1984 Airstream 345 owner (Newbie) need advice!

[streamquest]

Originally Posted by Keyair

Just for fun... and I know we were putting the "Cart before the Horse" in many ways, but my GF and I have long been talking about what to use as the Toad...

I thought this would work for me....


But the reality is that a 4x4 is needed...
So, as my girlfriend already has the Land Rover sickness, so she suggested a Defender... I suddenly remembered they were Aluminium() Bodied....
So I did an image search...
And there it was... PERFECT!
Sweet or what!

Steve,

It seems like I constantly come across people towing polished Cobras and Defenders. Consider this if you want something different; my all time favorite piece of polished vintage aluminum! Enjoy!

Chuck Yeager Pushing The Limits (The Right Stuff) - YouTube

[Keyair]

So, the forcast today was maybe rain...
I needed to check that the airstream was all buttoned up, so off I went!

About a couple of hours doing some jobs...

One thing that kinda upset me...
I was setting up the Aux heater.. and guess what?
As I mentioned in a previous post I wanted a Motor Assist water heater...
Well, this MH originally had one... I spotted some extra pipes under the sofa... and chased them all the way back to the water heater area...
Now I will have to pull out the water heater to check.

Moving on..
Decided to pull all the upper front marker lamps off, so I can polish the front cap, polish the castings, replace the marker lamps, put LED bulbs in...
Once its all polished, I can reseal the windshield, and side window frames.
I have some dents and ripples in the front roof, but they are soft, so I will do those later, from inside.

The marker lamps were horrible... full of dirt, brittle and ugly...
The castings are almost fuzzy with corrosion..




With them all off, I wiped down the roof, and put some foil tape over the holes to keep them from leaking if it rains..

[Keyair]

A liitle parcel arrived today...

The Velvac Mirror adjustment, and heater switches and mounting plate!
Velvac quoted me $130ish for these...


Ebay to the rescue...
$34, shipped!
Not happy with the heater switch.. so may change that to a rocker style switch, with a power on LED later.

This spurred me to make a new template for the Passenger side Mirror foot..
I will tack weld together a base and see if it works as I hope!

[Keyair]

Very cool Streamquest!

Can I get my Motorhome to make that noise as I pull away???

[Keyair]

One thing I am learning is not to try to put everything I am up to in one post.
I keep closing the tab and loosing everything I wrote!

So, with that in mind...

I was trying to get the Aux heater back in and wrapped up... and that is how I made the discovery about the M/H originally having had a Motor Assist style water heater...

I had bench tested the fan, when I rebuilt the box, so I knew it was good, but I have no power at the wire, on low or high.
Refresher pic..


I knew the Aux heater is controlled from the dash Hi/Lo switch, but forgot to bring my Powerprobe to test.
To save time next time I go, I decided to pull the upper instrument panel forward for access to the power switch...
Oh boy...
The plastic panel is a mass of cracks so will have to be fixed or replaced... I have some ideas...

Once it was pulled forward, and the air vents disconnected I saw lots of horrors.. and some good news too..
Lots of wires...
Lots of wires disconnected...
Lots of wires with ugly crimp connectors..
Lots of warning lamps hanging loose...

I will let the pics do the talking...




Good news is that note, there IS a spare slot for my matching 2" Transmission Temp gauge!!!

[Keyair]

The deeper you look... the scarier it gets!





Again, beyond figuring out if if the Aux heater switch is good, or what the issue is, I am not going to delve beyond that and if there are any scary wires hanging or possible shorts...
For now.

[Myrtle lynn]

Originally Posted by Keyair

The deeper you look... the scarier it gets!

Again, beyond figuring out if if the Aux heater switch is good, or what the issue is, I am not going to delve beyond that and if there are any scary wires hanging or possible shorts...
For now.

Know the feeling of removing that panel. Yuck!

[bkahler]

Originally Posted by Keyair

The deeper you look... the scarier it gets!





Again, beyond figuring out if if the Aux heater switch is good, or what the issue is, I am not going to delve beyond that and if there are any scary wires hanging or possible shorts...
For now.

Steve,

You may already know this but one thing to be careful of when pulling out the dash is the cable that goes from the heater control slide lever to the valve doesn't give a whole lot. A PO of our 310 pulled a little to hard and broke the mounting tab off of the slide assembly. I've sense found replacements for that slide but it's no fun to work on.

Brad

[Keyair]

Yes Brad.... it is loose, and I could see at least one side the tab is broken...

