The Ducati 749 wore a new suit to the track this time around. Although it looked great, it’s mechanical state was not quite up to to the image. It was more show than go for Sunday’s track day.
The weekend started rough and it went a little downhill from there. While finishing the dress-up on the bike (the red gas tank arrived late on Friday), Saturday, the fuel tank o-ring was damaged and required a fast trip to San Jose to get a $25 replacement o-ring. At least the dealer had it in stock and I was able to get the bike back together in time to pull into Monterey for our pre-track-day dinner.
The first break in my routing was not unloading my truck on arrival. Once back from dinner it was 10:15 PM, I found that someone had pulled up next to me in the space I’d planned to setup my gear. There didn’t seem to be much point in unloading in the paddock at that point, so.. off to sleep I went:
Dawn comes early in Monterey, and despite my original setup plans foiled, equipment was unloaded and the bike was plugged into the generator to start warming up the tires:
With the rest of the crew arriving, we got the bikes into tech.
Dr. Johnny debut his newly refurbished track bike. He’s a happy camper, as you can tell!
Unfortunately, when unloading my 749, I noticed that the bike seemed difficult to move around. After some fiddling around we discovered that one of the front brakes was dragging pretty badly. My first session was going to be spent taking apart the left front caliper.
My pal Isaac was able to score a ride on the damn fine SuperLeggera owned by the track organizer. He was very impressed at the handling.. I guess light
I was eventually able to get the brakes handled and the bike on the track for the last couple of sessions of the day. Things went OK, but it seemed the brake was starting to drag again, so I packed it in; we all loaded up and headed for home.
April can mean unpredictable where here Northern California. Last weekend we had a deluge of rain. This weekend was a little different: Saturday evening at Laguna Seca.
The work for this Sunday’s trip to Laguna Seca started in earnest on Thursday, with some upgrades to the Track Van.
First of was constructing a strong anchor system for the motorcycle wheel chock. Using a pair of E-Track 2×4 mounts, and a 36″ long section of 1.5″ angle iron, a secure, yet easily removable mounting system was created. E-track mounting system
Another pair of E-Track anchors were added to the inventory, along with some more cargo straps for loading additional equipment (which came in handy as I’ll note later).
Along with updates to the truck came upgrades to the bike; principally a new set of proper track tires on Friday. The new hides are Pirelli SuperCorsa in medium compound rear, and soft compound front:
Out with the old:
In with the new:
Having done quite a few track days over the last year, I’ve come up with some items that I think are crucial to enjoying your day at the track. First of them is SHADE. Shade is very important here in California (I offer this to my friends in Seattle that I’m not sure have ever seen the sun). In the past I’ve been fortunate enough to have friends with nice easy-up awnings, but this outing was planned to be Solo, so I dropped $200 on a pretty heavy-duty setup at Costco. Although not as ‘easy-up’ as others (I have to remove the top each time to pack it) it’s big, and comes with side panels that were REALLY handy when the wind picks up at Laguna.
In the truck everything has a place, and everything is packed in it’s place; ready for the quick drive down the road to Laguna:
The next morning, it was a short walk to registration and tech inspection. Not sure why the app was showing 44F, it was low 60’s (you might notice people are wearing t-shrts) at 7:45 AM.
Once passed through tech, the generator was fired up so they would properly heat up the tires during the riders meeting, leaving the bike ready to go for the first session.
With the generator and tire warmer setup on loan from CT Racing, it was a great day of riding!
By the last session, I was able to cut 6 seconds off my previous best lap times, clocking a 1:51.34 just before the bike ran out of gas entering turn 2.
A couple of the lessons I took away from this last outing:
A good set of tires are essential
Tire warmers are not hype, they not only keep your tires up to optimal temp they let them last longer and operating more consistently
A lap time timer is mandatory if you’re trying to develop good consistent laps… what I found was laps that *felt* fast were often slow, and the ones where I was relaxed, taking it easy, were my fastest by far. If you want to know if you’re really getting quicker, you’re lying to yourself unless you use a lap timer
Proper preparation for the day is important. I had a maintenance issue develop right before lunch and I had to scrounge up materials to build a brake bleeing setup, and get some tools loaned to me because the things I expected and brought tools for were not the ones that shut me down
The number 1 suspected cause of the alternator failures, according to the Sprinter People I’ve queried, is a leaking high pressure fuel pump. So, even though I’m not identifying a clear indicator of a problem, it just seemed prudent to take the time to investigate it while everything else was apart.
