Buffings pads 'n angle grinders.

So I made a discovery today that makes me look like a genius or a pretty casual dummy. Take your pick.

Misc unsorted images below.

Barely moving on the van. Non optimal weather, motivation, and dollars are slowing things down. I'm still plodding through some basic plumbing stuff. I do have two pretty nice sunroof kits ready to install though (not shown). They have full size shrouded reversible fans, built in LED lighting, and a low profile knobby for rolling up the roof instead of a protruding crank. One is for the shower, the other for above the bed. Should be nice.

I found a really old electronics test board on hard rubbish. I've given it to Laurie to harvest parts for his SteamPunk creations. Premium parts! I'm hoping he looks up the manufacturers info and fills me in on some history, it's an awesome looking board.

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The internet vs mechanical repairs

So the Sprinter is the first new(ish) enough vehicle I've owned to actually have brake pad wear sensors. They're common on virtually all vehicles nowadays, despite being more of a novelty than anything else.

But discovering how these ridiculously simple parts work is extremely difficult in an internet world. Correct mechanical *advice* for virtually every topic, part, real or imagined is incredibly difficult to find. These brake sensors are quite magical if you start trawling forums, youtube, and general car help forums.

Possibilities include:
• It's an open circuit that shorts against the rotor and signals the pad is worn.
• It is a magnetic sensor.
• It's a resistive sensor that changes impedance as the pad gets low and should be XYZ ohms when new.
• The metal clip is a sensor and very delicate.
• The sensor incorporates "electronics".

However none of these are true in any make or model, year or timeline, this universe or the multiverse, yet most of them are the PREVALENT explanation.

How it really works:
• It's a closed circuit. Impedance if any is irrelevant and not measured.
• The metal clip is just a springy metal clip to assit in keeping the plastic sensor secure in the brake pad cavity.
• When the brake gets low, the little plastic nubbin on the ROTOR SIDE of the clip wears down and breaks the circuit where the wires previously traversed.
• Dash light goes on.
• Part is consumable and cannot be re-used. It is literally worn down like the brake pad.
• ...the end...

So thanks to the internet, I once again had to spend excessive time trying to diagnose multiple options that may or may not be true, until I finally conclude which combination is the only and obvious choice. If the sensor is a closed circuit and is unplugged/absent/damaged/used, this will trigger a brake warning as an open circuit is detected. Otherwise everyone would leave the sensor unplugged and not replace them. This is the only combination of events that makes sense, keeps costs low, and is reliable.

Thank you internet. You cost me many brain cells for something very simple yet again.

ps: Don't arbitrarily replace pairs. Just replace the one that tripped the fault. Go ahead and replace pad sets left/right if you want for convenience...but re-use undamaged sensors.

Dubious Spring Compressors and misc October

Just finishing up some work for the RWC for the van sale. Did the rear brake pads, rear shocks, and front shocks. Front is a little tricky as I lost my spring compressors and tie-rod-separator tools many decades ago in a Macca's carpark in Albury. A story for another day.

Spring compressors run ~$70-100 from SuperCheapAuto, but I'm cheaper than that. I fished through a literal junk pile at work and grabbed some bits from salvage that we harvest from a customer job which replaces some mechanical lifting mechanisms for an electric system. It's a little light-weight for small-truck-springs, but it'll have to do. It's M12 threaded rod. I could have used some larger stuff, but that's legit' stock as opposed to bits I pulled from the trash box.

Garrick took a great shot of Pix'.

A junk pile of bits, just waiting to become the next gizmo of dollar-savings.

Hmmm, surely I can make a spring COMPRESSOR from these spring EXPANDER bits??

Begone excess bits. I just want the hook and the thread.

...but I'm gonna need four hooks to make two spring compressors. Good thing the junk box has surplus.

I don't want thread in two of the hooks. Goodbye thread.

The hook on the left is bored through and spins freely. The hook on the right is threaded for the rod and compresses the spring as I reverse the thread. This setup ensures I don't drive the rod up through the wheel well in a build where the hook on the left was threaded.

The proper ones swap for reversed thread in a top and bottom split. In theory the rod stays in a static position while you compress from both ends, but it NEVER works out that way.

M12 rod vs. small truck spring. She's a lil' bendy.

It'll be easy to lift this monster shaft out of the steering body right???

I ended up having to drop the entire steering sub-frame to get the sucker out. No spring compressor was going to get that spring compressed enough to get this job done. I wish this was the bolt-on type, not the through-fitting type. I should probably re-seat that left compressor too...naaaa...

Now all I gotta do is harvest a bunch of these bits, fit them to the new shock, and reverse the process. Easy right???!!?!? Right!!?!?!??

Boat Van: the roofening 6

Misc unsorted pics. Cutting down the old roof panel into usable pieces to plug the holes that remain in the roof-addition from the old side door and rear doors.

Test-fit panel is not attached yet. Still deciding on how much metal folding I'm going to do in the absence of a folding brake. I could use contacts at work to custom fabricate some really sweet panels with elaborate folds...but I'm cheap.

Test panel above the door. Held on with a clamp from the interior by the folded edge. I think I'll end up folding the left and right sides to create exposed seams like the van's original vertical joinery, rather than pop rivet the patch panel to the outer edge.

Bad kitty!!