Mystery Turn Indicator.
Thanks to a quick post on the Binder Planet, my left turn signal indicator is now off when it’s supposed to be.
Transfer Case/Transmission Service
I’ve been noticing a chatter coming from either my transmission or transfer case at speed and under load, and it’s getting louder. Looking through the service manuals is, as usual, pretty useless. There’s no decent picture of the T-19 I have, and no direct reference to where the drain plugs are or how to service them.
Update: Realizing I had neither the time nor the pump to change my own gear oil, I stopped by the Jiffy Lube and paid the guys there to do it for me. Transfer, Transmission, and front diff are all full and clean—of Gl-5. So that will have to come out sometime this spring, after I’ve bought a pail of 50 wgt. The rear diff was full of chocolate milk so that got replaced, and he lubed all the points on the front and rear driveshafts. On the short ride home, I still heard chattering, so it’s looking more like a driveshaft problem than a simple lubrication issue. Oh, well.
Checking the Binder Planet, I found three posts with great information:
4 Quarts Valvoline 50 wgt racing oil is correct. See FAQs for details.
The fill and drain plug are on the passenger side of the transmission/
drain is directly below the fill plug.
—You pull the lower plug to drain, should be a 5/8″ square plug. The upper plug is the filler hole and you fill it until it starts to trickle out… to the bottom threads of the filer plug. They make an 8-point socket, or you can use an 11/16″ 12-point socket. Difference is the 8-point will be less likely to strip the plug. Crescent wrench is not acceptable… lol. Clean each plug while looking for metal chunks attached to the magnet on the end. Clean the threads, apply some RTV or thread sealer (no teflon tape) and snug them down to… IIRC, 35 lb-ft. Don’t quote me on that though, I am guilty of tightening them to 1/2 grunt… looking up pipe plugs it says a 3/4″ thread is 33-37 lb-ft and a 1″ thread is 70-85 lb-ft.
—I myself prefer to pull the top plate and just dump the gear oil in until it is to the bottom of the filler plug.
—One thing you must know is that the gear oil is not a standard gear oil you’re going to find on the shelf at Wal-Mart or whatever and most counter-monkeys will tell you “just regular gear oil” or “GL-4 or GL-5″. Truth of the matter is the gear oil you need to run is a non-ep. GL-1. 90 weight mineral gear oil, no EP additives. Many are running 50w motor oil.
—Reason it needs to be GL-1 is that the EP additives in GL-4 & GL-5 will destroy yellow metals. That means the synchros, any bushings/spacers, brass or copper will disintegrate. Mobile has a synthetic Trans fluid that is supposed to be superb, but I stick with Gold Band Industrial Mineral Gear Oil, which is the brand we used in all out heavy equipment, international as well as CAT, from gear oil to hydraulic and I run it in both the transmission and transfer case.
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This link has two very good photos showing the drain plug on a Dana 20 transfer case.
I take the nozzle cap off a quart of gear lube, cut the tip off, and push it into an appropriate length of 5/16″ or 3/8″ fuel hose. Long enough so you can screw the qt bottle onto it right side up and hold it above the level of the fill plug while you squeeze it. Turn it upside down, squeeze, right side up, let some air back in, and repeat. Repeat until the bottle is empty, then screw on the next one. When the oil starts running out into the pan, stop and put the plug in. With the tunnel cover off, your best bet is to run the hose down into the fill plugs from the big hole there. Protect the interior from spills as necessary, this isn’t the cleanest method, but it works.
The transfer case takes just short of 2 quarts, and the transmission just under 4. If you start with 6 quarts you’ll end up with about 1/2 quart left over. At least that’s what I ended up with on the 800 a couple weeks ago.
The trans, transfer case, and both axles have square headed plugs to check the gear oil level. The trans and transfer case have 2, the lower is a drain so use the upper. They shouldn’t be too dirty but as long as they’re full, you’re in the ballpark. There’s no filter in a manual trans. Also, greasing the u-joints, steering, and up on the bell housing there’s grease fittings for the clutch linkage and transfer case shifter.
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Of course, with all the free time I have, crawling under the truck and servicing it myself is going to happen about as soon as hell freezes over. The Jiffy Lube out on 40 does transfer case and transmission servicing, which sounds better in the short term.
Gasketed.
Thanks to some 11th-hour help from Mr. Scout, I got the second bolt off the exhaust manifold and a new gasket installed, along with two shiny copper bolts of the correct length and diameter. It was tricky work by myself trying to hold a wrench on the top nut while torquing the bottom bolt enough to make things turn; as it worked out, I snapped the bolt in half. Whatever works.
Peer Pressure is quiet again. There’s no backfire coming off a heavy foot in the gas, and exhaust fumes in the cabin are all but gone.
