Oka owners group newsletter
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An improved steering arm and steering knuckle, that is much stronger than the original items. I wrote sometime back of my experience, when my steering arm broke. I replaced my steering arm for around $300.00, from Oka Motor Company. Paul is offering his Steering Arm and Knuckle for $650.00, in my opinion a bargain, so much so, I bought the one Paul had brought along to show. The arm is much stronger than the original cast arm, it is held onto the steering knuckle with 6 bolts not 4, as on the original, and MOST IMPORTANTLY it is keyed to the steering knuckle eliminating any turning moments on the holding bolts, brilliant and most importantly much much stronger. Also the steering knuckle has been made much stronger with extra material and strengthening webs, Paul has these specially cast. He also mentioned how he has sold at least 10 of these knuckles to people where the top of the original knuckle has cracked or torn off. In my opinion cheap and great insurance. Paul also spoke about how he is developing 80 series axle assemblies, for the Oka, these are much stronger than the standard 60 and 70 series axles. As a number of heavily loaded vehicles, especially tour buses, can exceed the rated capacity of the axles, these will overcome all of the problems and have much stronger diff centres as well, a great initiative. In speaking with Paul he suggested that you should check your rear diff, every 25ks or at least every 50ks for any side to side movement, there should be none. He also explained how to make a simple shim from packing strap to stop the brake clips coming loose. I asked about Exhaust Brakes, and he cautioned, stating that the army had them fitted to their vehicles and then had them disconnected as they had precipitated some engine failures. The reason being that there had been a couple of cases where, under operation of the exhaust brake, valves had been forced open and into the piston crown. He also has axle spindles, heavy duty 35 spline axles, premium heavy duty free wheeling hubs and much more, ask him when you next need some parts. The best part Is that Paul is enthusiastic about Okas and it shows in his professionalism and willingness to help. • •
• • • 2 Chris Deed explained how he was making his own Bio-Diesel from used cooking oil and was very happy with how the Oka ran on it. Very interesting and “food” for thought. Darren Visser gave us an impressive demonstration of his airbags (the load carrying kind) fitted front and back, all independently connected and adjustable on the move. He explained that there were “better” airbags and which ones to use. Norm Burrell showed us his motorbike carrier and spoke about his planned additions and modifications to his vehicle. Jim and Julie Curtain’s new “Unimog 5000”, registered on the Thursday prior to the weekend, certainly sparked a lot of interest and discussion. It has a number of accessories fitted, one of the most interesting are automatically self deploying snow/mud chains, operated from the cab at the push of a button. It has central tyre inflation and also run flat tyres, which is just as well as each wheel/tyre combination weighs 300Kgs. It is the only “5000” currently in Australia. We even had a “friend” drop in with his new 101 Forward Control Land Rover on his way home to Victoria after just purchasing the vehicle in Brisbane. All in all, a great few days, and much thanks to Marj and Lloyd for their hospitality over the weekend. Most of us found it hard to leave. • •
• • • N.B. I would like to encourage EVERYONE, if they have found something useful, have made a modification they have found useful, or just a handy gadget or want a question answered to drop a line to Marj or myself(contact details below), so it can be included in the newsletter, so that we can all learn that little bit more. If you have pictures, they can also be published and could also be placed on the website for all to see. Some of the things I would like to hear about are – ! Exhaust brakes, your experiences, are they useful? !Engine improvements, turbo boost increases etc? ! Intercoolers, do they make much difference? Air to Air, or Air to Water? !Diesel Gas Fumigation. I believe Arthur Hosking from Dubbo has had this done and it has transformed his vehicle. Please let us know!!! !Have you fitted a boost gauge or exhaust pyrometer? How did you fit them? Which brand? Where do you place the pyrometer in the exhaust? Where do you place the boost sensor? !Campers. Rowena Patterson has had a great little camper made for her Multi-cab, how did it go on your big trip? Any improvements/changes? How is it laid out? Marj and Lloyd have one of the best camper I have seen, it is perfect for long distant touring, and their 50+ years of camping experiences shows through. !Any economy improvements? I was told at the recent camping show here in Penrith that a member had bought a Fuel Saver from Mtech to improve their economy. Does it work? Have you found any other devices that work, most make great claims but don’t seem to work under controlled testing. 3
