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edit: terrible snipe so I'll edit in the quoteAmbassadorofsodomy posted:Without stepping on minivan goon's toes, that kit is *probably fine* but don't limit yourself to looking for recovery gear just on FORE EX FORE sites. \/\/\/ what you didn't lead with "let me show you the pig balls website"? tangy yet delightful fucked around with this message at 18:37 on Jul 20, 2022 |
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Jul 20, 2022 17:52
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Hey ryanrs, do you have a twitter/instagram/other place where you post photos of your van? I was telling a coworker (who also uses a converted Toyota Sienna as a mini camper) about your van, and she was curious to see more. I didn't want to lead with "so have you heard of the dead internet comedy forum Something Awful Dot Com? No no it's not like that"
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Jul 20, 2022 18:04
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Shameful not promoting the pig ball website
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Jul 20, 2022 20:46
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SHAMEFUL!
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Jul 20, 2022 23:47
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Safety Dance posted:Hey ryanrs, do you have a twitter/instagram/other place where you post photos of your van? I was telling a coworker (who also uses a converted Toyota Sienna as a mini camper) about your van, and she was curious to see more. I didn't want to lead with "so have you heard of the dead internet comedy forum Something Awful Dot Com? No no it's not like that" Absolutely not. My van is extremely AI and belongs nowhere else. If your coworker is not cool enough to read the thread, then they are not cool enough to see the van, sorry. e: I forgot I posted some videos on Vimeo. However they are all from the van's point of view. They do not show the van, ha ha. ryanrs fucked around with this message at 23:13 on Aug 11, 2022 |
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Aug 11, 2022 22:20
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Skid Plate Engineering  Here are my current pair of skid plates. Front of van = top of image. The largest loads are carried by the stubby posts on the bottom corners of the upper plate. These stubs bolt to the engine cradle / unibody interface.   Force is concentrated where the stubs are welded to the steel plate, and the steel plate yields next to this weld. The plates are 3/16" and fairly heavy, though not stupidly so. The two bolts hold the plates together, but is not enough to convey any stiffness. So even though you have 2x 3/16" steel in place, it does not behave anything like a 3/8" piece of steel. Changes Starting with the original CAD files, I'm getting a new front plate cut, since the current one is too bent up for easy modification. But first some changes to make it stronger.  Carve out a piece so the plates no longer overlap. Make them coplanar. Still 3/16" A36 steel.  New 1/4" steel plate across the spacer stubs. Welded to the front plate, bolted to the rear plate. Increase clamping pressure a lot to gain some stiffness from the rear plate overlap. Welding to the front plate will gain a lot of stiffness, even though the overlap is only 3" wide. The top plate will have captive nuts on the rear so installation/removal of the 10 bolts will be easy enough with an impact.  X-ray view. Net weight increase: <10 lbs I am unsure how the new bolted joint will perform. I do not know how to analyze this kind of joint where the forces will be high enough to cause yield and slipping. Figuring it out will be more than a day or two of reading, though, so I probably won't. I think I'll be ok since the old design was nearly strong enough, and the part is not safety critical.
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Sep 13, 2022 19:24
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Final design of Skid Plate v2.   CNC plasma cut 3/16" steel. I decided not to make the overlay plate out of thicker steel. 2x 3/16" is enough.   Reinforcing the rear skid plate with a strip of 2 x 3/16 cold rolled.     The welds aren't so pretty, but they are strong. Tomorrow I will weld the main plate.
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Oct 2, 2022 06:23
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Celebrating a new gas tank with a triple digit fill-up. Installation was easy since I just paid my mechanic to do it. Not shown: The fuel sender is calibrated differently, and now E means you are completely out of gas.
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Oct 2, 2022 07:14
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Those welds look great.
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Oct 2, 2022 22:33
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$6.19/gallon? Ouch, it's down to like $3.79 here in Massachusetts. And your welds look perfectly fine. It's not TIG, and it's structural. It'll be good.
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Oct 3, 2022 00:08
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sharkytm posted:$6.19/gallon? Ouch, it's down to like $3.79 here in Massachusetts. The gently caress. I paid $5.79 here in Seattle yesterday. Why do you get such cheap gas?
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Oct 3, 2022 00:27
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Kesper North posted:The gently caress. I paid $5.79 here in Seattle yesterday. Why do you get such cheap gas? 246 Main St Buzzards Bay, MA 02532 $3.35 Regular $3.79 Mid-Grade $3.99 Premium $4.73 Diesel
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Oct 3, 2022 03:12
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sharkytm posted:246 Main St Buzzards Bay, MA 02532 MAPCO 5500 TN-153 Hixson, TN $2.87 Regular $3.45 Mid-Grade $3.67 Premium $4.29 Diesel
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Oct 3, 2022 03:18
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Please don't fill this thread with examples of how gas in high cost of living, liberal states costs more than low cost of living conservative states. It's so boring. Nice welds. Did you end up taking classes or did you already know how?