Soft Top Repairs
I’ve got a hand-me-down Kayline soft top that came with Peer Pressure when I bought it at auction. It’s a fastrac, which, unfortunately, I wouldn’t have chosen. It’s black vinyl, which, fortunately, goes with anything. It has a hole in the center section above the bed. And the flaps that close over the door panels, which originally fastened with velcro, stopped working before I even bought the truck. Kayline sewed loop velcro to the flaps and glued hook velcro to the metal door inserts, but the glue failed over multiple summer/winter cycles. This makes driving with the top on interesting, because the fabric around the doors puffs up like a hot-air balloon and flaps like a chicken trying to achieve liftoff.
I knew that re-gluing the velcro wasn’t an option, so I decided snaps were the best answer. After looking around online, I found a snap set at West Marine with everything I needed. The important bit were the pliers, which offer a lot more control over installation than a hammer and punch. I then went to the Home Depot and picked up a couple of different combinations of bolts and nuts, and a metal drillbit to fit.
First, I marked off where the snaps should go on the driver’s side, then pulled the insert and drilled holes. I used 8/32 3/8″ bolts to hold in the female sides, held in with nylon lockwashers. The bolts are just long enough, with the thickness of the insert, to hold the whole nut without going beyond. I put three snaps along the top and two on the side, and that seems to work pretty well.
I’m not as happy with the snaps as I’d like to be; they don’t hold as securely as I’d hoped they would (or the OEM snaps on the top itself). I thought I’d try something different for the passenger side, so I went to find a bolt with a smaller head to use on the male side. I picked up some 6/32 1/2″ machine screws and they fit inside the male heads much better, so I put the male heads on the insert and the female side on the fabric, then removed the excess on the bolts with an angle grinder. Either way, these snaps still don’t seem to have a whole lot of grip.
Overall I’m pleased with the results, and after a day’s driving at 55+ with the top buttoned up safari-style, the flaps didn’t budge. I’d still like to find some heavier-duty snaps that will grip tighter.
Out Of Gas.
I grabbed about 15 minutes while I was on grill duty this evening to pull the faceplate off the dashboard and swap out the amp/gas gauge with the spare I’ve got in my bins. Unfortunately, it didn’t read anything from the tank. The backlight and amp gauge work in both units, so I’m going to officially say it’s the wiring, which means I’ve got to run a new hot wire from the tank up to the bulkhead.
Meanwhile, Brian H. took delivery of his Wagonmaster today, and will be selling his red Scout to make room for the new acquisition. Pretty, isn’t it?
I also got an email from my friend in Wheaton, who mentioned he’d been up to Crazy Ray’s in Mt. Airy to look around, and found a Scout II that hadn’t been picked over much. Because they were already in the area, I let Brian and Bennett know, and they made a trip up to look it over. Apparently there wasn’t much left of the body, but they pulled some engine parts and left the rest for the crusher.
Gas Tank Replacement.
Last year I did some horse trading for a new poly gas tank. The tank that came on my truck leaked from several different places, and the gauge never worked, so I figured I’d try to knock out a few birds with one stone. I ordered a new sender and J-hooks from SSS and tried to block out a solid day’s time to work on it. I talked to Mr. Scout about my plans, and he kindly offered his garage for the weekend. I cruised over the bridge Friday night and he had a big pile of steamed Maryland crabs waiting for me, and cold beer never tasted so good.
Bright and early Saturday morning, we got started by using a cheapo Harbor Freight siphon to pull the gas out of the tank. It worked great after I finally looked at the bulb and realized the big arrow was pointing in the wrong direction.
After we drained the tank, we disconnected all of the vapor lines still existing on the driver’s side, the fuel line and the sender wiring from the passenger side. (make sure to have a bucket handy to dump the remaining fuel in the lines).
I’d sprayed the bolts with PBblaster the day before so it only took a little coaxing to get the nuts started, and the straps loosened up quickly. We rolled a floor jack underneath and braced it with blocks, then let everything down slowly and pulled the tank forward.
Once it was clear of the straps, we disconnected the sender leads and pulled it free. It was in decent shape but the sender unit had been sealed in with some kind of goo that came off in one piece. A couple of the vapor lines had been capped with non-fuel grade hose (two years ago, I replaced the fuel neck hose it came with, which was actually radiator hose) and several others just dead-ended up into the fender cavity.
We put the new sender into the tank, made sure the seal was tight, and set it into place. The poly tank I got is a little smaller than steel, so the straps aren’t quite as tight as I’d like, but once we cinched it down, it’s won’t go anywhere. We had to scoot it over to the driver’s side slightly to make the fuel neck hose fit (nobody in Chestertown had any to sell us, and the piece I had was about 1″ too short) but once that was done everything went smoothly.
