Some Jeep Work and a Shot in the Hand.

 

There hasn’t been a lot going on the last couple of days.

We are still waiting for the the RV to be released from the shop. The guy promised it would be ready by Friday. The problem has been getting parts for the chassis AC.

Work on the Jeep.

The auxiliary braking system has been giving some trouble. When the brake-away switch is actuated the signal to the pump pulses and the pump runs and stops, runs and stops.
I thought that the problem was with the plunger switch so I took it apart and found that the switch was ok.

As you can see in the above picture, the switch is very simple. There is a plastic plunger that goes into the end of the switch which slides between the two points and keeps the circuit open. There is a cable connected to the plunger at one end and connected to the towing vehicle at the other. If there is an accidental separation the cable pulls out the plunger, the switch closes and the brakes are automatically applied.

I did find a problem with the switch. The wires are riveted to the blades of the switch and one side was not making a connection. I put tie blade on the anvil, rapped the connection with a hammer and that took care of that problem.

I put everything back together and hooked the switch back up. You can see the plunger in the front of the switch below.

When I pulled the plunger the pump started but it still pulsed. As I was checking for loose wiring the pump stopped. I noticed that the control module for the system was very warm. I checked the voltage at the pump and it was gone.
I have to wait until I get the the RV back before I can trouble shoot this problem further. All the documentation on the aux braking system is in the RV and the RV has to be connected to the jeep brake system to go much further. I am thinking that the controller for the system is fried but I won’t know for sure until I can look at the paperwork and do some more trouble shooting.

A Shot in the Hand.

Last year I was having trouble with a trigger finger.
A trigger finger is caused by inflammation of the tendons of the fingers where they pass through loop’s that hold them in place. It’s like a lump in a cable and it gets stuck on each side of the loop when you open and close the hand. It can be very painful. 
Last year I went to the doctor and had some cortisone shots in the hand. 
The shots fixed the problem until I came home and started doing a bunch of Blacksmithing.

Now the finger is messed up again. I went to see the hand doctor yesterday and convinced him to give me another shot so I can drive more comfortably. I promised the doctor that I would have the finger surgically repaired next May but there isn’t enough time to get it done now. 
The doctor acquiesced and gave me the shot. Unfortunately the shot didn’t make much difference. The finger still locks up and hurts when I unlock it.

Ok that’s all I have for now. Talk to you later.

The Fuel Valve Revisited, a Couple Days at the Cabin and Some Work on the Jeep.

 

The fuel cutoff valve:

I haven’t been able to get the fuel cut off valve out of my head. Some times when things don’t work it will bug me until I get to the bottom of it. This fuel valve is one of those things.

I decided to give the valve a good test and if I had to, take it apart to see why it failed.
While I was thinking about the problem I went over everything that happened to the valve.
One of the things that I remembered is; when I removed the valve after the first test drive I found that the stem was loose so I tightened it.

Another thing that stood out was, the last time I was taking the valve out I forgot to disconnect the power and when I went to remove the coil the wrench stuck to the nut on top of the coil. The coil was energized and working.

I put the valve in the vice and removed the coil. The stem is the steel part that is screwed into the Brass body of valve. The solenoid coil is the black thing sitting on the vice behind the valve.

 

Here is the valve taken apart. You can see the valve body with the orifice, the stem and the plunger, its spring and the plastic washer.

 

The valve is so simple that it is hard to see what is wrong. I put the valve together and made sure everything was tight. Then I put the coil on the valve and energized it.
Nothing happened, no click of the plunger! what is going on here?

I had an idea! I removed the coil and loosened the stem a little. I put the coil back on the valve and energized it. “CLICK”. The solenoid seemed to work. I tightened down the stem and tried it again . No Click.
I tried it several times and decided that the washer must have been crushed when it got so hot.
That is why it was loose when I removed the valve. With the washer shrunken and the stem tightened the plunger is pressed down on the orifice and there is no room for the plunger to move. The amount of movement is apparently controlled by the thickness of the washer.
I decided that what I needed to do was make a new thicker washer.
Fortunately I still had that piece of Delran plastic. That seems to be the perfect material for this project. It is tough, machinable and impervious to almost any chemicals.

