Flash Gordon is alive!

[regcheeseman]

It's bad form to thread jack.....but, big blue drum full of citric, leave for a week. Slow process, a knot wheel on a grinder will do it in about an hour.

[T4vancalledStan]

Sorry for the bad form of ‘thread jacking’. Was trying to speak to Jumbungla directly. Point taken.


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[Jumbungla]

Hello again everyone!

It's been a while since I've been on, but I've been tinkering away on the van when I've had the chance. Just not a lot worth posting about.

This lockdown has me all out of sorts.

Anyway, most of my work recently has been body work, and I've not really felt the need to post anything.

But today I got bored of body work and decided to make a start on fitting my upgraded fuel pump that's been waiting in my garage for a few months now!

I figured I'm never going to have as good an access to change the pump over as now - having the whole front off!





Slightly concerned though that it looks like I've got some diesel leaking out from where the injectors meet the head. Most of that diesel you can see here is from taking off the leak off pipes, but there was some fluid there before.





Is this a common thing? New injector seal washers? I put new ones in before when I changed the head.... Also some oil around the head gasket - I'm hoping that is just diesel from the injectors or leak off pipes.

I've got a new section of leak off pipe to cut up and put on as the old ones aren't looking great.

While I'm in this position is there anything else I should consider changing? The plastic fuel pipes here, should I replace them? I'm sure I read about them going brittle and cracking and letting air in?



Anyway, left it there until my new tensioner and belts come. Will do all of it in one go. Will put my new tappets in that I've had for ages as well.

Anyway, after that I got back to bodywork again, yawn. Got to be done though.

Spray painting the parts in epoxy primer, standard primer and then 2k black. Solid as a rock now!





Good tent this! Perfect for painting in. Easy to put up and take down as and when needed.







Outriggers tacked into place, with front bumper fitted to make sure it all lines up.



Should hopefully be able to finish it tomorrow, then treat all the bare metal!



Also want to get my boost and exhaust temp sensors fitted while I've got everything exposed.

Getting there, slowly.

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[S49]

Thanks for the update mate.Coming together nicely

[Hans]

Glad u back mate, i am learning from u , i like your curtains haha

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[Jumbungla]

Haha!! The Mrs hates them.

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[S49]

Those out riggers look a nice fit, where did you get them from? Someone on here a bit back had Heritage ones and they fit where they touch.

[Jumbungla]

They are from Just Kampers, Si.


But oooooooohhhh don't be fooled by the pics.... It took a lot of reshaping and careful coaxing with a hammer to get it reasonably close to fitting haha. Not great.

Those out riggers look a nice fit, where did you get them from? Someone on here a bit back had Heritage ones and they fit where they touch.

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[T4vancalledStan]

Doing an incredible job, well done!


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[Jumbungla]

Slowly getting there on the front end....



In other news, got myself a 3d printer a few weeks ago. Built an enclosure for it out of IKEA lack tables (£1.75 each).



Got a load of T4 bits I'm going to print, started today with a fasica fitting to hold my exhaust temp and turbo gauges. Only printed in super draft mode so bit rough around the edges but really happy with it as a start. Needs a bit of tweaking on CAD to get it fitting flush with the rest of the fascia.





Going to fit it here, and move the hazard switch to next to the radio. I'm pretty sure with my abl that with the diagnostic port I can just tape it up and leave it floating behind the dash somewhere?



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[mike_skinner]

Nice! The only things I’ve 3D printed for mine are the locking turn clip thing for the fuse box cover and an ejector seat button. I reckon the parts can shrink quite a bit (like 10%) so it’s a lot of trial and error. Fusion360 is great

[Jumbungla]

This is knackering me out in this sun. But hey ho much better than doing it in the rain!! Just nice knowing that (at the moment) I can work on the van any day, not just the 1 day a week it's not raining haha.

Feels like slow progress on the van at the moment, but the hours are going in. So i would have had to put them in anyway!

Here are a few pics of what I'm dealing with at the moment.

Near side front wheel arch before taking a wire wheel to the stonechip.







Previous owner must have gone to Del Boy's school of welding. Most of the strength in a weld comes from the seam sealer and stonechip.... Right?







Just horrendous. Not even sure how he got a flat layer of stonechip over these holes!! Looks recently done so can't have rusted out.

Inside wasn't much better so thought I'd tackle that too.





Starting to look a bit better, horrible welding because of all the seam sealer stuck in the holes of the previous crappy porous welds.
Bit of grinding back and it'll be alright.



Then I decided to look at the off side front. Much worse as I think it was all original rust and hadn't been touched!









Made up a new footwell plate, really pleased with how it cut and folded.





Welded in like a dream. Feel like it was a real pivotal moment for my welding. It just felt right. Turning my wire feed speed and power setting down really helped. Nice sizzle and almost silent at times.

Still put too much weld down. Need to work on that.

Then looked at the off side front jack point. It shriveled up on itself 6 or so months ago when I was jacking it up. Not hard to see why really, haha.







Amazingly, a cut off from a square bar I found fitted the jack point perfectly. Only had to cut a small corner off.





Shame I didn't get a pic before I welded it in. But drilled the holes to get access to the exhaust cat mount, and fits great!





Proper solid area to jack from now.

Then I got bored of grinding and welding and looked at the engine again.

Took the old fuel pump out, all the belts off, old noisy tappets out.



New tappets in!



Crankshaft back on, the tappets will have a lot longer than 24 hours sitting, haha.



Just waiting for my recon injectors from Reg and once they're in I can put my modded fuel pump in! Exciting.

But in the meantime. My timing belt kit came with a new crank pulley bolt so I thought what the hell, I'll replace it, and while I'm there I'll do the front crank seal.

So the crank seal housing was missing a bolt. And all of the others were far from their 20Nm spec. I think every bolt in my engine bay is loose.

Anyway, replaced with one I had lying around.



Old seal came out easily with the Haynes manual tip. 2 screws into the seal and pull with 2 sets of pliers.



New seal in. I'm slightly worried I've pushed it too far in. But I cant find any info anywhere to say "don't push it too far in"






While I was on enginey bits I decided to fit my boost pressure sensor and exhaust temp sensors.

Cheers for the tips TommyP!

Went in a treat.



Exhaust temp sensor.



Boost pressure sensor and tubing.


Not sure I'll get up to much on the van tomorrow. I'm shattered. But might end up re-indexing the new fuel pump throttle as I realised i missed a bit from Reg's guide!

Bit of a mammoth post this. But still no real "finished" pictures to show. Ah well.

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[T4vancalledStan]

Your posts are always fantastic. Very impressive stuff. You really are going head to head with the van. You got a mechanic/welder/panel beater background or what?


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[arfur fox-acre]

Thanks for the update, great photos too. Loving the write ups so please keep it coming.

[Hans]

Amazing mate. I thought my is bad, but at least i am the firs who fu k with it. U got a lot more work. Respect

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