Changing Data Type ftom hyperlink to text back to hyperlink

Have a rather odd problem with what I suspect is a less than perfect
solution.

We have a macro in Access which transfers/imports two Excel spreadsheets
into a table. One of the spreadsheets has a hyperlink field. The hyperlinks
work just dandy in the Excel spreadsheet. After importing them, the
hyperlinks do not work in the table.

We have found that if we change the field type from hyperlink to text and
then immediately change it back to hyperlink, the hyperlinks work again. I
can't explain it but that's the behavior we get.

So one question is is how in VBA I can pull this switcheroo and change the
field type to text then back to hyperlink using DAO?

Second question is what is the datatype for hyperlink?

Third question is why the hyperlink gets lost on the transfer from Excel to
Access.