27 Sept 2013 - Yet another fuel tank!!

Well after the July attempt and cost of trying to reseal the RH tank it managed to spring a leak within a couple of days. I noticed a small drip under the tank almost the size it was before the repair. Stick my hand under the tank and...yep still leaking.

I gave it a few more days just to check it wasn't trapped fuel from the last leak but no it was definitely a leak good and proper!

So what to do? Well at least this leak was very minor and the tank wasn't dropping it's level at any great rate (after 5 weeks the half full tank wasn't empty) and this is diesel/SVO blend not highly flammable petrol?

As four years ago a military tank is still around £200. This is too spendy so I did the same as before and went with the Britpart offering, which is a good copy of the original rear fill underseat type. OK the metal is not as thick but at £70 delivered you can't argue? Rob down the road was selling his ex-Mil FFR and that had a leaky tank so he donated that one so I could use the filler cap assy as before.

Now Rob's tank had leaks in almost the same locations as mine so it was worth a prod to see what I could find. Also Rob had POR15 sealed his tank as well when he rebuilt the 109.

After a combination of heating the solder joints plus a bit of crowbar'ing the support plate came away. The source of the leaks was obvious. The trapped area between the support and the base of the tank had never seen paint and was an ideal trap for 'carp' and water etc.

 

I guess this corrosion problem will exist in all tanks of this type. Applying POR15 will seal the internal surface....for a time. But if the material that the coating is stuck to is not stable the leaks will re-appear...and it can only get worse? Really what you need to do is immerse the whole tank in POR15 to do it right?....or buy the later two part pressed type from the usual suspects. They might not look 'correct' but they not have these rust traps!?

So with Rob's old tank ready to go to recycling I lopped out the old filler with the trusty 4" chop saw and made a similar hole in the new tank, after lopping the rear filler and vent stub off.  As this was a new tank I thought I would try soldering. Last time I had to resort to tack welding with the MIG.

Well the soldering worked. The fresh metal helped and a dose of plumbers flux and the lead/tin solder I had to hand did it's job. This was an old roll that came from SWMBO's late departed Dad's shed. God bless Ken.

 

 

Painted the whole tank with zinc rich primer (as before), then a good coat of exterior black gloss and left it to cure for a week. So, hopefully, this should be jacked into position this weekend. I will stick some underbody wax front and back once it's up and bolted.

12th August 2013 - New starter motor in....Trigger tried to torch himself!

STARTER MOTOR

Over the weekend I managed to fit the new Britpart starter motor...which wasn't straight-forward.

The old one was always a PITA to get in and out between the chassis rail and engine block. It would only 'just' go through, and even then only if you fitted it exactly the right way round. A bit like playing Jenga! The new one wouldn't fit through the access though.

Checking one against the other I found the new ones flange was very slightly bigger on two of the radii plus also had an additional unnecessary lump. I had to remove said lump and reduce each radius by 3mm. then it would go in. Still a PITA though. I probably wasted 2 hours struggling before I realised the motor assembly wasn't 'exactly' the same.

A good comment from someone on the S2 forum was to remove the LHS/nearside (if you drive on the correct side of the road) wing support bolted to the chassis rail/wing. This makes a perfect port to put the starter through. Saves all my swearing?

With the new motor installed it really starts a whole lot easier then the original ever did. Blip the button and Trig's Tdi fires every time...even without the glowplugs.

Did a 10 mile round trip dump run without any issue. Running sweet.


OH....DEAR..........

Monday morning SWMBO gave me the task of collecting a wendy house for our daughter on my way home. So Trig's had a job for the day. Both tanks were full so a 80 mile round trip including the office would not be a problem.

10 minutes into the trip as I joined the dual carriageway the engine cut out and the dash lights went dead. Luckily this happened as I reached a layby otherwise I would have been blocking lane 1 of the A303! As I stopped smoke started to waft from under the bonnet in the area of the starter motor.

I grabbed the fire extinguisher and carefully lifted the bonnet. Yep, definitely smoke ;) I jumped back in the cab and isolated the battery (useful to have a switch?).

As the smoke cleared I could see the reason for the engine cut-out and the smoke. The main supply cable to the truck electrics and jumped out of position and had welded itself to the exhaust manifold!

I decided at this point that maybe todays long trip wasn't really a go'er. I bent the now exposed cable away from the manifold into free air and tried the starter. Started fine. I just hope the dual batteries haven't been damaged by the huge current flow?

Drove back without issue (5 miles) and dropped the LR off at home. I isolated the battery and took another car from the fleet to make the office run.

Last night I stripped out the offending wiring. The 25mm cable from the starter to the starter button (supplies all the truck +12v bar the starter motor - melted and was the source of the smoke); Battery ground connection 16mm? - this has also melted; battery isolation switch - FUBAR'd.

Here's the state of the 25mm supply to the starter!

What this does show is that :-

1. You should tie the cables down firmly to avoid this (they have been fine for +2 years....but)
2. It pays big dividens to have a battery iso switch!

The 25mm cable from the battery to the starter survived so that can be reused and I have ordered the same CSA to replace the damaged cables. This and a new batt isolator came to <£20. It could have been A LOT more expensive?!