Renault life. Extra van gets some tlc

[Brigsy]

Updates.

Kangoo large turbo mockup continued. After dismissing the last return pipe as dogshit idea, purchased an all in one 600mm long stainless flexible oil return pipe to try. Typically the nut was larger than standard an10 so would not fit on the threaded turbo drain between the compressor cover and exhaust housing! Almost got the grinder on the nut but sacked it off, returned for refund and onto solution number 3. 

Solution 3 is another stainless flexible oil return pipe with flange that bolts straight onto the turbo oil return. Did not hold my breath when offering it up, however it looks like a good useable solution. Very oem like.

Job jobbed

 

All it needs is a short bit of hose joining to sump fitting. Need to order another straight an10 fitting, ill have shares in torques at this rate!

Water feed solution done. 90deg fitting was stupidly tight here, so changed for banjo.

Its not optimal but itll do. Ideally all the fittings need to be custom bent pipes tig welded together. I really should learn to tig weld and this would be a relatively easy job.

Started mocking up airfilter setup as larger inlet than current setup.All needs shortening, need to do some measuring on the vehicle. Ill prob get the join tig welded in the middle to make a tidy job.

Getting there, very slowly but some progress is better than none.

Thanks for reading!

[Brigsy]

Updates.

Extra van gets some loving. It only moved once last year and has been laid up ever since. To recap it needed a bit of work doing, inlet gasket was leaking on cyl 1 causing a bit of noise on boost and a fuelly mix coating the inlet, and down on power but not by much. I had the parts in stock, but lacking motivation id failed to do anything. Not a massive amount of work, inlet, exhaust and turbo off, but if you cant be arsed its easier said than done.

I have Croft booked for Easter Friday and its looking likely that my yellow megane r26 will be in the bodyshop, so with 8 weeks to go ill see if i can get this ready.

Made a start. 

45 mins later, inlet off and turbo moved out of the way.

1hr30 in, fully stripped. Its fiddly to work on but easy in some respects as its all done from the top.

On stripping the gasket off, noted cylinder 1 & 4 inlet ports had split the gasket and rippled the stainless side. All bolts were tight so it had not blown out due to lack of torque on the fixings. Never seen a c1j gasket fail like this, i assume its high egt, high emap (exhaust pressure) related and the cast manifold moves a bit.

Oem renault gasket not up to the job.

Interesting ripples on the stainless side due to movement, cracks visible.

Ive had these fail before but not like this. The new one has stainless plate both sides and supposed to be better. However might be time for a material change, i have a lead on a copper gasket.

Id noted the starter wiring was a bit tired last time id been underneath, heat had affected it and the plastic conduit was melted. The r5gtt runs a starter motor heatshield originally but they fall to bits and get binned, ive done thousands of miles in this without issues but the efi engine is a different animal and clearly needs some protection

With access good the heat damage was clearly visible, Not the best.

Touched it and everything fell to bits revealing 50mm or so of bare live wire. This has no fuse as standard, good job it never touched anything or could have been sketchy.

Heatshrink would not go over the angled connector to the starter + terminal so only option would be tape which is a bit bodgy. I need the angled connector and opted to splice a piece of new wire in. A quick rake about in the spare wiring and a bit of megane starter wiring found. Needed the angled connector for starter as access is tight, so crimped a straight joiner in, and chopped loom back which revealed an oem joint.

Hydraulic crimper gives solid joins.

Dual wall heatshrink x 2 layers.

Original loom cut and joined at oem joiner.

Dual wall heatshrink.

Fibreglass firesleeve added for heat protection.

Starter motor had seen a lot of heat. Ideally it needs a heatshield making but can wait to another day. Added some dei reflective tape i had spare.

Refitted. Added a heatproof ht lead cover over the firesleeve, should be adequate. Ill add a maxi fuse into the positive wire to batt to avoid any issues in the future.

With this done started cleaning up inlet. The fuel vapour is clearly visible with added bit of exhaust blow.

Quick once over with brake cleaner.

On with the rebuild. New gasket in situ, both sides metal so hopefully will last a bit longer. 

Back together. Give it a wipe over to clean.

Battery back on, primed up fuel system with ign on and off a few times and good to go. laptop on to check sensors reading ok.

Primed oil system up by holding full throttle as the adaptronic has fuel and spark cut for flood clear, its a good feature. Oil pressure come up straight away, so went for a start and it fired straight up.

All seems to be good, engine idles better with no air leaks.

Mot pre checks next weekend then will get it booked in asap.