! Tyres pressures? “Can of Worms”? Everyone seems to have their own ideas, “Hard/ Soft”, the 4wd magazines seem to be promoting lower pressures on gravel and off- road. I went to talk a by Vic Widman, who runs Great Divide Tours, who stated he never runs his tyres over 40 psi on his fully loaded Land Cruiser (over 3 tones), where others were running 5o+. He found he had far less tyre damage, at the lower pressures, as it was more forgiving to the terrain. What do you use? Do tell us what you are up to, what works or doesn’t work or if you have any questions. newsletter will be very interesting and it adds to the “pool of knowledge”. Michael Hession 02.9809.5754(Bus) 02.9679.1373(Hm) engraving@godfrey-engraving.com.au OKA RALLY - Walhalla - 23rd - 25th November 2007 Written by Rowena Paterson It will mean the Attendance: Fred Hallett & Vicki Blackley, Wayne & Lisa Simmonds, Paul Nott, Ian & Jackie Jones, Rowena Paterson, Darren Visser & Janine Ridley & family, Chris & Arleen Deed & family, Lex & Corina Brown, John & Dianne Smithard & Greg & Maree Boyle & family. We couldn't complain about the weather, near perfect as we met at Walhalla, in the high country north of Moe in Gippsland Victoria. Walhalla is a beautiful historic mining town, nestled deep in the mountains. It's a very interesting town, has been burnt down a number of times and had a number of mining accidents in the past. You couldn't help but noticed the burnt line of trees in the mountains surrounding the town. That's how close the fires came earlier in the year. It even has a tourist train which runs in the valley from the township to the Thompson River. We stayed at the local campground in town, set up 8 OKA's and a campfire and we were happy for the night. The next day we headed off north of Walhalla, towards Thompson Dam which is Melbourne's main water supply. After having a look at the low water levels of the dam, we headed further north for 8 kms of dirt road until reaching Merrimans Track, which took us a few kms down the mountains to the Merrimans campground. The track was interesting, with a few people describing it a little hairy in places. The track was recently graded which made it quite rocky and narrow in places, so it was quite interesting negotiating our OKA's down a steep windy rocky track with a number of hairpin turns. The campground was great, huge area with plenty of grass, shade and a short walk to the Aberfeldy River. Again it was interesting to see the surrounding hills, all blackened by the bushfires earlier in the year. We set up OKA's, campfire, chairs, drinks, food etc.... The Boyle family joined us, which made a total of 9 OKA's for the weekend. The Deed family went for a ride on their dirt-bikes into the mountains. The rest of us walked to the river for swim, sat under the shade of the trees and enjoyed the scenery, weather and each others company. Another great weekend! 2008 SUBSCRIPTION RENEWALS Please note renewals for the 2008 subscriptions will be due in January 2008. Could you please make a $25 cheque payment payable to "The OKA Owners Group" and forward to: Secretary, OKA Owners Group C/- Rowena Paterson 7605 Goulburn Valley Highway Kialla Victoria 3631 For Direct banking use: BSB No. 063547 Account No. 10131505 4 If you have recently joined the group during the second half of 2007, please disregard this renewal notice. OKA drink coolers have been made as part of your membership and posted via Australia Post December 2007. Could please contact me if you haven't received any. Thanks very much, Rowena For enquires please contact Rowena Paterson on 03 5823 2732 Email:okapaterson@bigpond.com OKA Owners Group Website: www.okaownersgroup.info OKA XT GAUGE REPLACEMANT I have just purchased a full set of replacement gauges. My OKA just spent four years chasing dirt bikes up the Cape York telegraph track without air con this left the instruments very sad. I also fitted two fuel gauges with a new set of vertically sliding float sensors (very accurate). I included