We removed the plastic evap assembly from inside the fender (it wasn’t hooked up properly) and tightened the fuel neck up to the body (it wasn’t, originally), then double-checked our hoses and started putting fuel back in the tank. While that was happening, I worked on splicing new connectors onto the sender wiring.
When the last bit of gas was in the tank (and after Brian pranked me by pouring some of his water out on the floor under the tank while I wasn’t looking) I primed the carb and fired it up.
She ran smooth and didn’t die, which meant the engine was pulling from the tank properly, and I pulled her out into the driveway to idle for a moment. The gauge still read zero, so we decided to ground the wiring when we got back from Dogfish Head out in Rehoboth.
The next day, we tied the ground into a bare spot on the frame, hoping that would solve the issue with the gauge, but there was still no reading. So I’ll pull the gauge itself, test the wiring, and swap it with a spare, then look at adding a new wire for power all the way up to the dash. (I get good power to the gauge itself, and the ammeter works correctly). The ride home was uneventful and easy; I put 5 more gallons in it before crossing the Bay Bridge and didn’t have any problems with the pump shutting off or fuel coming back up the filler neck.
All totaled, it took two guys about four hours with minimal air tools, a couple of jerry cans, a siphon, and an assortment of electrical connectors.
Dana 20 Teardown
Here’s an interesting and helpful teardown guide for a Dana 20 transfer case. I’m going to see if I can save out the pages and the larger images into some kind of usable offline archive.
Now, With More Seating.
This weekend, I finally solved the mystery of the rear bench seat. When last I’d attempted to swap out the bench that came with Peer Pressure (a fantastically ugly, ripped pillowed vinyl) I was stymied by two latches that hook around posts mounted on the inner wall of the wheel well. The latches were too high and didn’t catch the posts, making the seat an unsafe proposition for any passengers I might be transporting. (in the event of a sudden stop, the seat would most likely shift forward, squishing passengers between the seat and the seatbelts they were buckled into).
Saturday evening, while moving three benches around the garage, I finally noticed something missing from the original bench, and everything suddenly made sense. IH mounted two feet on the bottom rear of each seat, which propped it up off the floor by about 2″. These feet were missing from the bench the truck came with—they had been knocked off with a hammer. I reasoned that once the feet were gone, the seat sat lower on the floor and the latches were able to swing under the posts correctly. So I busted out the POR-15 and painted up two mounting brackets in preparation for Sunday afternoon.
After I’d knocked the feet off of one of the spare benches (no pillowtop, thank GOD), I sat it in the bed, adjusted the sides, and bolted it into place just as easy as could be. The only thing left to do now is scoot the Tuffy console forward about two inches so that fold becomes fold-and-tumble. And, after unbolting the set of belts it came with, I can get rid of the original bench and reclaim that much more space in the garage.
Sunday afternoon I took a quick trip down to visit Brian H, who has taken a Sawzall to his driver’s floor, and we shot the breeze for a half hour or so. He’s making adjustments to his cab before welding in all new metal—floor mounts, rocker, the whole works. What he’s got done so far looks good, and his welds are really coming along. He’s trying to get her back on the road for next weekend’s trip to Bennett’s farm…I’m pulling for him.
Weekend Cruise.
I haven’t gotten much done with the Scout lately, but I’ve been slowly amassing parts. One thing that has been crawling closer to completion is the radio install, but we’re not quite there yet. The DIN sleeve is in the faceplate but it needs to be trimmed a little more to fit. The head unit itself needs a source of constant power to retain the programmed memory, so I have to find a way to get a 12V wire from the battery to the dashboard. Thankfully there’s a female pigtail off the battery connector that I can tap into, so I’m going to pick up a length of 12 gauge wire and a box of connectors, pull the inline fuse from the old radio, and run it into the dashboard. I also have to rewire the rear speakers with something heavier.
While I had a little time with Finn Sunday afternoon, I replaced a couple more bulbs in the dashboard, but the one I swapped out for the left indicator light isn’t working. It also happens to be the most difficult to get in without disassembling the entire speedo assembly.
Wiring and Tank.
Last week, I got a small package of J-hooks from SSS, which should complete the list of parts I need to drop the gas tank and install the poly replacement. Well, except for some kind of catchbasin for the gas I’ve already got. I’ll probably either siphon it into the Saturn or just go buy a Rubbermaid container.
I also found a post on the Binder Planet which has some more detailed instructions for running constant power to the head unit; unscrewing the fuse box should reveal two bus bars, one with switched power and one with constant. They each will accept female spade connectors, which means all I should need is a length of wire and the proper spade connector.
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