440-3 A/C delete, low mount alternator, in 79' Dodge Fleetwood Tioga

Started by Berlin-Tioga, April 19, 2019, 03:42 PM

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Berlin-Tioga

Hi!


As some of you may have noticed, I was in need of a new alternator.
The new unit came yesterday so started right away.
My goal was to be able to delete the old A/C. But to do that, the alternator hat to move to a new place because of the belt routing around the water pump.
To have more room to work I disassembled parts of the front, lowered the radiator as low as possible -without opening coolant or transmission lines ;) -
After removing all the old alternator brackets an the original fuel pump I could take a first look at the possible mounting place for the generator.
Luckily there is a so long unused threaded hole just at the right place to hang the alternator on!
Tomorrow I will try to move the spanner for the water pump to the right side, where the Power steering pump sits.
Going to be close - but a miss is as good as mile!


Then I'll try to figure out the bracketry for the alternator. Don't know yet if I'm going to weld some steel or mill an grind some aluminium.
One way or another, I'll keep you updated.




Greetings from far-far-away-land,


Ben

Rickf1985

I would have just drained the radiator, it is easy and you may be due for new antifreeze anyway. Even if you are not it makes the job so much easier and safer for the radiator.

Froggy1936

Hmm.  What is that round thing with the spiraled hose just to the left of the Alternator in the picture ? Never saw one of them ! Frank
"The Journey is the REWARD !"
Member of 15 years. We will always remember you, Frank.

Berlin-Tioga

@Rick


Draining the antifreeze would have been ok. What scared me was to open the trans cooler lines.

Berlin-Tioga


ClydesdaleKevin

Quote from: Berlin-Tioga on April 19, 2019, 04:19 PM
@Frank

That is an impco LPG/Propane vaporizer.

Nice!  Does that mean you can run your RV on propane as well?  What is the cost of propane vs. gasoline in Germany?

Kev
Kev and Patti, the furry kids, our 1981 Ford F-100 Custom tow vehicle, and our 1995 Itasca Suncruiser Diesel Pusher.

Rickf1985

Hanging it from the lines is worse than taking them off. If you are worried about fluid loss it would be very little, just the little bit between the top line fitting and the bottom fitting. Half a pint if that.

Berlin-Tioga

@Kev
Yes, the motor runs on Propane as well. As we are metric here I am not well in gallons and stuff, sorry.
But: it's roughly 35 liters/100 Kilometer of gasoline @ 1.62 €/l vs. 39 liters of propane on 100km @0.59 €/l.  But to honest, milage on gasoline is only guessed, as I never drove it that much on gas.


@Rick
it is not hanging on the lines, the radiator is sitting solid on some harder stuff down there.
But I might take it out anyway to have even better access.

As I did not change the trans fluid so far, could somebody tell me what it needs? What I have around is ATFIII, from my 84' Suburban's th700.
But I guess, that is not what Moparella tf727 wants ;) 

Greetings,
Ben

TerryH

As an aside here, I run dual fuel on my RV, but it is TBI.
I have run dual on numerous service vehicles that were carbureted and found it best to run through 1/2 tank or so of gasoline for every six or seven tanks or so of propane.
The limited amount of lubrication provided by gas helped keep the rubber/moving components of the carburetor in order.
It is not our abilities that show what we truly are - it is our choices.
Albus Dumbledore

ClydesdaleKevin

So petrol is 1.62 €/l but propane in Germany is only 0.59 €/l?  Nice!  Over here in America, the propane is typically more expensive than the petrol. 

Kev
Kev and Patti, the furry kids, our 1981 Ford F-100 Custom tow vehicle, and our 1995 Itasca Suncruiser Diesel Pusher.

TerryH

Here - SW corner of Canada, Cdn$ price today is gas - $1.69 litre, propane - 0.71 litre.
It is not our abilities that show what we truly are - it is our choices.
Albus Dumbledore

Rickf1985

That translates to $6.40 a US gallon!!!!! Damn!!! why is it so high up there? The current average here is $2.84.


https://gasprices.aaa.com/

TerryH

Correct, $6.40 Cdn per Cdn gallon.
Various reasons - dollar exchange, pipeline opposition and that we pay the highest taxes on gas in North America for a few.
Thankfully, Kraft Dinner is cheap! :)rotflmao :)rotflmao
It is not our abilities that show what we truly are - it is our choices.
Albus Dumbledore

Berlin-Tioga

  Hi there,


not to much to show here from yesterday.
I was surprised that the spanner from the water pump belt was easy to move over to the right side,
where the power steering pump sits. I took the little time to paint some of the smaller parts.


Next I started to mock up the new bracket for the alternator.
It took some painters tape, some cardboard and some confidence.
After transferring the hole pattern of the engine block via the painters tape I added the mounting holes from the new alternator.
Now I figured out a contour and transferred it on some DiBond for test fitting.


And guess what, I was surprised that it fitted right away! Unfortunately I missed to take a picture.
But I also felt a little unhappy with the three mounting points so close together.
So for the next version I will use another hole further up, a little to right.
If that looks better, I will transfer the design to some solid 10mm aluminium plate.
Some new, longer and stronger bolts were ordered today. (3/8-16 UNC, right?)