[bkahler]

If I'm not mistaken these control units are the same as used in Dodge vehicles from the late 70s and early 80s. I spent a year working in Pasadena and while there I visited a lot of Pick-A-Part places and managed to grab a couple of them out of vehicles. They were not always cosmetically the same but the functionality and fit was the same.

Brad

[Keyair]

Looks like you are correct again Brad...
What I thought was interesting when researching the Hvac control head unit is it is part Vacuum controled and part electric...

The fan speed switch is replaceable and it looks like it is a:
Standard Motor Products HS-203 Blower Switch.


The pushbutton control unit is also seperate...
Chrome button unit is:
PART 3847742

Great thread and info over on the Barth website...
http://www.barthmobile.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/3631087061/m/9671018061?f=3631087061&a=tpc&m=9671018061&s=70310 72951&cdra=Y

[bkahler]

I poked my head inside a bunch of chrysler cars, trucks and vans while looking for those controls. Broke a couple getting them out but still managed to save a few.

I was kinda surprised at the prices that one site was charging for replacement and rebuilt units. But at least they are rebuildable and there are still a lot of them around in junkyards.

Brad

[bkahler]

Poking around on ebay for a few minutes I came up with these units. Granted none of them have the chrome look like that which is installed in our 1984 310 but I believe they would be functional replacements. Or parts could possibly be swapped.

If I was going to buy I would probably contact the seller and at least verify dimensions of the opening. I'm pretty sure I have one similar to these in my stash somewhere.

1993-Dodge-Plymouth-van-Heater-Control-Panel

Temperature-Heater-Control-w-A-C-1982-1995-LeBaron-Aries-K-Reliant-USED

90-91-CHRYSLER-LEBARON-4-DOOR-TEMPERATURE-HEATER-CONTROL-SWITCH-CLIMATE-OEM-AC

Chrysler-Town-and-Country-A-C-Heater-Climate-Switch-AB-93-94-95-AC-Control

Brad

[Keyair]

Yup, LeBaron, Town and Country etc was the same...
I did notice that there are 2 styles of switch and buttons... Black plastic, and Chromed.

I will try to grab a unit next Junk-Yard trip if I see an unbroken one.

[crazeevw]

Steve & Brad,
As much as I've read about this A/C dash control units, I may just have to work in a junk-yard visit soon.
I've been behind dash plate a few times, each time I manage to work something else loose while fixing what I broke before. Gotta be a better way.....
Derek

[Keyair]

If ya gotta fix it... fix it right!

Raining here in CA last few days....

I hit on a solution to an issue I have been worried about last night..
My solution might help others...

Our fuel system needs a strip down... gas tank needs dropping, filters, and pipes need replacing, and I want to have the tank treated and sealed inside and painted outside before I re-install it...
Needless to say, this might means the tank is out for a while...
So how do I run the Generator?

Here is my solution...
I had this twin tank selector switch on my pickup, which was leaking... so I replaced it.
This old one just had a bad seal, so I stripped and replaced the old rubber O rings with HNBR rings and it is now good...
This is how I am going to have the Genset set up...
The upper line with filter will be between the switch and the Genset fuel pump, allowing me see the fuel flowing, and see it being filtered regardless of which line is supplying the fuel.
The lever, allows me to select either the main gas tank line or a pigtail pipe which I will drop into a portable gas tank, like my 5g tank I use for my mower etc..
This was a prefitting pic on the bench, I already tested it, and it works great!


Now, there is an added bonuses...
The factory fitted genset pipe in the main tank only dips to the 1/4 mark.... so to run the genset you must have at least 20 gallons onboard... and in reality maybe 30.
That is a lot of gas sitting there going stale if you are planning a longer non running period.

Also, running off the portable tank, I can see how much gas I have and also am using with the genset! I am also planning to run some Seafoam thru the genset to clean the carb and maybe break up some of the assumed carbon deposits in the engine to help with the dieseling it does sometimes.
Just thought I would share the trivia!

[Keyair]

Weekend Benchwork project....
Need to get that front roof polished and sealed before winter...
Front markerlamp castings cleaned up.




Seriously "Furry".




Start with 120grit pad on the Dremel Multi-Max..







Then onto the bench buffer with black bar...
First one...


End result..

[bkahler]

Originally Posted by Keyair

After much thought I went forward..
Here is what I did...
Build an "Interface plate"...

Normally, I would have taken a block of aluminum and milled it... but I don't have access to that equipment, so it was time to fabricate something that will be a test piece and and also fully functional and visually ok..

