Cummins Canoe (A Stepvan Story)

Buddha.

Finally in expo white.
Now all you need to add is a “Sure Start” switch like the Ambos have. A momentary on switch, a pair of relays in parallel (for redundancy), and ____ feet of 00 wire and you’re set.

Slow cranking? Reach over and hit the Sure Start, and you’re house batteries are momentarily combined with your starting batteries. Slow cranking no more.
Does that work if your house bank is lithium?
 

PlethoraOfGuns

Adventurer
That's unfair. You can't compare a 6.blow to a 7.3, very different engines.

I've also always wondered about jumping myself or someone else with my lithium battery bank. Is it really ok to just jumper cable them up or is some damage going to happen?
 

iggi

Ian
Well, my ambo's alternators crank out 14.5 volts pretty often. My Lithium bank is 13.6V max. No issues there.
Seems most 12V systems can handle up to around 15volts. All the inverters I've checked have a max input of 16V. Max Air fans get really cranky at higher than 13volts though.
Charging lithium batteries directly from your alternator is often not a good idea.


That's unfair. You can't compare a 6.blow to a 7.3, very different engines.

I've also always wondered about jumping myself or someone else with my lithium battery bank. Is it really ok to just jumper cable them up or is some damage going to happen?
 

PlethoraOfGuns

Adventurer
Yes, I believe any lithium battery will suck more power from your alternator than it can deliver and poof. I think if my starter battery ever did die, I will just hit the switch for the Amp L Start and go make a samich and watch a movie and then start the engine.
 

iggi

Ian
There's a lot of "it depends" in that statement. I don't worry about it much in my rig as the BMS limits the input to the lithium battery bank to 150Amps and my charging system is rated to push about twice that.

Yes, I believe any lithium battery will suck more power from your alternator than it can deliver and poof. I think if my starter battery ever did die, I will just hit the switch for the Amp L Start and go make a samich and watch a movie and then start the engine.
 

PlethoraOfGuns

Adventurer
Nice. I have a lil wimpy 70-90 amp alternator. With my luck, I'd surely fry it with my house bank. Going to stay safe and avoid doing any of that.
 

PlethoraOfGuns

Adventurer
No no no, bad, all bad!

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Driving at night on some county backroad in VA and the engine temperature gauge started climbing. Normally it's been sitting way too cold, like 100 degrees all the time. I shut her down and pulled over before bad things happened. All the coolant in the radiator was gone. Looked underneath and everything was white and wet. Popped the doghouse off and yep, the braze job on the engine didn't hold. Filled the radiator back up and continued on and got to where I was going. Stand by for further analysis...
 

PlethoraOfGuns

Adventurer
Yep, not good. But it is still drivable. Just need to add two gallons of coolant every time the fuel tank gets filled up. But that is getting old really quick and things are going south quick.
 

PlethoraOfGuns

Adventurer
We dove in deep. It is what it is. Everything is on hold now that the van is officially stranded.

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Looking down the side of the block under the problem area. That looks terrible...

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Lots of white fluffy stuff caked on everything underneath. Not sure how to clean all this. I'm assuming this the result of the block sealer that all leaked out. What a mess.

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And the money shot. Not sure what happened, but it's definitely leaking out of here again. That block sealer made a mess of things! It held for a good while, but no, it didn't work. Oh well, it was worth a shot. I'm really only out my time and some fluids. But I did learn to silicon bronze braze stuff. Find the silver lining in all tragedies.

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Anyway, no time to stare at things and attempt to come up with new cuss words. Ripped the busted head off with a come-along. I still can't get over how much access there is with these step vans. Not sure if I ever want to work on anything else ever again.

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The key to this mess is to stay organized! Obviously parts that we're going to reuse with the new cylinder head.

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And as documentation, we're crossing all of our i's and dotting all of our t's. All of the old cylinder head bolts are in great shape and within manufacturers specifications. Now we just need to wait for parts to come in...
 

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