Oh, feel free to comment on the most sketchy fixing of the part on the mill, haha.




Greetings,


ben

TerryH

If it works, that is all that counts. Nice looking job on the tensioning bolt slot. :)ThmbUp :)ThmbUp :)ThmbUp
It is not our abilities that show what we truly are - it is our choices.
Albus Dumbledore

Berlin-Tioga


Yesterday was only a short period of time to work in, because of bunnies, eggs an family duties.


But I managed to finalize the mounting on the driver side.
The water pump pulley an the power steering pump got aligned exactly with some custom spacers.
Don't like stacked washers here.


And there is low mount bracket 2.0. Well, the mock-up part.
As mentioned above, I ordered some new bolts, which I need for the final evaluation of the hole positions.
But in my opinion it's looking good so far, much more sturdy with the added mounting point on top.


Please don't hesitate with suggesting improvements! I'm only best-guessing everything.




Greetings,


ben

ClydesdaleKevin

Looks good so far!  As long as the belt is perfectly aligned and the metal you are using for your custom brackets is thick enough not to flex or bend, you should be good to go!

Kev
Kev and Patti, the furry kids, our 1981 Ford F-100 Custom tow vehicle, and our 1995 Itasca Suncruiser Diesel Pusher.

Rickf1985

Nice job, I am assuming the middle belt and idler is there to help the water pump and fan pulley from slipping?

Berlin-Tioga

Exactly! But that one is original.
I only swapped it over from the passenger side.

Berlin-Tioga

    I had some time on the weekend to go on with the conversion.
The new bolts had arrived on time, so I was able to verify the hole position. Only minor tweaks were neccesary.
Then I transferred the outline and hole positions to some 10mm Certal (high strength aluminium, afaik) an started sawing, drilling, milling, sandingââ,¬Â¦
On my testfit I then realized, that even my longest bolt -6ââ,¬Å" long!- was still a tiny bit to short to be all confident.
But there was no way to get longer ones in Germany, or even Europe.
So I had to flat sink one hole by 5mm. Still 5mm left to clamp on.


On the picture you can see the final version.
On the first test with only the one big red wire attached the new alternator would not charge, although it was advertised as ââ,¬Å¾one wire applicationââ,¬Å".
With an added test wire hooked up on the D+, shortly touching the positive battery terminal, we could convince that thing to work.
The wiring is figured out but needs to be done properly. I think I will keep the original charge wire from the former setup.
That one goes to a relay which controls the charging of coach battery -I guess.
But to ad some effective cross section I will route an additional lead directly to the battery.




The most bolts of the driver side belt stuff are also replaced by new, stronger bolts.




So far, I am quite happy with the result. Look at all the room on top of the engine!
I can probably adjust carb and timing now WITHOUT burning every inch of skin on my arms and hands.


Letââ,¬â,,¢s see what kind of weird stuff comes up on reassembling the rest.




Greetings,


ben

ClydesdaleKevin

That looks great, and also looks WAY stronger than the stock brackets.  Excellent job!

Kev
Kev and Patti, the furry kids, our 1981 Ford F-100 Custom tow vehicle, and our 1995 Itasca Suncruiser Diesel Pusher.

Rickf1985

With that really short belt on the alternator you are going to have to keep checking and tightening it until it stops stretching.

thomas

realy nice set of brackets!!! the black looks like they were made at the factoty!! some of the guys on this forum are tallented like that also,,I admier you guys for that sort of skill!!  THOMAS

Berlin-Tioga

Done, and test drive successfully accomplished.
But there were some funny drawbacks to work out. I thought I could use one of the two original "not charge" wires from the old alternator to give the new one the needed field current -hope that's what you call it..
Crimped the new additional charge wire, put it in a nice protective cable tube, included the original wiring.
After starting the engine the new alternator worked fine, felt like success!
BUT: when I turned the key back to stop the engine, it just wouldn't!  ??
I could even remove the key, motor still running.
Disconnected the battery cables, motor still running.
I had to pull the spark coil cable from the distributor to kill the engine, luckily not getting struck bey the nice, strong MSD fire.
Must have been something with the wire I used to tickle the D+ on the new alternator.
I put in a new lead from D+ to switched +. Now everything works just fine.


I will keep you updated on ups an certainly on the downs of this conversion to help everyone considering this conversion.


Thanks for reading,
Greetings from overseas,
Ben

Berlin-Tioga

Hi there,

first belt successfully chewed up. But I am getting faster in replacing.
And since I deleted the AC, my burn marks are smaller thanks to more open space.
Although I checked for belt stretch more often as Rick suggested, it was probably still not enough. More spares stored;)

By that time I also had a bad leak in the upper radiator hose, like one inch over the thermostat housing.
Had to fix that at an Opel Dealership with kinda-fitting parts.
Made it happen by the use of a good piece of 35mm Vacuum cleaner pipe ;) Chromed steel, of course!
Does anyone know the correct number of the replacement part on an MB400 chassis? In an out on the radiator on the passenger side.


Thanks in advance!!!

Greetings,
ben