

Hello all,

How does one "mount" the image of an entire drive so that one can then 
mount the partition on that image?

To create an image of a partition (/dev/hda1) is fairly straightforward:
   dd if=/dev/hda1 of=/tmp/part1.img
If this partition is a vfat partition, one can mount it using the 
loopback device under Linux:
   mount -o loop /tmp/part1.img /mnt/vfat

However, I recently imaged the entire drive of a system:
   dd if=/dev/hda | ssh foo at bar.com 'cat > /tmp/backup.img'
which is a variation on this idea:
   http://www.cwelug.org/cgi-bin/wiki.cgi?Backup-Restore_Windows

/dev/hda has a vfat partition that I would like to access (/dev/hda1).  
Is there a way to mount the disk image and then mount the partition 
within that image?  If so, how?

Pointers are greatly appreciated.

Regards,
- Robert