Date: Thu, 2 Sep 2010 14:32:15 -0700
Reply-To: Scott Daniel - Turbovans <scottdaniel@TURBOVANS.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Scott Daniel - Turbovans <scottdaniel@TURBOVANS.COM>
Subject: Re: 1.9 > 2.1 cooling kit?
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hi David..
lol.
nice to read your words.
but what time to I devote and divert to this project ? !
let's see ...I put my first oil pressure gauge on a car in about 1966
probably...
it IS pretty elemental.
heck, instructions come with some OP gauges.
and you mention vibration ..
man did I ever learn about that factor from diesel vanagons.
and I've worked on aircraft..
where vibration is always a real issue.
things rub and short out or leak.
things vibrate and just break from metal fatigue.
so for sure ....if a mechanical line comes off the engine to a gauge, it has
to be well protected from vibration . I have even used a grease gun hose
just for that and that works really well. Though you figure that eventually
the grease gun hose would have to fail ...they're oil resistant of course,
and have to be make to stand hundreds of lbs of pressure I'd think.
and ...waterboxer in particular ..
that is a tricky engine to put an oil pressure gage on, coming off the left
underside there between the pushrod tubes.
I have two metal line set ups I'm going to work with there...any day now, on
my getting-her-all-dialed in 85 Westy GL 1.9 wbxr ..
and for sure, I am going to be thinking a lot about fatigue on that metal
line.
Like whatever is done there, just can not fail.
I have done this on a metal oil line before ..happened to be a turbo oil
feed line ...one type adapted to another engine ...and I could see the
potential for metal fatigue on that line. I don't see how it could hurt to
have a lead wheel weight clamped to it in the middle of a longish span, to
dampen out vibes.
It never failed, I can say that.
normally we don't worry about vibration that much on gasoline engines. But
diesels taught me ...
it can be a real issue. the one that really taught me that was a diesel
vanagon where there is one plastic clip that keeps the hot positive battery
cable up off the oil filter.
About 5,000 miles driving is enough ......if the positive batt cable is
riding on the oil filter .........
to rub through the wire insulation, zap to the oil filter, and light that on
fire.
Fortunately on that particular van ..
the driver didn't have a fire extinguisher, and by luck a power company
truck came by with one and put out the fire that was starting to eat at all
the plastic parts on top of the engine, like air filter box.
No serious damage in that van fortunately.
heck, one thing I don't like about oil pressure gauges is that they can add
an element of UNreliability if the oil line fails in any way going to a
mechanical gage.
which is why an electrical one with sender on engine is better.
ok, long enuf !
Scott
www.turbovans.com
----- Original Message -----
From: "David Beierl" <dbeierl@attglobal.net>
To: "Scott Daniel - Turbovans" <scottdaniel@TURBOVANS.COM>
Cc: <vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM>
Sent: Thursday, September 02, 2010 12:09 PM
Subject: Re: 1.9 > 2.1 cooling kit?
> At 11:06 AM 9/2/2010 -0700, Scott Daniel - Turbovans wrote:
>>installing an oil pressure gauge is pretty elemental. Not much to it
>>really.
>>Same for a temp gauge.
>>I can see value in an overview discussion ..
>>which type to use, mechanical or electrical, and advantages/disadvantage
>>of
>>each,
>>gotchas to watch out for etc.
>
> Scott, I think that a total step-by-step recipe with part numbers for an
> electrical oil pressure gauge that doesn't disable the warning lights and
> that is not going to suffer from vibration problems down the line would be
> a very valuable thing. Many people don't have your mechanical sense and
> what seems easy to you is not to everyone.
>
> Yours,
> David