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Oct 3, 2022 04:01
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CAD + CNC = easy fit up, so long as you don't weld it upside-down.  Welding       Two skid plates assembled.  There are a couple more details to be welded, more weld nuts, drill some holes, then paint. An interesting video that explores the question of what is a skid plate for, anyway? My skid plates are ablative armor that I smash into rocks with the full weight of the minivan. The 3/16" steel was almost strong enough, and still protected the oil pan even when bent. Aluminum would have been completely destroyed. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTajhFtvQlc
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Oct 3, 2022 04:08
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StormDrain posted:Nice welds. Did you end up taking classes or did you already know how? Last year I took a 15 hour, 2 day MIG class at The Crucible, an industrial art non-profit. Then I went and bought a welder and a pile of steel.
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Oct 3, 2022 04:15
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Some pics showing the reinforced design, and why I placed the extra steel where I did. Post-trip damage pics, before any unbending was attempted.   The reinforcement dog bone, where the two parts overlap. It's only visible in CAD (with transparency), or as the oxide colors from the welds on the far side.
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Oct 3, 2022 07:15
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Rear A/C and Heater Delete I had my mechanic do the work. When I got the van back, the A/C worked great, better than before. But then two days later, I found a couple tablespoons of compressor oil under the van. gently caress. After talking to my mechanic, he said he put dye into the system when he recharged it. So I went and found the rag I used to wipe up the oil, and it did not fluoresce under UV. Therefore it must be residual oil that dripped out of the rear A/C evaporator (now disconnected and open to the world). Success! e: I just discovered an unswitched 40A Jcase fuse that feeds the rear a/c and heater blowers. Since I don't need those anymore, it's the perfect circuit to power my offroad lights. The light controller is probably the next project once I get the new skid plates installed. ryanrs fucked around with this message at 19:55 on Oct 4, 2022 |
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Oct 4, 2022 05:28
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That's a seriously over-engineered skid plate, way better than most of the junk seen on off-roaders around here. When's the next outing?
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Oct 4, 2022 12:45
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Maybe Mendocino National Forest this weekend? There will be lots of deer hunters out, so that's not so great in terms of camp sites and traffic. Gotta find my orange hat. Deer season ends in the Northern CA B zones on Oct 23.
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Oct 4, 2022 16:49
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Fastener Trivia Using flat head screws to center the weld nuts. The tapered head forces the holes to be concentric.  I'm mating these ungraded, soft weld nuts to 180ksi grade 9 bolts. It's one of those design specs that makes you wonder how high was the engineer? (A: moderately) While I'd like to use hardened nuts, those can't be welded. One of the little quality of life upgrades to the skid plate is that all fasteners are now single side access. So you do not need to reach around with a second wrench. That becomes pretty important when you spam nuts across the entire joint. The grade 9 bolts are for the abrasion resistance of the hex heads. In practice, I've found the bolt heads don't get messed up enough to cause removal problems, although they are a wear item. Just replace them before they get too hosed up. The reason I used 11 bolts instead of just 2 is to clamp the two skid plates together really goddamn hard across the entire interface. That way they behave less like two independent 3/16" steel plates, and more like a single 3/8" plate (which is stiffer and stronger than 2x 3/16). Professional engineers have formulas and tables to calculate how many bolts they need, and the spacing. But I don't know that stuff so I just used a lot of bolts.  Main mount point and green Toyota M14 bolt. The bolt goes through the skid plate, engine cradle, and into the unibody. The first version of the skid plate used 1.5" OD, 1/8 wall tubing. I upgraded to 2" OD, 3/16 wall tubing for a couple reasons. The old tube was stronger than the 3/16" plate, but would be weaker than the upgraded double layer 3/16". Another problem was that the old 1.25" ID was barely large enough to fit a 19mm socket. So if you ever needed to replace that bolt, you couldn't use standard metric, it had to be small-head JIS. There is practically no weight penalty to oversizing the tubes, because they are only 1.5" long. Bigger, stronger, possibly more likely to snap the engine cradle bolts.  
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Oct 5, 2022 07:56
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ryanrs posted:Professional engineers have formulas and tables to calculate how many bolts they need, and the spacing. But I don't know that stuff so I just used a lot of bolts. I learned that junk way back and all I remember is that it's usually fewer bolts needed than you think...But better to be on the safe side if you're not mathing it.  Those ones are pretty large too so they should provide a ton of clamp load and stiffness.
Suburban Dad fucked around with this message at 13:45 on Oct 5, 2022 |
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Oct 5, 2022 13:43
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The new skid plate looks like a great improvement, lessons learned always makes version 2+ that much better. All the extra bolts are that much more margin and it's not like the weight will hurt much, you're not trying to get into orbit or anything. I never thought of the trick for centering the nuts before, I'm going to use that, thanks.
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Oct 5, 2022 15:33
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Nice work on the skid plate, looks solid. Another way to keep the head of your boots from getting chewed up is to weld big washers that are thicker than your bolt head height around the holes so the washers take the impact and not the heads, can add a lot beyond relying on harder fasteners to prevent abrasion.
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Oct 5, 2022 22:56
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Get Bent Engage clamps!  Deploy stabilizer!  Lift to bend. It took less than 50 lbs of lifting force to bend the steel. It was very easy to make small adjustments in the angle. Note that I am bending along a dashed line that was 80% cut with a plasma cutter. Once I check the angle on the car, I'll weld up most of the cut line, restoring the strength of the plate.
