A Chill in the Air
A Chill in the Air
A Chill in the Air
Today was chill in a number of ways. The weather is finally what it should be like this time of year in Florida - 50s at night, 60s and 70s during the day and sunny. Makes working out in the garage a real joy.
So today I tackled the remains of the cooling system, the transmission and one other system. First order of business was to remove and replace the thermostat. The bolts came out easily enough, but getting the thermostat housing out from under the injection lines that pass over one side was a definite challenge. After loosening the clamp on the lines at the front of the cylinder head I was able to move them enough to wrestle the housing out. It wouldn’t have been an issue of the thermostat stayed in the lower part of the housing, but it didn’t. So here it is:
And boy, oh boy, was that sealing ring like a piece of stone! I had to pick and pry at it for a good five minutes to dig out a section, after which I was able to use a flat bladed screwdriver to lever it out of the housing. It worked fine - I saw that it’s a 79C thermostat, which checks out as the car would never go above the 80C mark when I drove it.
Time for the new thermostat, a Wahler with an 82C setting.
New ‘stat in the hole.
And the cover back in place and the bolts all cinched down and hose reattached.
And now on to the transmission...
Not a lot to report here. The older transmissions are a bit more of a challenge to drop the pan on, as the cooler hard lines come into one side of the pan with a flare fitting and another comes out of the transmission body in front of the pan, blocking a couple of the bolts.
Fluid coming out looked OK and smelled good. I drained the torque converter as well. These older units also use a cork gasket, as you can see in the picture.
A small amount of clutch lining material in the pan, nothing unusual. Cork gasket was in good shape, too. Nice clean pan and gasket, ready to go.
I was in a bit of quandary over whether or not I needed a filter for my transmission. Early models used a screen, later models a replaceable filter. I had the serial number and gave it to the Classic Center, but they couldn’t tell me. I can now confirm I have a screen, not a filter.
Gotta use the right Febi fluid, too!
With the transmission and torque converter all buttoned up, I moved to the transmission cooler lines both of which were in marginal condition. The left line was the worst, as it had been rubbing against the emergency brake lever and was nearly worn through. I had to bend the bracket that the hose clamp was located on to move it away from the lever. A really tight area, right next to the power steering pump pulley.
The right side line was pretty old and brittle. No conflicts like the left side, though.
Both lines got replaced with new spring reinforced lines. Guess I forgot to get pictures of the new lines, I’ll get them next blog post.
So while I was getting the engine warmed up, I was wondering if the AC was still sealed up well. I put my manifold gauge set on the suction side of the system and pulled a vacuum.
29” of Hg. Can’t get much tighter than that. So I let it pull a vacuum for about five minutes, then I shut off the pump and closed the valve. This is what it looked like an hour later:
Awesome! Still holding 29” of Hg. So I open the valve again, fire up the vacuum pump and let it pull a vacuum for a good hour to get any moisture out of the system. I don’t have any R12 on hand, but I do have some EnviroCool, a drop-in substitute for R12. So I dumped a can into the system and turned it on. It was making ice cubes in a matter of seconds. Nice!
That pretty much did it for the day. Not a bad day at all. All I have left now is to drain and refill the differential. I surveyed and identified all of the clamps in the engine compartment, so I’ll be ordering all new hose clamps from BelMetric. When those come in I’ll install them and then do the final fill of the cooling system with Mercedes coolant.
Sunday, January 6, 2019