Planning sketch... and template..

Steve,

I bought pretty much the same mirrors back in 2008 for our 310 and also the same set as yours four our Argosy. In looking at your sketch it appears that you settled on having a 1/2" difference in thickness from top to bottom. I've seen that number used elsewhere and I'm wondering if this is the number you finally ended up using.

I'm planning on having blocks milled and am working on the sketches now. When I held the mirrors up to the coach it looked like 1/2" was a good number.

So if you're using a 1/2" then that's what I'll use.

Thanks,

Brad

[Keyair]

Hi Brad,
Yes, that is about what I spaced the top out to get the mirror head from leaning in...
I used this VERY scientific method....
A sharpie... the body of a Sharpie is 1/2"...



Otherwise, you end up with this...


Also note that the position I chose for the drivers side, indexes the forward lower mounting hole on the body with the new mirrors forward lower mounting hole, and uses a longer bolt to go right thru the mounting plate...
I did this for a reason... my plate is sheetmetal and might flex aor vibrate a little... you are doing it solid, so you will not have that issue...
The additional holes in the outer plate surface are for accesss to the body mounting screws..



Food for thought...

Because of my choice of that forward lower screw hole, the new mirror sits a touch high... and overlaps on the window frame and hits at lease one rivet...
You can see the effect here, but I plan to add a 1/4" rubber gasket between the body and mounting plate.


I also think the drivers side mirror could go forward a bit without issues based on this view from my line of sight sitting in the driving position..


So, adding these two points with your plan to use a block of Aluminum, mabe you could drop the mirror down a 1/2" and push it forward?

I have not drilled the body for the wires yet, but I plan to go right thru the between center of the 4 original body mounting screws with a 1" hole to be able to pull the connectors thru.

PS...
Note that 1/2" is at the upper mounting hole...
If you need some better pics or accurate measurements just shout!

Also note, I am planning to push my passenger side mirror further outboard... maybe 1" minimum as the awning support leg resricts the view...

[bkahler]

Originally Posted by Keyair

Hi Brad,
Yes, that is about what I spaced the top out to get the mirror head from leaning in...
I used this VERY scientific method....
A sharpie... the body of a Sharpie is 1/2"...

Is there any other way?!

Otherwise, you end up with this...

THAT is what I'm trying to avoid

Also note that the position I chose for the drivers side, indexes the forward lower mounting hole on the body with the new mirrors forward lower mounting hole, and uses a longer bolt to go right thru the mounting plate...
I did this for a reason... my plate is sheetmetal and might flex aor vibrate a little... you are doing it solid, so you will not have that issue...
The additional holes in the outer plate surface are for accesss to the body mounting screws..



Food for thought...

Because of my choice of that forward lower screw hole, the new mirror sits a touch high... and overlaps on the window frame and hits at lease one rivet...
You can see the effect here, but I plan to add a 1/4" rubber gasket between the body and mounting plate.


I also think the drivers side mirror could go forward a bit without issues based on this view from my line of sight sitting in the driving position..


So, adding these two points with your plan to use a block of Aluminum, mabe you could drop the mirror down a 1/2" and push it forward?

I have not drilled the body for the wires yet, but I plan to go right thru the between center of the 4 original body mounting screws with a 1" hole to be able to pull the connectors thru.

What I'm planning on doing is machining the aluminum block to be about 1-1/4" thick at the top and 3/4" thick at the bottom. I will then drill and tap holes in the adapter that line up with the new mirror mounting locations. I will then add four counter sunk (socket head caps screw) holes in the adapter to bolt it directly to the motorhome using the existing holes. In this way the adapter gets mounted first and then the new mirror bolts directly to the adapter. I plan in putting the hole for the wires about where you are suggesting.

I think by mounting it this way I can move the mount around some to allow for optimal positioning. Moving the mirror forward on the drivers side sounds like a good idea.

PS...
Note that 1/2" is at the upper mounting hole...
If you need some better pics or accurate measurements just shout!

Thanks!

I'm stuck in Pasco Washington for the next two weeks and am hoping to draw up the plans while I'm here. Would it be possible for you to get me a sketch of the screw hole locations and dimensions on the motorhome? I would need the location of the holes compared to the rivets on the motorhome and anything else you think I might need to sketch up an adapter. I have the hole pattern for the new mirrors with me. I just forgot to get the dimensions off of the motorhome before leaving

Brad