I put the Delran rod in the lathe and turned down the end to the outside dimensions of the washer.

   

After getting the inside diameter bored I cut off the new thicker washer. The new washer is on the left in the picture below.

As you may be able to tell, the in side diameter is a little smaller than the original.
I had to use a half round file to finish it to size. That stuff is really hard to file.

I put the solenoid back together with the new washer and checked it out. I energized the coil and heard the plunger click. I blew through the tube and it worked, the valve was open.
After several cycles to make sure it would work I installed the valve on the van and started it up. The valve seems to be working. I took a short ride around town and it still worked. I stopped at a store for about ten minutes. When I came back to the van I didn’t smell any gas fumes and the engine started without any loading up or belching black smoke from the exhaust.
Hopefully this will be the answer to the carburetor loading up problem.

A short trip to the cabin:

I needed a couple days at the cabin. I figured that I might not get another chance before we leave for Arizona. We are still waiting to get the RV out of the shop so I can’t do anything about getting ready to leave. I wanted to get my weed eater from where I left it under  the picnic table down at the shotgun range and I wanted to finish the work I started on the spring tanks.

Saturday morning I headed for Boonville; It was very fogy around Santa Rosa when I left but that cleared as usual, around Cloverdale. As the jeep climbed the hills on 128 heading west the fog came back and was with us all the way to Boonville. The windshield wipers were on the whole way.
It was a cold gray morning in Anderson Valley when I stopped at the Market to get a sandwich for my lunch. I was counting on the sandwich to be large enough to serve as lunch for today and tomorrow. I planned on a nice big french roll with lots of turkey and some pepper-jack cheese.

I walked to the back of the store where the deli counter is and struck up a conversation with the deli ladies as I filled out my sandwich request.

The lady behind the counter took the slip of paper and looked at it, then looked up at me.

“I’m afraid we have a problem” she said.

“Oh? What might that be”. I asked

“My bread delivery hasn’t occurred yet”…

“And you have no rolls” I finished for her.

“Right”, she replied. “You have a choice between sliced rye or sliced whole wheat”.

“Gosh, I was really counting on this sandwich to feed me for lunch today and tomorrow. I was kind of hoping for a roll but I guess whole wheat will work”, I replied.

The lady took pity on me and made a really large sandwich with lots of meat. Nice folks in that store.

By the time I got to the cabin the fog had lifted.
The first thing I noticed when I got out of the jeep was that the cow skull was missing from the stump and the overflow pipe was on the ground.

I walked up to the stump to check things out. At first I thought that some human had absconded with the skull but I noticed that the skull had not been lifted up but dragged from the stump; I could see the drag marks. Then I noticed a few tufts of white hair scattered around below.  I assume that the skull was carried off by a coyote, to use as a chew toy. In my wanderings round the place for the next to days I never stumbled on it.

Once I got moved in I drove down to the shotgun range to get my weed eater.
When I got to the crossing where you enter the meadow there was a tree down and hanging over the road. I realized at that time that I came up here without a chain saw. Not a smart thing to do in these wood where a tree could block you in at any time even in good weather.

I left the jeep at the tree and walked down to the shotgun range and retrieved the weed eater. When I got back I realized that it would be hard to turn around where I was and to go forward I would have to do something about the tree. I took the ax out of the back of the jeep and cut off a low hanging branch from the tree that gave just enough room to drive the jeep under. I turned around in the meadow and went back to the cabin to hang out for a while.

After eating the first half of my sandwich I got in the jeep and headed up to the spring tanks to finish up the plumbing.

Once that was done I drove up to the Bear Spring and sat there for a while listening to the squirrels barking in the trees. I noticed that this year was pretty sparse as far as squirrel food is concerned; there aren’t many acorns and the Madrone berries are nonexistent. I wonder what the squirrels are eating.

