Cummins Canoe (A Stepvan Story)

[PlethoraOfGuns]

I had to order a bunch of parts. In the meantime, there are many odd projects to work on.


Installed this neat little 120v power monitor. Now I can accurately measure both 12v and 120v power usage.


For like a year I have been toying with the idea of a lock for the pocket door into the cab. Needed something low profile and simple. Would have liked to lock it from both sides, but I had these parts laying around and made it work. Had some extra stainless steel spring powered locking pin things from the adjustable solar panel adjusters I had in my last rig. Made some brackets and screwed some things to other things and bam.


Close the door, slide the pin over and down into slot, locked door. Unfortunately, I can only lock it from the inside, and will have to go out the rear exterior door if I wanted the pocket door locked and completely leave the vehicle. It's minimal security, but it's better than nothing and now I can comfortable leave the cab doors open like when running the hot tub and no worries about riffraff going fully into my house randomly and who knows what else.

 

[ITTOG]

Wow, creativity on full display.

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[PlethoraOfGuns]

Waiting on parts is the worst. Have some down time, so what better to do than chill in your mobile hot tub! But the worst part about the hot tub is the lack of accurate, automatic temperature control. Only way to control temperature while you're in the tub is to open the valve at the end of the inlet hose and allow the pump to circulate water, which takes heat from the boiler coolant loop, which has another temperature probe built in that turns the boiler on when it senses too low of a temperature. Boy, van life is rough, even during break downs...


Brainstormed for a bit and came up with this semi simple solution. Got this 12v temperature control box and cut it into the passenger seat where all the other hot tub controls are. This box will operate a relay which activates the hot tub circulating pump. Throw the temperature probe into the hot tub water and the control box will turn on the pump automatically until the temperature probe senses the set temperature and then kicks the pump off. I have it set so the pump kicks back on when the temperature drops one degree below the set temperature. Made my own temperature probe cable plug out of a two wire 1/4" phono plug so it can be unplugged and stored with the other hot tub equipment when not in use.


Here you can see the control box with the orange mounting clips and all the relay and plug stuff. It was all wired so the old toggle switch for the pump can still be used to activate the pump for things like pumping water to fill the onboard tank and such. With all this fancy equipment, the hot tub temperature can be set to 80 degrees during the day when not in use and then set to 102 or whatever people want it at when they go to use it. I'm using 80 degrees because on average the boiler takes about an hour to raise the hot tub water temperature 15 degrees. Come back from work or an adventure, set your favorite temperature, make dinner, clean up, and by then the hot tub will be perfect temperature, all by itself!


And for anyone wondering, this is the backside of control panel underneath the seat. You can get a good view of the heater exchanger for the hot tub. There is a bypass valve so you can turn the heat exchanger off when you don't need it to heat up the seat while you're driving or it's summer. Hmmm, yes, the van has heated seats! Kind of...

 

[ITTOG]

Where do you store the water? Or do you have to have fresh water every time you use it?

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[PlethoraOfGuns]

The hot tub holds about 250 gallons. The van only has 50 gallons of storage. So in order to fill hot tub, I set it up within pumping distance of a water source like river or lake, use someones hose spigot, or make 5 trips back and forth between water source and hot tub to fill.

 

[PlethoraOfGuns]

While the van is missing half the engine, might as well do some other stuff. Recently, the van has been listing to one side. During the build, care was taken to balance things out inside. But looking at the suspension, I think it's past due for replacement.


Almost half million miles and these are for sure done.


As things were taken apart, it seems to be worse than originally thought. Good thing you never reuse leaf spring u bolts! Cleaned these plates up and painted them. They were packed pretty good with dirt.


I'm well aware of the reasons women live longer than men. All the old bolts were stubborn. Sawzall could only do so much. Regular angle grinder discs wouldn't cut deep enough in between the leaf spring and hanger. But hey, this worked, and I made it out without a trip to the hospital! Only needed the torch for one nut that the sawzall or grinder couldn't get to.


Underneath the axle, where the u bolt plate sits, was lots of rusty pitting. I'm assuming this will happen again down the road. Had some extra chassis paint from two years ago so through that on as extra protection. Also cleaned and painted the spots that I couldn't paint when the leaf springs were installed.


Good as new! All new bolts with lots of anti-seize. Torqued everything down, ready for tires, just need a functioning engine. These were very heavy and awkward. Lots of choice words were spent during this process. But it's done and one more thing that won't have to be done for many more years.

 

[iggi]

"I'm well aware of the reasons women live longer than men" So true. lol

 

[Bikersmurf]

While the van is missing half the engine, might as well do some other stuff. Recently, the van has been listing to one side. During the build, care was taken to balance things out inside. But looking at the suspension, I think it's past due for replacement.

View attachment 713713
Almost half million miles and these are for sure done.