a boost gauge to help with driving economically. All up these cost me a little over $1,000 with a digital clock tossed in. Replacing old VDO Speedo and Tacho for an XT (LT may be the same) Not having access to the proper calibration equipment I gave this job some thought before I started. I decided to start with the Speedo and use my GPS to fine tune the calibration then note the rpm’s at a given high speed, 100kph thus give myself a reference for the Tacho’s calibration. The Speedo that I chose is part number 437 055 011 G. This unit is good for 120kph a little less than what my newly powered up OKA is capable of but faster than what I plan on traveling at. The scale is large thus giving me maximum accuracy. It also has a trip meter; if you have ever used Ron and Val Moons books (excellent) a trip meter makes navigation easy. Installation wiring New Speedo “NEW OKA” Trip meter Rewiring was very simple once I got the colour coding from the factory. THIS IS FOR XT’S Blue is 12v ignition. Red is 12v ignition going to the Hall effect sensor. Green is the Hall effect sensors signal wire coming back to the Speedo Black are the earths. Gauge illumination is the same (Grey and Black), simply splice in a second set of female terminals. This new type of VDO gauge use Perspex light channels with two bulbs. This gives much better illumination. Replacing the bulbs with LED’s is better again. GREEN BLUE
BLACKK RRED Front view of New Speedo plug WARNING
DO NOT CONNECT 12V TO THE GREEN WIRE; this will damage the Hall Effect sensor. 1. Using a small flat bladed screwdriver (upholstery needle is better) pop out the female terminals from the plastic plug housing. 2. Cut the blue and red wires off as close to the terminal as possible and reconnect together on the one terminal. Do the same with the three black earth wires. 3. Clip terminals into the new plastic plug housing as per the pictures above. • • • • • 5 Calibration I found that the easiest way to calibrate was to use the PULSE function. My final pulse reading is 7520. I have 286 x 19 ! or 35” dia. tyres. The Tacho part number that I chose is 333 055 001 G which tops out at 3,000rpm again gives me a big scale best suited for blind old blokes ME. Note; running a little past the scale will not hurt these gauges. This was fun to sort out as VDO forgot to include instructions. I looked up VDO on the Internet and lo and behold they have a site for dealers (about the third down, google page). This site has all their fitting instructions, what did we ever do before bloody computers. Instalation wiring. Again for XT’S Blue is 12v ignition Pinky/grey is the sensor wire. Looks brown in picture below. Black is earth Gauge illumination; again do the same as for the Speedo. As there is no plastic plug simply plug the wires onto the correct terminal as per the picture below. • • • • Fine Adjustment screw Switch Code; OFF ON OFF Calibration This was simple enough. The three switch code for XT’S are OFF ON OFF. Now fine tune via the tiny Philips adjuster so that 100ks gives you the same revs as before. In my case it is 2,490. Perking UP a Perkins Phaser T110 motor I must say that from the first time I drove our OKA I was very impressed with the Perkins. Great gobs of stump pulling torque from idle, fuel economy was good considering the size and shape of the OKA. Unfortunately out on the highway she was a total slug, absolutely useless for long distances on our busy highways. No way was I going to live with this type of performance. For me it was either fix it or sell it. Everything else about the OKA was better then the best so fix it simply had to happen. John Perrott recently summed up the highway performance very well “I followed a Franna Crane all the way to Townsville, because I couldn’t overtake it”. The biggest bummer was that Perkins, in their wisdom fitted a turbo with a boost curve suited for a boat (stationary motor). This is the single main problem with the Perkins motor in our OKA’s. Full boost is reached at full rpm. This means that when you change up a gear you are off boost thus only getting naturally aspirated horsepower and torque. Swapping out the turbo for a modern water-cooled, (no need for turbo timer) needle roller turbo with a WASTE GATE cost nearly $3,000 before a cent went towards fitting it let alone the Glycol intercooler. Where to find someone who can sort out the Perkins? Over the last few years we have been exhibiting our seatcovers at Landcruiser Parks EXPO weekend. I could not help noticing the dyno event. For $25 you get your 4x4 put on a dyno, most