There were a lot of steps not shown to get to this point. They all seem pretty straight forward, so I’ve skipped ahead to the part where I actually remove the pump.
There are three E10 torx head bolts that secure the pump to the engine block. Two are fairly easy to access and are located on the upper half of the pump assembly.
Here is one of the bolts being removed.
The next bolt is located to the left, about mid-pump, very close to the connector you see removed in this photo.
Here is a slightly better angle showing where the bolt is located.
There are two electrical plugs that need to be removed. The one on the right slides out forward. The one on the left slides upwards. The left one is a bit of a pain to removed. I used some channel lock pliers to get an even pressure on the rear clips and gently wiggle it upwards until it came off. Take your time, breaking more parts while doing a repair is not a good plan.
Plugs disconnected and ready to move onto the last steps. NOTE: The high pressure outlet has already been disconnected (top of pump). You can see the threads of the connector at top of photo. To removed these I needed an 18mm open wrench to hold the lower fitting in the pump, and a 14mm flare nut wrench to remove the coupling on the high pressure line feeding the injectors. That’s an important step. You won’t be able to remove the pump with them connected. What I didn’t remove when I was working on mine (maybe a bad choice) were the two lower pressure feed and return lines about mid-pump on the right (not seen here).
Last of the three bolts is bottom center. As much as I’d like to do as little removal of parts as possible, I don’t really see a practical way to get at this bolt without removing the fan blades from the clutch. You just have to do it. I found the 3 bolts on the fan to be 5mm HEX socket (not torx). They were torqued pretty tight. They are a normal right-hand thread, nothing tricky there.
And what did I find on the back of the pump? 2 of the 6 bolts had completely backed out. You can also see that there is diesel fuel on the back of the pump. This matches up with the failure mode described by others, and is the smoking gun (along with the turbo resonator) that I believe was killing my alternators.
All 6 bolts were thread-locked with blue and re-torqued, and pump re-installed.
With the pump re-installed, next step is to re-install the alternator, turbo resonator, intake charge system and get a volt meter installed for diagnostics.
It’s a common problem, when the T1N Sprinters get a little long in the tooth. The turbo resonator (pressure side) can start to split, causing loss of boost and the dreaded Limp Home Mode.
Mine was not exempt from this plight. Below are some example photos of what the Turbo Resonator looks like when failing. This example shows the common separation of along the bonding lines. During high boost this can open and cause the loss of pressure, power and then a CEL fault which the trucks ECU detects as a dangerous condition for the engine and cuts severely reduces power.
This is what the part looks like. It is connected directly to the outlet side of the boost section of turbocharger. The rubber o-ring seals to the turbos (pressue side, not exhaust / impeller side).
Closeup of the gap formed at the bonding point. I’m told this is the typical failure point. In a lot of case you wont’ be able to see this unless the motor is under boost. In my case, it looks like it’s been failing for some time, it probably why the seller unloaded the truck $2500 under asking price.
Another area that I’m told is possibly suspect fails is the outlet side. I didn’t see any signs of a failure here, but it’s something to check if you suspect you have this issue.
Another thing to look for is leakage around the o-ring. In this case there is crud around the area, but the ring appears in tact and no signs of blow-by. It turns out the crud was from the primary cause of my reliability issues, from a totally separate part.
Fortunately, this part is not really difficult to remove. A 1/4″ wrench or an E8 female Torx socket (later bring the correct tool) and remove too small bolts when it attaches to the alternator bracket and it’s removed.
While waiting for repair parts, and researching the possible causes for the alternator deaths… I brought over The Boy to help out with some cleanup and conversion prep.
The original flooring was actually in very good shape, other than the poor paint job applied by a previous owner. I set the boy to scrubbing it down with a high-tech degreaser and a lower tech broom. Some of the old loose paint easily came up but the rest seemed adequately adhered for the next step of the project; new flooring.
The rubber flooring I planned to use came in rolls from China, so they had been in that state for a long time. To ease installation when that phase comes around they were unrolled flat and stacked under the plywood floor. Then I found some stuff to stack on top of it to make sure they were reasonably flat.