A Walk in the Woods:

I decided to take a walk out the cabin loop trail and enjoy spending some time in the woods. I stopped at all the benches and spent some time just sitting and listening to the forest.

When I was walking back to the jeep I stopped at this one spot and noticed these green things laying on a log.

Upon closer inspection I realized that this might be what the squirrels are eating. These are the husk of the fruit of the California Nutmeg.
This particular area has more mature nutmeg trees than anywhere else I have seen. This is not the aromatic nutmeg used in eggnog.

After a few of hours wandering around in the forest I headed back to the jeep and drove down the hill to the cabin.

For dinner, I opened a can of Nally’s Chicken and Dumplings.
Boy, the crap I will eat when I am alone. The problem is I really like Chicken and Dumplings and was really disappointed with this stuff. Think; a few chunks of canned chicken in canned gravy with squares of dough lying at the bottom of the gravy.

After a little reading and a couple of classic radio shows on the XM it was time for bed.

Sunday:

It was cold in the cabin this morning so I slept in until around 9:00. I didn’t want to start a fire in the wood stove as I knew that it would warm up as the day progressed. While I was fixing breakfast I lit all three burners on the stove to help take the chill of the cabin.
I spent the morning enjoying several cups of mocha and trying to see out the dirty windows in the cabin. Finally I decided that I had to do something about the windows. These windows are made from heavy duty clear plastic film. When you try to wash them the film flexes so you can’t put any pressure on the windows. What I tried is just spraying the windows to get the accumulated dust off.
Of course the water just beaded up on window. I had one of those micro fiber towels and used it on the window on the porch and it worked ok. The window came out kind of clean. As I worked my way around to the side windows I found that once the towel got wet it no longer work to remove the droplets and just spreads the water and dirt around. It will take at least one of these towels for each window to do a good job.

Later I began the chore of getting ready to go home. As I was walking in and out of the cabin I noticed a white garbage bag on the porch that had some tubers in it for what I think are Dahlias.

Below you can see the tubers.

I had planted some by the stump earlier in the year and noticed that a couple of the plants had taken root and were doing well.

Eventually I got all the flowers planted and the jeep loaded and headed for home.

Monday:

A doctor’s appointment and work on the jeep:

After breakfast I started on this blog but around 9:30 I had to go to Sebastopol to see the cardiologist to get the results of the latest echocardiogram. Everything looks good so I guess you will have to put up with me for a while longer.

Patti and I went to Hank’s for breakfast, always good.

After breakfast I started working on the jeep. I wanted to re-mount the vacuum pump for the aux. braking system.

This is the original (temporary) mounting system that has been this way for 5 or 6 years.

Hanging by some zip ties is not really acceptable.

This is the new mounting situation. Screwed to the fender well is better.

What the @#%*.

There is of course a small problem; I have to buy a piece of vacuum hose to complete the installation. 

I can’t drive the jeep to the parts store because the power brake system is temporarily disabled.
Patti is out shopping so I can’t use her car so I’ll just take the van to the store.

I got in the van and tried to start it. No go! I cranked the engine over and pumped the gas but nothing happened. It wasn’t getting any gas.
The temperature outside at this time was about 90°. I decided that this was a good time to quit for the day

I have no idea what is going on with the van but I’m going to try not to think about it until next summer.

Tomorrow I will take Patti’s car and go get the hose for the jeep.

I just goofed off for the rest of the day and have been working on this blog since dinner time; now its time for bed.

Good night.  

Try These Recipe’s.

 

“Cutie Meringue Surprise”

Patti and I have been eating these little mandarin oranges called “cutie pie’s” for years.

I have always thought that there should be some kind of a dessert one could make out of these sweet little oranges.

Yesterday I wasn’t doing much so I looked in the cupboards and came up with a box of Kingsford Corn Starch. On the back of the box is a recipe for Lemon Meringue Pie.

I followed this recipe and whenever it called for “lemon” I substituted “orange”.
The only changes I made to the recipe was that when it called for 1-1/2 cups of sugar I only added 1 cup as I figure that the oranges were sweet enough. I also added slices of orange to the filling after I poured it into the baking dish.
I don’t make pie shells and didn’t have any frozen ones so I just built the pie in a baking dish. After the pie came out of the oven I added slices of orange and a little orange zest on top.