horses in class wins. What was very interesting is the punters were getting Leone Mehl to do a $340 dyno tune up at a budget price. The fellas thought this was excellent value especially considering that Leon is regarded as the top man in Brisbane for dyno tuning. We started selling our seatcovers through Leon’s family www.northside4x4.com.au Caboolture shop. What was of special interest to me is that Leon’s brother Jamie was making glycol intercoolers for individual vehicles. Jamie promised sight unseen to sort out Old Ugly. So we set off South for Brisbane, our first family holiday in the OKA. A little about Glycol intercoolers Glycol intercoolers do not have the lag problem that front mounted intercoolers have due to very short ducting. They also work from idle due to good fresh intake air through their front heat exchanger. Engine topped intercoolers suffer from low fresh airflow until some significant forward vehicle speed is reached (Ram air), not very practical for 4x4’s. The one big problem with glycol intercoolers is the awkward shape of the heat exchanger. To overcome this some manufacturers swap the heat exchangers air/water passages around. This gives you a compact tubular packaged intercooler that can fit into most engine bays. A very big problem with this design is that the boosted air is passing through the water galleries, which greatly reduces the efficiency of the heat exchanger. Due to the flow restrictive design of the water galleries a significant drop in boost pressure also occurs. 6 The Mehl brother’s design their intercooler heat exchangers for each engine/vehicle application. So if you want to power up a common Nissan GU so that it can tow the five bedroom five star fifth wheeler, they have an off “their shelf” kit (new Turbo, Glycol intercooler and brackets) fitted and tuned for about $8,000. To get a one off OKA done I needed (Di’s actually) big pockets; leave the ugly one in Caboolture for an undetermined number of months and lots of begging. Jamie now hates OKA’s; he got his hand stuck in the grill one night. Pretended to be working on her ugliness for the next two hours waiting for the swelling to came down enough to extract his hand. Swore me to secrecy, aye! HOT COLD
The new Glycol Intercooler. Have a look through the pics and see what you think. I am going to change the front grill headlight area, so left Jamie with instructions to simply get the front heat exchanger working, don’t finesse on looks or long term fixture (rub points etc). Insulated exhaust A couple of drawbacks! The air con condenser now gets hot air directed onto it from the Intercoolers front heat exchanger. It now works OK for most of the time but driving into the sun does tax it even with the secret illegal front windscreen tint. I plan on replacing the condenser with a modern design that has a much higher rate of efficiency. I am also planning on installing a 12v WAECO roof air conditioner for the back cab as we have already had too many air con failures with the factory system. I am working on a better compressor-mounting bracket. Story to follow. So the aircon problem is solvable, if we lived south of the tropics I would not worry about it. Engine oil filler access is now a must use funnel job. Jamie planned on putting the intercooler directly over the rocker cover. This would leave easy access to the injectors. Direct the boosted air into the exact centre of the intake manifold. To do this he needed to weld a new oil filler onto the front of the rocker cover. The Rocker cover being plastic made this imposable. I have found out that Perkins did make an Aluminium rocker cover on the earlier Phaser motors. (Keep an eye out in wrecker’s yards for me please). Jamie can now import the turbo with the Perkins flange casting. This will make fitting a lot simpler. Waste gate? The Waste Gate changes the speed of the exhaust gases through the turbine. When Leon had her up to full power under load on the dyno the intake pipe was so hot I could hardy touch it. The pipe coming out from the intercooler felt like fridge temp. Cold coolant from special radiator Coolant bleed plug To fuel compensation valve. Boost pressure from manifold. (Where you would plumb in a boost gauge) To Turbo waste gate. New intake position Old intake position, delivers more air to cyl 4, less to cyl 1, inefficient 3” and no muffler Loud out the back Quiet in the cab “Loud turbo whistle”. Clearance notches in gear linkage Mounting is very solid with no movement 7 The waste gate Diaphragm is operated by Boost pressure. More or less Boost adjusts