Back to the headlights… as you can see, the still need a lot of work. This is the 2nd of the pair. Again, it will be treated with sanding and polishing.
The other light is sufficiently refurbished for my needs, and was set aside during the previous day’s efforts. It doesn’t look too bad. But still not perfect. Note: I actually did one more round of this before re-installing them in the van.
Back to the interior work. Getting the road noise levels down is an important part of this projects. If I plan to do long distance treking in this, I don’t want to be yelling all day, or fatigued from the noise. I did test it with an DB meter and the average level was 85db on a highway.
Here the poor-man’s Dynomat is being installed over the wheel wells. This asphalt roof repairing product is reported to have similar sound deadening properties as the vastly more expensive Dynomat. A small roll of this is available at the local hardware box for about $16.
Using a heat gun makes short work of complex curves. Easy-peasy. It’s just a little time consuming to cut the stuff, and press it into place.
The first (and eventually failed) effort to attach the rubber to the wood. In this first round I used a Liquid Nails product. The specs looked good; very low VOCs; water cleanup… what’s not to love?
Placing pressure on the mats then maintaining with some stuff laying around the shop so that it bonds nicely to the floor. At least that was the plan I executed.
Shifting gears a little bit, I removed the Turbo Resonator and examined it on my operating room quality work area. I have a separate write-up on this. In the end I determined that the part was failing and likely contributor to the alternator death syndrome.
Back to the interior. With some help from The Boy we finished covering the wheel wells. The aluminum backed roofing seal didn’t fully cover the wells, so a less expensive product (Jiffy Seal) without the aluminum backing was acquired to complete the product. The Jiffy Seal was then covered with aluminum tape to maintain the same “look”.
One done with the wheel wells, I popped back onto the internet to look at possible causes for the failure, the most ominous of which is a possible failure in the High Pressure injector pump (large black assembly on the right).
It does not look like a fun thing to remove and look for problems. I’m generally of the mind that if it’s not clearly broken or in need of refurbishing, I don’t want to mess with it. Some more investigation is underway.
Below and to the left of the pump is the turbo charger. The intake hose as been removed and the high-pressure cold-side routing, which includes the turbo resonator has also been removed. Both the resonator and the pump are above the alternator and could possible cause it to fail should they leak fuel or high-pressure intake gasses.
High pressure pump in close up. The black part is the front block, which bolts to a larger raw aluminum block with the drive assembly. It’s said that the pump can leak between the two plates if the bolts that hold it together, internally, begin to loosen. This is a known issue with the 2004-2006 model year.
Next effort will be to consider removal of the high pressure pump. At least the front end is mostly stripped down and access will not be horribly difficult.
While doing some research on the problem and waiting for parts, I decided to pull out the headlamps to work on them.
Removed from the truck, they are easier to work on. T1N Dodge Sprinter headlamps
One diagnostic task, is to look for unusual current loads in the system. First stop was the headlamps, looking for evidence that some clown hat put in 100w bulbs or some other nonsense. What I found was just that sort of… nonsense. Luckily they didn’t over-watt the lamps, but at some point someone put in those inane blue headlamps (but they looks so cool.. no!). I didn’t detect this because the blue one was burned out. All the better. A pair of 55w H7 replacements will be procured.
With the lamps out, I’m going to do some sanding and polishing on them to return some of the original clarity. Right now, they are much better after that first attempt, but they are not where I want them to be. T1N Dodge Sprinter headlamps
Some sanding with 800, 1500 and 2000 grit wet-sand, then a light polish with Mequires… they don’t look too bad. But I know they can be better. T1N Dodge Sprinter headlamps
To fully diagnose the electrical gremlins that are plaguing me, getting unrestricted access to all the grounds and the glow plug relay pack, goes a long way. So.. I started to take apart the front bodywork.
Neat Sprinter tidbit… this is the air intake (other side does not have this vent). This is a true cold-air intake. Air box is right there behind the headlamp (or where it would normally reside). Also, it’s possible to get at the grounds behind and under the headlamp with those parts out of the way.
