Pita Van 4x4 Conversion

[Haf-E]

Seems like a shame to build it up and not get to enjoy it - but I guess you can always build another...

Still curious how it will respond to being shifted into low range - hopefully it all stays happy.

I have to admit I have been looking at the 118 wheelbase T1N vans with a lot more interest lately.

Thanks for the update.

 

[Haf-E]

You might consider having the Pita van at the NW Mogfest in Sheridan OR August 18th to the 21st. Would be good exposure for your conversion to the die-hard Syncro Vanagon crowd that usually attends the event (they outnumber the mogs, gwagens and pinzgauers combined usually).

I am sure they would mind you attending as it is a low key event and all vendors usually do is contribute something to the silent or live auction on Saturday night.

 

[BajaVan]

Why would someone want a Pain In The ***** (PITA) van? JK, LOL, IMHO...

Congrats on getting it all finished up.

It's a love hate relationship with this one as I'm sure you know. It does feel good to be getting it wrapped up.

BTW, I need to pick your brain a little bit more a bout the whole South Dakota vehicle situation we were discussing ;-)

Seems like a shame to build it up and not get to enjoy it - but I guess you can always build another...

Still curious how it will respond to being shifted into low range - hopefully it all stays happy.

I have to admit I have been looking at the 118 wheelbase T1N vans with a lot more interest lately.

Thanks for the update.

I'm one of those weird people that enjoys building them more than using them. Some day I'll have my own nice adventuremobile that I'll keep for the duration. Right now though, I need to focus on our business and refining our products more than building out a cool van. Luckily the new potential owner is an electrician and skilled carpenter, so the Pita should turn into one hell of a sweet ride when it's done.

 

[Petrolburner]

Glad to see someone tackling a 4WD conversion for the first gen Sprinters. Sad to see the test bed going away so quickly. Will you be doing the whole conversion over again on another Sprinter right away? A kit like this is long overdue, so I hope selling the prototype moves the business forwards instead of backwards. Keep up the good work. The finished crossmember looked great.

 

[BajaVan]

Glad to see someone tackling a 4WD conversion for the first gen Sprinters. Sad to see the test bed going away so quickly. Will you be doing the whole conversion over again on another Sprinter right away? A kit like this is long overdue, so I hope selling the prototype moves the business forwards instead of backwards. Keep up the good work. The finished crossmember looked great.

Yes and thank you.

We have already started the process of converting my business partner's 158" wheel base van. This first project was proof of concept. The second go around will be refining the brackets and writing instructions for the end user. We should be able to offer this as a kit for the DIY individual after one more go around.

I have about 500 miles now on the van since converting it and am really happy with the driving characteristics. I have another 600 mile road trip planned for it this weekend and I am really looking forward to putting more miles behind the wheel. The van is a a joy to drive on long trips especially when the road gets twisty.

 

[luthj]

Diy kits?!?! Don't tempt me like that! :Wow1:

 

[Petrolburner]

Yes and thank you.

We have already started the process of converting my business partner's 158" wheel base van. This first project was proof of concept. The second go around will be refining the brackets and writing instructions for the end user. We should be able to offer this as a kit for the DIY individual after one more go around.

I have about 500 miles now on the van since converting it and am really happy with the driving characteristics. I have another 600 mile road trip planned for it this weekend and I am really looking forward to putting more miles behind the wheel. The van is a a joy to drive on long trips especially when the road gets twisty.

I hope you have the opportunity to put many more miles than that on the next prototype, in the dirt. Torture test the setup thoroughly before offering it to the public. You only get one chance at a first impression.

 

[BajaVan]

I hope you have the opportunity to put many more miles than that on the next prototype, in the dirt. Torture test the setup thoroughly before offering it to the public. You only get one chance at a first impression.

Definitely, we will be doing lots more testing and tweaking prior to releasing a DIY kit to the public.

Little update. I haven't had a whole lot of time to work on the Pita Van. Been busy with other projects here at the shop. But here's a quick update;

New upper control arms are in and professionally aligned. Aligned to specs for a factory 1999 ML320. I then took it for a nice road trip up to St. Helena to visit a buddy and to introduce the Pita Van to it's next owner. He was very excited to see the van and take it for a spin. I have about 1300 miles on the conversion now and everything is still happy.



Finally got the new rear driveshaft installed. All new one piece shaft with big 1350 U-joints on both ends. Definitely a noticeable improvement over the original shortened two piece shaft. No vibes and smooth running at 80mph.



More to come soon.

-Rob

 

[Paddy]

Well done. Awesome.

 

[Riptide]

So how did the ECU handle the addition?

 

[BajaVan]

The ECU is completely happy in high range. The van acts just as it did before. ABS and traction control still fully functioning. No check engine lights or codes being thrown. Trans shifts both in full auto and when shifting it manually. We still have some quirks to sort out with low range but we're making progress. It's still looking promising to have full integration of the ML's 4-Lo traction control system.

 

[luthj]

I will be curious how you resolve the TCMs confusion in low range. From what I understand the Transmission output shaft sensor will not match the wheel speed sensors in low range. So it may throw a wobbly? Not really sure myself.

Maybe a signal modifier on the wheel speed sensors? In high it would do a pass through, in low it would multiple them by the reduction ratio? This could create other issues with the traction control though. Hmmm. Its too bad the TCM is locked/encrypted. This could probably be solved pretty easily with a few changes to the firmware.

 

[Paddy]

Would the esp disable switch remedy the lo range wheel sensor issues?

 

[spencyg]

Or possibly, in Low range, both signals are being generated from just one source? Could you split the signal from either the wheel sensors or the output shaft sensor and in low range, just use that for both inputs to the ECU? Are they a 1:1 match (presumably a hall effect sensor with a binary pulse output) or are you getting 1PPR off the output shaft, and X PPR out of the wheel? I suspect the latter is the case because the wheel sensor is likely also providing ABS triggering. I'll bet you could build a small circuit to provide mathematical filtering of the wheel sensor to "mimic" the output of the output shaft sensor, then just abandon the output shaft sensor entirely. This way no matter what the ratio is between the output shaft of the transmission and the wheel rotation, your inputs to the ECU stay in lock step.

What is the factory intent of the output shaft sensor? Does it apply to traction control? If so, are you trying to keep traction control?

Cool project!

SG

 

[Haf-E]

The output shaft sensor is to detect excessive slip of the transmission I am told. I think its a bit of a nanny sensor to protect the tranny from overheating perhaps.

I was hoping that the output shaft sensor was still before the transfer case on the ml320 tranny - but I guess its not. Adding one on the rear output shaft wouldn't work well since there is a center diff in the tcase. Hummm....