here. Remember the lock nut At low rpm the waste gate (turbine by-pass) closes up which speeds up the gas flow through the turbine, this spins the turbine faster. The turbine then drives the compressor faster thus more boost pressure. This is termed spooling up. At high rpm the waste gate opens up allowing full flow for the greatly increased exhaust gasses. Read about the problems that JCB had with DIESEL MAX, holder of the diesel powered land speed record. www.jcbdieselmax.com. The fighter pilot had to stand on the brake’s to make both engines feel load so that both sets of turbo’s spooled up. This gave the 2.7tonne, 4x4, most beautiful vehicle on planet its power and top speed of over 350mph. (I am sure that JCB and Perkins are one and the same- so a little stretch of the truth puts OKA power as world’s fastest diesel!) Anyway back to her ugliness. To get the new turbo to fit into place required modifying the exhaust manifold flange, plugging the inefficiently located intake manifold’s intake and notching out the gear selector arm. Extra oil and radiator feeds were needed for the new turbo. The crank case vent was rerouted from exhausting into atmosphere to the intake system. (Something we all should do for the planet). An extra radiator and electric circulating pump also need to be installed. The fill point is placed at the highest place so that bleeding the system is easy. All up very time consuming thus expensive. Glycol fill point Intercooler radiator A couple of added bonuses, apart from the power increase, was the replacement of all the gear linkage rod ends and getting rid of the worlds worst exhaust header. The gear linkages are painful dam things unless adjusted just rite. I found that once the Oka has warmed up the gear adjustment drifts a little so expect a few warm wrists during the adjustment process. The factory header is designed to cook drivers not to mention alternators, ok so it’s got a little dickey heat deflector, big deal. I purchased a roll of 50mm exhaust insulation glass tape. Leon wrapped the tape around the exhaust header for the first meter or so. There is almost no heat getting into the cabin. The engine bay stays very much cooler and the new alternator should see long and reliable service. I bought the tape, new engine bay insulation and insulated backed flooring vinyl from www.merlynproducts.com.au they also make Turbo booties. They will have a 8 Crankcase gasses now vent into the turbo air supply at the air filter. I have used the “blocked filter” pick up point. This has a 3mm hole. Really needs a 5mm hole. I plan to braze a brass fitting on, One-day! Glycol circulating pump booty for the standard Perkins turbo but not for my new turbo. I believe that these booties make a significant decrease to engine bay temps. The Dyno sheets speak for themselves. If Jamie can be persuaded to do another OKA (he has a very short memory), look at $8,000 to $10,000. Maybe an engine swap would be cheaper. Don’t forget that time is money and add the cost of labor to a replacement engine and probably a different gearbox. Our Perkins had a full rebuild about five years ago, so apart from millions of oil leaks it is in great nick. Leon set the boost pressure close to standard for reliability reasons. He did make comment that there is plenty of extra power to be unleashed with an increase in boost pressure. The new on highway performance is great, we can pass comfortably and the fuel consumption appears ok. Now that I have a Speedo that works and the fuel filling problem fixed I can get some fuel economy figures next trip south. Extra references. www.exploroz.com/vehicle/technical/intercooler My definition of UGLY. “When the heart has soured and no longer performs to its true potential”. 2008 SUBSCRIPTION RENEWALS Please note renewals for the 2008 subscriptions will be due in January 2008. Could you please make a $25 cheque payment payable to "The OKA Owners Group" and forward to: Secretary, OKA Owners Group C/- Rowena Paterson 7605 Goulburn Valley Highway Kialla Victoria 3631 For Direct banking use: BSB No. 063547 Account No. 10131505 If you have recently joined the group during the second half of 2007, please disregard this renewal notice. OKA drink coolers have been made as part of your membership and posted via Australia Post December 2007. Could please contact me if you haven't received any. Thanks very much, Rowena For enquires please contact Rowena Paterson on 03 5823 2732 Email:okapaterson@bigpond.com Yüklə 2,02 Mb. Dostları ilə paylaş:
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