After re-checking and cleaning all the ground table locations, and there are plenty, I focused on the glow plug relay. Typically the relay itself does not fair hideously, but what more commonly happens is a glow plug (or 5) will short out, causing a heavy drain (more than 20A) on the electrical system. 5 glow plugs shorted out is over 100A of current and would easily kill the 90A stock alternator.
Based on information obtained from the various Sprinter forums, I fabricated (term used loosely) a jumper cable that can be used to test glow plugs for a shorted condition.
Because the simplest place to test it from the glow plug relay harness, I unplued the 5 wire connector (1 for each GP).
On one end of the wire is a spade connector that is screwed to the battery. I didn’t want to have to mess with holding both ends of the wire. On the other end, I crimped on a small finish nail. This is useful when testing the glow plugs from the glow plug harness.
Poking the wire into each of these connectors here, I was able to determine that none of the 5 glow plugs are exhibiting the signs of a short. When I bought the vehicle the owner assured me the glow plugs had all be replaced in the last 2 years. It seems very likely that was a truthy statement. All good in this arena. But that also means I must continue to look for the cause of my woes.
Since the bumper on this thing was in pretty bad cosmetic shape, I decided to remove it too for a little refurbishing at some point down the road.
This little LED light really came in handy when working on things under the beast. Takes 3 C-cells and provides a pretty good amount of light, even if they LEDs are not the wide angle type. It was much easier than the conventional flashlights (due to built-in stand) and not hot and tangly like an old-school drop light (I really do have a heavy dislike for them).
To keep the new battery charged up while I sorted out this mess, I re-purposed one of the 25′ charging cables from the MV Agusta, added the charging lugs to the Sprinter’s battery, and plugged it into this gem I picked up last month. Love having the computerized 1.25 AMP computer controlled charger.
With the Glow Plugs eliminated as the likely cause of my troubles.. the next step is more drastic… checking the turbo system and fuel system components. Good times ahead.
Absolutely a day of ups and downs… so.. let’s start off where the day did.
Having just finished putting the truck back together again, it was time for a really good test drive. This time I picked Hwy 17. A 16 miles windy trek over the 1,814ft. Patchen Pass in the Santa Cruz Mountains (the epicenter of the 1989 World Series Earth Quake, mistakenly associated with San Francisco, 40+ miles to the North). Hwy 17 displayed on Google Earth
The old dog handled the mountain with ease. Passing slower vehicles on the steep climb was a non-event. Considering the type of vehicle, it handled the curves quite confidently.
Once in San Jose, first top was Club Auto Sport, where my trainer Isaac has his facility (Fit for Speed). Had a great workout, then headed out into the sun to start running some errands while in The Valley.
First stop was Harbor Freight to check out the finest in Chinese manufactured crap for American consumption.
The truck will need a set of wheel chocks, and these were on sale for $40 each, so I grabbed a pair. Don’t know much about them, but hopefully they are not complete crap.
Also needed was some rubber flooring for the back. The original plan (as you might have seen in the previous post) was to carpet all 14′ of the van. After some discussion with some other track junkies I know, a change of specification to rubber flooring was made. This stuff was not very expensive, so I picked up 4 rolls (enough to cover 6′ x 8′) of the stuff on the left ($38 total).
Next up are some ramps. These on the left are 8′ long and rated at 500 lb each. Nothing I own weighs more than that, and made in steel, they seemed stout enough for my purposes. A pair is $72, and that fits the budget nicely.
Ramps, rubber and sundries loaded up and ready for the next stop. However I spent so much time in Harbor Frieght, I needed to get rolling back home to complete some software projects. So.. heading to the dealer for a spare key and the RV shop to look for lighting, will have to wait.
And waiting I would be doing. A lot of it as a matter of fact. Not far out of Los Gatos I began to lose power, followed quickly by a batter light and a vivid reminder of my breakdown on Hwy 1. Recalling how suddenly, and with little warning it died last time, I found the first decent turnoff on the little mountain highway I could find, shut it down and… just felt pretty damn deflated.
Having just a few days before upgraded my insurance policy on the van to something called “Full Roadside Coverage” I ran up my insurance company and for the first time in my 50 years of life, tried out Road Side Assistance.
Very long day/story short.. they dispatched a flat bed heavy-duty tow rig from Santa Cruz, and said that the distance to back to town (about 22 miles) was ALL COVERED. I asked the operator if I could get it towed to my personal shop, and she said I’m covered for up to 26 miles, the distance to the nearest Mercedes Dealership that can service the rig. Excellent (considering I’m getting towed).