Here it is cooling on the stove.

 

We ate about half of this for dessert and it was bloody awesome. “Try it, you’ll like it.”

If you are diabetic I’m sure “Splenda” would work just fine in place of sugar.

Great Sprouts:

Oh! By the way;
There was one more recipe that we tried yesterday. Patti got this off FaceBook.
Patti loves Brussels Sprouts and I have never liked them. Patti found this recipe for baked Brussels Sprouts with Honey and Balsamic Vinegar so I figured it was worth a try.

Here is how it goes.

Cut sprouts in half, put them in a bowl, drizzle extra virgin olive oil over the sprouts and toss with a little salt and pepper. Put the sprouts on a baking sheet and bake in a 425 oven for 20 minutes.  Remove from oven, return to the bowl and drizzle on more e.v.o.o. and a little balsamic vinegar, toss to cover all and serve.
These were undoubtedly the best Brussels Sprouts I have ever tasted. I am now a fan of sprouts.

Okay that’s all I have for today.

RIP. Fuel Cutoff Solenoid.

 

Yesterday I went to the auto parts store and purchased the clamps that I needed to finish the solenoid job.
When I got home I clamped the hoses where they needed them, then I started the engine.
The engine started and ran for a couple of minutes and died. I tried several times to restart the engine without success.

As it turned out the solenoid is literally fried. I checked the name tag on the solenoid and found that the operating temperature is from 40° to 170°. The engine in the van’s normal operating temperature is from 200° to 230°. Way outside the max temp for the solenoid;  since the solenoid was mounted directly on the manifold. I wouldn’t be surprised if the temp got to around 300°.

I have been researching solenoids and found some that have an operating range to 250°. I think that will work if I mount it properly. These solenoids are an inline style and will probably require a different mounting system.
In other words I’ll be starting from scratch. I’m not sure if I’m going to pursue this any more this year as it is getting close to the time we leave for Arizona and things are going to get very busy soon.
I think I will put the van back to the original configuration and continue this experiment next year.

Stay tuned.  

A Successful Test Drive + Smog Test + New Solenoid Mount.

 

Sunday:

A successful Test Drive.

Patti and I took the van for a test drive to see if the solenoid solved the gas smell and hard hot starting problem.

We drove up the freeway to Geyserville where we got on Litton Springs Road and drove to Dry Creek Road where we turned west on Dry Creek and followed it to Lambert Bridge Rd where we turned left and followed that to West Dry Creek where we turned right and followed that road to Yocum Bridge Road and followed that back to Dry Creek Road where we headed back to Healdsburg. We stopped for lunch at the Bear Republic Pub.
By the time we got there the engine in the van was nice and hot.
I shut it off and we went in to the Pub for lunch. After about 45 minutes we came back out to the van. When we got there the first thing I noticed was there was no gas smell.
The van started ok but stumbled a couple times as we left the parking lot.
We got on 101 without any problem but as we drove along I found that the van had a hard time accelerating; it would stumble and run real rough. It would even back fire.
We took the first Santa Rosa exit off 101 and made it all the way to Mendocino Ave when the van started really acting up. I took the first right off of Mendocino Ave. and as I made the turn the engine died all together.

I opened the engine compartment and could see that the solenoid had come loose from the mount. I touched the solenoid and it was so hot I had to rapidly pull my finger away.

I wasn’t very well prepared for this test as I had forgotten to bring any tools (dumb).
I decided that the best thing to do was to just by pass the solenoid so we could get home.
But how to do this without tools or parts? I looked around in the van and came up with a ball point pen. I took the pen apart so I could use the body of the pen for a tube to connect the gas lines together. Now I needed some tools. I looked in the kitchen box and found a butter knife and a steak knife. Everything was too hot to touch so I used the steak knife to cut the tubing. I inserted the pen body into the tubing and used the butter knife to tighten the clamps.
That got us home.