View attachment 713714
As things were taken apart, it seems to be worse than originally thought. Good thing you never reuse leaf spring u bolts! Cleaned these plates up and painted them. They were packed pretty good with dirt.

View attachment 713715
I'm well aware of the reasons women live longer than men. All the old bolts were stubborn. Sawzall could only do so much. Regular angle grinder discs wouldn't cut deep enough in between the leaf spring and hanger. But hey, this worked, and I made it out without a trip to the hospital! Only needed the torch for one nut that the sawzall or grinder couldn't get to.

View attachment 713716
Underneath the axle, where the u bolt plate sits, was lots of rusty pitting. I'm assuming this will happen again down the road. Had some extra chassis paint from two years ago so through that on as extra protection. Also cleaned and painted the spots that I couldn't paint when the leaf springs were installed.

View attachment 713717
Good as new! All new bolts with lots of anti-seize. Torqued everything down, ready for tires, just need a functioning engine. These were very heavy and awkward. Lots of choice words were spent during this process. But it's done and one more thing that won't have to be done for many more years.

You’ll need to find the 7” Mac 15 amp grinder to go with that disc. I found a virtually new one last year for about $40. It’s a beast… but truly awesome what it’ll do. It’s certainly not one you can hold with a single hand, at arms length, over head. I’ve also been warned that if it catches on something it can really beat you up.
Not mine, but quite similar.

 

[ITTOG]

Yeah I had to be reminded about the age difference during my build. Hospital visits are so much fun! Don't select the link if blood or seeing inside the body makes you queasy. https://www.expeditionportal.com/fo...6-x-12-trailer-conversion.199414/post-2786111

 

[PlethoraOfGuns]

I have a big 7" Milwaukee grinder, but I had to hold it up only inches above myself. I felt the 4" grinder would do less damage if something went wrong or if it got caught it would just slow down instead of ripping out of my hands and end up like ITTOG! Good God man! You are lucky, but that terrible! Yikes! I wore a hoodie, mechanics overalls, and welding leather apron just in case.

 

[PlethoraOfGuns]

Yay, parts! It's like Christmas, except Santa stole all my money and then gave me something nice that I needed.


New cylinder head came in. A little bit of touch up paint, swapping some parts over, and in she goes! Out with the old, in with the new!


So, got the new cylinder head installed. Started bolting things down, was grabbing fasteners from the pile and noticed these alignment pins, that are kinda probably maybe supposed to go under the cylinder head. I don't really need those right? There are clearly more than enough cylinder head bolts. That cylinder head is heavy!

 

[PlethoraOfGuns]

So I ended up taking the cylinder head back off to put those alignment pins in. Yes yes, those are very much needed. But while we have the coolant all drained, lets do a cooling upgrade.


The Cummins runs pretty cool. It only got hot once or twice climbing some hills in Colorado. The old setup lacked a fan shroud, and the mechanical fan was nowhere near the radiator. Making a shroud was going to be too complicated, so electric fan was the way to go. Aftermarket fan kits are almost $1000!!! Lots of inter web searching brought me to the Lincoln MK 8 fan. Apparently this fan is the most powerful cooling fan ever put into a production car. Called some junkyard and picked this baby up for under $100. Some simple aluminum brackets and rivnuts did the trick!


It fit pretty darn good! Just had to drill some holes and cut off the original mounting tabs.


This thing draws more than 30 amps on high speed. It is a two speed fan. The low speed wire we're just going to leave capped off for future use for something one day? In the upper part of the photo you can see the 100 amp relay for the fan. I don't think the little 30-40 amp cube relays will last long with this thing. I had the 100 amp relay sitting around so in it went. I hope we don't need a bigger alternator!


Oh this is great! Look at all this room we still have! It would have been a nightmare making a fan shroud around those turbo charge pipes. Also the old fan sat about 4" higher than the radiator. This was the way to go. It pulls a lot of air! Sounds like a rocket taking off. Anyway, threw some coolant in, cracked the first injector line to bleed fuel, and it fired right up! I always blow up these Cummins engines, but they are so easy to work on, so it almost cancels each other out. We're back on the road! Let's see how engine revision #3 will do.

 

[Pntyrmvr]

What year Lincoln Mk 8 had that monster lurking under the hood?

Great attitude on the engine life expectancy!


"Talk is cheap. Whiskey costs money."

 

[Bikersmurf]

It looks like a very similar fan to a Ford Taurus fan. Very common and plentiful. They can easily cool anything you throw at them.

 

[PlethoraOfGuns]

So if you want the biggest and baddest fan, 93-98 Lincoln MK 8 is the one you want. They push over 4000cfm. Very similar to the Taurus fan, which I also considered. The Taurus fan is 16", the MK 8 fan is 18" and has a bigger motor. My radiator is 18" tall, so easy choice was the MK 8 fan. Either fan is more than enough for any of our rigs. I'd say just get whichever one will physically fit your application better.