The tow truck driver was a nice enough guy. We talked cars and trucks all the way back through the hellish commute traffic (It was 3:00PM by the time we started rolling up the hill). As stated, they transported me all the way to my West Side garage, we unloaded and I put the van way for the next round of repairs.. :/
Unloaded all my stuff from the back….
Then unpacked the ramps to give check out the length and angle.
The deck height on the sprinter is 2′ 3″… which.. is pretty darn low for a vehicle capable of carrying 5000 lb. of cargo. I might have liked to have 10′ ramps, I’m not 100% sure I’m strong enough to reliably get the bike into the truck solo… (perhaps a winch is in my future?). But I’m going to go with these for now. The ramps also have holes in the sides and top that I could use to bring them together and make a nice solid platform for getting two bikes up into the truck, walking along side them.
There is a lot more experimentation to do, but for now.. I have to do some research and figure out WHY this things seems to be eating alternators like a kid loose in a candy shop after hours. Something just aint Right.
With the required repairs to make it run complete, now the work on mods to get it from a former runner of illegal immigrants, to functional (if not nice) micro toy-hauler can begin.
Flooring
After doing some research at the San Jose International Car Show, I’m now more convinced the flooring found in the van is a factory original. As such, I’ve decided to re-use it.
Next to the flooring are two rolls of recycled industrial No-VOC carpets (6’x9′) that are enough to carpet the floor of the van, probably all the way to the firewall if I decided to go that far with it.
Audio / Communications
Having used the existing stereo briefly, I quickly found it’s navigation horribly complicated and it’s general performance underwhelming. Plus, it has a CD player in it.. might as well have an 8-track too. So that was removed, and a new (and very INexpensive Kenwood head with built-in Blutooth, and both Apple and Android music interface capabilities.
Having found the unit jammed in there fairly tightly, I ended up going a little medieval on the dash:
Having pulled all these parts off ended up making it MUCH simpler to route the Blutooth microphone (required for drivers making phone calls here in Nanny-State Kalifornica). I also noticed that the framework under the dash was painted a bright yellow, not at all like the read the rest of the van is painted.
Instructions for mounting the microphone were not at all clear, in fact there was only a single small diagram showing it mounted on top of the steering column. Huh? Screw that I said.. and ripped the left side A pillar cover off and mounted the microphone up at the top of the window, pointing at the driver. I hope that was not a big mistake. I’m sure I’ll test this soon and find out!
Running wires down the A-pillar and through the dash was easy enough, but getting from the lower section of the dash up to the top was not exactly obvious. Using a tool not at all designed for the job, often makes things simpler. 🙂 Here I used it to fish the microphone wire up and over the pedal box and long another wire loom, eventually appearing under the HVAC environmental controls.
One there, the wrong tool was once again used to fish the wire up to the top section of the dash (removing the cover around the dash vents makes like a lot easier). Viola… easy as cake.
Not being a fan of rattles, and especially in the dash area, the wire loom was tightly bundled, and once inserted into the dash, the head unit’s rear section was zip-tied to the dash structure as seen. Probably should have used grey or black wraps but…. I’m going to call this a design test.. yeah, that’s the ticket.. This radio is much tighter in the dash that the other install, and that’s OK by me.
Decal Removal
This is nearly complete. There are patches of left over adhesive I need to remove, but the nasty and ugly decals (save a couple that I just might leave) are GONE!! Thank you Magic Eraser!!
More Interior Cleanup
With some help from the family, we removed A LOT of USPS shipping tape stuck to the ceiling of the truck. Purpose? WHO KNOWS!??! but it was all over the place and Debby just couldn’t stand it.
So while she was busy peeling the tape, A.J. and I unscrewed all of the interior panels and removed them from the van. Once able to inspect the the bodywork from the inside, I’m even more convinced that a diamond in the rough is what I have here. No signs of rust or any type of body work / repairs. If it wasn’t so loud, I’d be tempted to just leave the interior just like this!
iPhone Integration
One of the features of the head unit, is iPhone (and Android) integration. This I wanted to test out. Thankfully it just worked. One press of the button to change input to USB, about 60 seconds to sync with the phone and store it’s ID, and bang.. music starts playing.