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Oct 5, 2022 23:20
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Suburban Dad posted:Those ones are pretty large too so they should provide a ton of clamp load and stiffness. Skid plate bolts are all 1/2"-13. This size has the winning combination of good local availability It's nice to get the little things e: gently caress, the Sienna lugs are actually 21mm.  my smugposting.
ryanrs fucked around with this message at 05:29 on Oct 7, 2022 |
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Oct 5, 2022 23:45
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Do you have a picture of the cuts you made to make it bendable? I need to bend some plate up to make ramps and don't have access to a brake anymore, however I do have a cutting torch.
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Oct 6, 2022 16:07
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The cuts were done with a CNC plasma cutter, not by hand.  e: click here for maximum pixels ryanrs fucked around with this message at 18:13 on Oct 6, 2022 |
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Oct 6, 2022 16:27
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Still a great project and I'm enjoying it. Sadly, not much else to say except I'm curious about what you're going to do with your OEM wiring...
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Oct 6, 2022 22:03
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ryanrs posted:I had my mechanic do the work. When I got the van back, the A/C worked great, better than before. But then two days later, I found a couple tablespoons of compressor oil under the van. gently caress.  gently caress.
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Oct 7, 2022 05:59
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That sucks. This is where you buy about 250 bucks in AC service tools and never talk to a pro again. I've used my AC equipment about a dozen times now. It's more than paid for itself in favors done for friends and family alone.
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Oct 7, 2022 19:54
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Is it really only a couple hundred bucks?
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Oct 7, 2022 21:45
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For a vacuum pump, manifold gauge set, and a can tap - yep. The only thing you won't be able to do is properly evacuate/recapture the refrigerant that's in there.
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Oct 7, 2022 21:59
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It currently is handling the evacuating part on its own.
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Oct 7, 2022 22:01
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IOwnCalculus posted:For a vacuum pump, manifold gauge set, and a can tap - yep. The only thing you won't be able to do is properly evacuate/recapture the refrigerant that's in there. From my time hopping around rooftops, that's affectionately called environmental reclaim  Which is why the argument that they're sealed systems and their environmental impacts aren't relevant is bullshit.
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Oct 7, 2022 22:03
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Here's the stuff I bought (other than the actual vehicle parts) to fix AC on my van. Vacuum pump $90 Vacuum pump oil - not clear if this was necessary or not based on my use but wanted to be safe. $10 O-rings $20 Refrigerant $90 (I think it was ~60 when I bought it though so see if there isn't another brand on sale) A/C gauge set although I'm not sure it was this one, it looked awfully close if it wasn't. $50 All in, that's $260 and you'll have extra refrigerant left over.
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Oct 7, 2022 23:04
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The prices might be off since I started 8 years ago but yeah, I have an HF gauge set, FJC vacuum pump off Amazon I think, a can tap for doing R12 and R152a systems, a can tap for R134a cans, UV dye oil, a UV flashlight, a postal scale for monitoring what's left in a can in case I need to do a fill that's not a multiple of 12oz, and a green hnbr o ring kit. The last one is a just in case thing, I normally spend 3 bucks at rockauto on the vehicle specific o ring kit for the vehicle in question anytime I start working on one. It's only 4 figures to get into HVAC work if you are working on systems that aren't already empty. That one's heading that direction already, and you probably should get your mechanic to drain the system free under his work warranty, but you can do AC work pretty easy otherwise. You'll often see pro level AC machines on marketplace and craigslist and for sale at picknpull yards that are upgrading their reclaim equipment, too. E: check out Motronic's AI AC thread for a basic introduction. You technically need an EPA license to do this but if you're only working on friends and families cars and your shitboxes it's very likely it'll never come into question.
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Oct 7, 2022 23:23
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builds character posted:Here's the stuff I bought (other than the actual vehicle parts) to fix AC on my van. Holy gently caress R134a has gotten expensive, but I suppose everything has. That pack of R134a has doubled in price since January 2021. Walmart is still cheaper but I distinctly remember paying sub-$4 per can, now it's $9.
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Oct 7, 2022 23:27
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I forced myself to really learn the basics the past 2 months and you can get ac repair set for $100 ish now. Here is the $63 vacuum pump I bought New Position 3.0 CFM Single-Stage 5 Pa Rotary Vane Economy Vacuum Pump for HVAC Air Conditioner Refrigerant Food Packaging Milking 1/4" Flare Inlet Port Blue https://a.co/d/0GUB9Nu Then just pick a good rated gauge set that includes all the taps and such for $35-50 on Amazon. I’ve had success now on 4 vehicles with this setup There are better and stronger vacuum pumps but we are only talking $90-100 for them bs $62
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Oct 8, 2022 02:43
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IOwnCalculus posted:Holy gently caress R134a has gotten expensive, but I suppose everything has. That pack of R134a has doubled in price since January 2021. That's weird, I was paying like 7 a can at Walmart 3 years ago.
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Oct 8, 2022 03:58
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