You may think it a bit od that I call this a successful test drive since the van crapped out and we had to fix it to get home but a test drive is supposed to bring to light any deficiencies in the design of the modification. It worked out that the mounting system that I originally used was in insufficient to hold the solenoid and since I used the screw that was holding down the solenoid as the grounding screw for coil on the solenoid.  When it came loose, it intermittently lost the coil circuit and the solenoid would open and close as it bounced around on the loose screw. That’s why the engine was cutting out.

Monday:

A smog test.

This was a typical Monday, it seemed that everything I tried to do went sideways. I decided that I wasn’t going to work on anything important today.

I took the jeep to get a smog test and remarkably it passed!

Tuesday:

A New Mount.

I tackled the solenoid mount today.

The original mount was just one screw that held a plate the solenoid was mounted on to the intake manifold.

 

In the above photo you can see the screw that held down the solenoid and you can see the ground connection also.

Another of the problems with this approach is that the solenoid gets extremely hot sitting directly on the manifold. 
Also, where the solenoid is sitting necessitates using a fairly long piece of tubing to run between the solenoid and the carburetor. This could possibly cause excess fuel to be forced into the carb due to heat and pressure in the tubing.
You can see the tubing in the above photo also.

A new design.

The answer is a completely new design . This time I built a mount that clamps to the Manifold and holds the solenoid away from the manifold’s heat.

Here it is.

This design also allows the output of the solenoid to be right next to the input to the carburetor and can be connected with just a short piece of tubing more or less a flex connection.

Here is the solenoid installed. I will need to pick up a few hose clamps to finish the job. I’ll do that today.

 

Okay that’s it for now.

We are still waiting for our RV to get out of the shop so we can start getting ready to leave for Arizona.

A couple of lazy days and a small project.

 

The last couple of days have been a bit slow.

Thursday:

I had an appointment to have a echo cardiogram in the morning.

When I got home from that I started unloading the van from the last trip. It took me most of the rest of the day to get it all done.

Friday:

Dave came by for a visit and while he was here the solenoid for the van arrived. It turned out to be a bit larger than I had visualized but I think I can get it to work.

Saturday:

One of the constant problems with the van has been, after driving for a while there is so much heat in the engine compartment and engine that when it is shut off, the fuel in the carburetor boils. The float sinks and allows excess fuel to be forced into the manifold by the pressure in the line and the last pump of the fuel pump. Bob solved this problem in his van by changing from a carburetor system to a throttle body injection system, an approximately $1500 fix. Hopefully the solenoid will help stop the fuel from flooding the carburetor. If so, it’s a $26 fix, only time will tell.
I suppose that some day I will have to change to a TBI system if I can’t get carburetors for this engine.

Installed the solenoid. The solenoid is the blue thing in the middle of the picture.

 

Bob came by for a visit about half way through the solenoid project..
He stopped by help me with a couple of computer problems I was having. One thing we did was to try and figure out how to post video’s on the blog. There are a number of steps to get set up.
Had to get a Google + acct. then had to get a channel on youtube and after a long time screwing around I did get a video on youtube but I couldn’t get the video to show up on my blog. Don’t know what that is all about but hopefully eventually I’ll get it to work.

That’s about all for now, talk to you in a couple of days.

A Day Off

 

I didn’t do a lot yesterday

It was my Birthday so I figured that I could get away with goofing off. Of course being retired, I can goof off whenever I want anyway.
I received a lot of good wishes from friends around the country. Thanks guys!

My brother, Sonny, stopped by for a visit and brought me a life time supply of glass fuses.

Sonny used to be in the auto repair business and has some old school auto stuff left.
He said that he didn’t know anyone else who still had a vehicle so old that it used glass fuses. I’ll have to find a good spot for that in my shop. 

Later in the day we went to our friend Lorraine’s for cake and ice-cream.
That was a nice touch Lorraine, thanks.

Other than working on the blog, that was pretty much my day yesterday.

Now, I will have to get back to work. We are leaving around the 3rd of November for Arizona so the preparations begin today.