Here I have WAZE up and running on the screen while the music app drops the bass.
That was enough for one day… many more days of work on this to come.
The work was not difficult, but it was a little time consuming to get to the upper most rear bolt, and also to remove the turbo resonator. To do so actually required a 1/4″ spanner wrench to operate on the small E8 TORX head bolts.
To properly address the repair, intake tract has to be removed from the passenger (right) side of the engine. Here you see the parts removed, which include the intake hose, turbo resonator and output hose to intercooler, along with the heat shield.
Here is the intake hose and turbo resonator that were removed.
Replacement rebuilt alternator, ready to install! BOSCH Alternator ready to be installed.
Close up of the “fiddly bolts” you will encounter doing this work. The larger of the two (there are 4 of these to deal with) use and E12 TORX Socket (seen below the bolt). The smaller of them (there are 2 of these) use an E6 TORX socket, however a 1/4″ wrench works better due to the confined space. Fiddly TORX head bolts
A little closer picture of the turbo sands intake hoses. Turbo, topside.
To easily move the belt tensioner, I found it simplest to just disconnect this hose at the intake (don’t lose the locking clip!), making the turning of the socket wrench on tensioner stud much less of a hassle. Intake tract and post-intercooler high-pressure hose.
Another part of the system that can fail, are the high-AMP fuses that are located in a black box next to the battery. Here is that box. Location of high-AMP fuses for T1N Dodge Sprinter
Inside the high-AMP box are a set of specialty fuses. It’s generally reported that the dealership is the only source of these fuses, and they are not commonly stocked, so it might be a good idea to order a few ahead of time “just in case” as this is not an rare failure point. High-AMP fuses for Dodge Sprinter (T1N)
Grounds are also an issue on these trucks. This is a main body ground, located right above the battery. In this photo the negative ground is still disconnected from the Alternator replacement service. Chassis groun; one of the many possible causes of a failing electrical system.
Another of the highly suspect grounds can be found (again on the driver side) down at the engine mount, and connecting back to the chassis. Both of these grounding points should be carefully examined. Engine ground strap; one of the various possible causes of Dodge Sprinter electrical maladies.
At the beginning of the week, the new truck broke down outside of town. After some fighting we got it back to the garage for diagnostics.
Once running again after purchasing a new battery charger and hours of fiddling, it was clear the battery was junk. Testing battery and charging system performance.
It looked like a cheapo battery, and it had no date indicators on it to clue me in to it’s age. Regardless… It’s dead, Jim.
Once a new battery was obtained, it was then possible to truly test the remainder of the charging system, namely the alternator.
Having started up the van easily with the new battery, checking voltage across the terminals showed that the rest of the charging system was in failure. This could have killed the battery during our repeated jump-starts to get it back home. Might have just been cheaper to tow it (note to self).
Lack of charging can be result of multiple issues other than a bad alternator in the Sprinters. The most common culprit are bad grounds. There are several on the driver (left in USA) side of the engine room that need to be checked.
main chassis ground just above the battery negative terminal
engine main ground on the left side engine mount, connected to the frame rail in the same area
control system and accessory points below the battery near the headlamp
Having checked all those and cleaned them for good measure, the next easy win is checking the alternator fuse. On the sprinter there is a large plastic block bolted to the battery cable lead connector. From that block runs several high-amp wires (red) and one very large black wire, which heads to the alternator (this is the main charging feed). Inside this block there are plastic fuses of various amperage, high amperage, including a 200A fuse on the charging system side. This fuse is next checked for continuity to ensure that it is not open, and thus causing the charging system to fail.
Having inspected that, and seeing that it is in tact, the next avenue of investigation is the alternator itself.
Following the acquisition of some TORX Sockets (female, not male), sizes E12 and E6 where required, and about 1 hour of pulling parts to access top and bottom of the alternator, the item was removed.
Turbo charger as seen from top in Dodge 3500 Sprinter (intake and outflow piping removed).Dodge 3500 Sprinter intake and turbo outflow partsDodge Sprinter 2500 90Amp alternator
Tomorrow I will be picking up a rebuilt alternator for around $210. Hopefully that brings the fun-van back to life!
