Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1141 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-02-17 22:28:58

Then, we were hit by a pretty rare and strong summer storm, with plenty of rain during the night, and the next morning we realized there was a mayor leak at the entrance of the house.

Called Ramón and he took it very seriously and, as it was the second time, was very drastic in pursuing the origin of the leak, as you may see.
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Fortunately, it was just a minor issue with the sealing of the roof between the container and the house and he made a quick and provisional but successful repair under the still pouring rain and the problem was solved.
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The unexpected rain also highlighted the need for planning and building of a good and solid vehicle entrance as the mud that formed made impossible for the Ford Cargo to get out by its own means, even if there was only a minimum slope from its parking place to the exit.
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The L200 was not able to pull it out and just helped to plow the entrance. It was finally one of the tractors that dragged the poor truck out through the mud to the front street.
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The situation made also clear how easily the rain may turn things into a mess and how important it is to have good tires and total traction to take you out of trouble, especially if you are alone.

It was not a very bright day, but all in all many problems were solved and, apart from a big hole in the ceiling, there were no major losses, and the sunset was one of the most spectaculars of the season.
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As soon as I was able to go to the shop I reconnected wires and airlines to the gearbox. I was pretty concerned, because of my weak memory, that I could crank the engine without filling the gearbox up with oil and cause a mess, so I got the stuff and start to pour nice and smelly oil in and asked Carmen’s nefew to take me a picture to record the moment so I could check later without unplugging anything.
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Then, I began to bolt the cardan shafts back in. What a boring thing to do, not an easy nor fast task, though.
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Eduardo had to remove many stuff from the shop so I profited to send home in the country the steel profiles and pieces to be used to build the bridge crane in the barn/shop. Pretty heavy pieces, I had forgotten how much.
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You know at this point that I am a very confident guy, so I planned to assemble the whole truck and trusted that everything would be okay, and the gearbox would behave accordingly.

After more than a little struggle with the rear cardan shaft, that curiously insisted in not being prepared to be put back in place, I went home. Carmen was already there waiting for me with something fresh and delicious for lunch.
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1142 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-02-17 22:42:15

Heidi was riding pretty smoothly when, suddenly, I revved up and lost traction with a terrible noise coming from the rear drive train. Ops… the cardan shaft, the fatal flaw of all the GS1200s.

There still was left a couple of kilometers before getting home so I sighed and started to push Heidi’s 250 kg under the merciless midday sun.
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After lunch, of course, I disassembled the rear drive train and confirmed that the splines of the rear yoke were absolutely worn out. The shaft was dead.
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When servicing the cardan shaft, some kilometers before, there were clear signs of wearing due to lack of proper maintenance from the previous owner, but I never thought that it would be that bad.

When asked, the dealer charged a small fortune for the part, so I decided to allow myself to look for alternatives and use the Beast as daily commuter in the meantime. There had been some attempts to buy her in the previous days, but nothing serious came up, fortunately.

Carmen doesn’t like Heidi as much as she loves the Beast, so she was not worried or touched in any way. Just a little and pretty expensive black piece of steel ruined, that was all… and she was right, as always.
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It was not good news, of course, but still there were good things to appreciate and to be glad of that particular day, as the fact that the terrace deck was being quickly built.
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When at the workshop again, I put back in the exhaust parts and bolted the fuel tank supports in the path of assembling everything before moving the Merkabah again, but I thought about it and stopped right there. Both cardan shafts… Heidi and the Merkabah… Hmm….
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I then decided to jack, again, the whole truck up to let the wheels spin free and test the gearbox and the traction before going on. Healthy decision, quoted Eduardo.

Indeed, it was the logical one. When all the axles were resting on the stands I started the engine, which came to life this time with a renewed mufflered sound.

Waiting for the air pressure to build up, Eduardo and I went close to the gearbox, spinning in neutral gear, and there was a rumble that was not there before. Not a loud one, but a troubling sound that was not supposed to exist. Hmm…

I engaged the gears and when releasing the clutch we realized that the front traction was connected somehow, not completely though, but with some bumps and noises. I checked and all the lockers were working and none was engaged. Double hmm…

The gearbox shifted gears smoothly when the clutch was applied, but somehow there were problems and the wheels did not spin freely and it felt like jammed.

I turned the engine off, not to damage anything if something was heavily misplaced or wrong, and then came the time for the heavy thinking.

Eduardo’s theory was that the big kingpin was the cause of the problem. As it was pushed back in place with my selfmade press, it could have went in with a little angle instead of properly perpendicular and that could have led to slightly twist the spin angle of the intermediate gear and cause it to push against the solar ring of either the upper or lower planetary clusters, causing pressure, friction and heat and eventualy jamming things.

Maybe, but there was more of it, I thought. He asked me to let the engine, the gearbox and the brain cool down and test again the next day as it was already time to go home. I agreed, of course.

During the afternoon, though, I studied the gearbox schematics to understand exactly how it worked, again. I discovered a problem, but that did not explain the jamming problem nor the abnormal engaging of the front traction.

Well, precisely yesterday, the first thing I did was to reverse the connection of the air tecalan to the actuator of the high and low drive from the gear shaft shift valve. Then, the even more boring job of unbolting the rear cardan shaft from the gearbox to allow for testing the rear traction with no opposition and to “feel” it by hand.

Crancked the engine until the brake warning light lit off and then checked the gears. The shifting was okay, the front traction was disconnected, the high and low connected appropriately this time, but I still had trouble trying to engage reverse and the box became progressively jammed when in high gears. Bad.

The rumble seemed to be fading, though.

Christ… I truly did not expect that. I thought I did a perfect job, but soon the rest of the crew told me that they sometimes have to disassemble twice or three times the gearboxes to get them right and perfectly running. Ops.

Anyway, the probable cause was something related with the planetary gear cluster, maybe with both superior and inferior, not discarding any issue with the intermediate gear. Much to my regret there was no option but to take the gearbox out again and check it out.

The Merkabah did not say anything, this time. Just stood still, as if she did not worry at all.
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As with everything in this project, it seems that the important lesson is not to take anything for granted and wait for the unexpected to show up before putting too much hope in what you have done, as old steel has a lot to say and it always have the last word, even if it does not want to share it with you.

I put my hands on the labor of disassembling everything again until the time came to go home, and that was it... for now.

Regards.


Pairoa

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1143 Beitrag von Slarti » 2021-02-26 21:33:39

Hi there Pairoa,

it is pretty unfortunate that the gearbox is playing up on you. I send you patience and am very sure you will persist and find out, what is not working properly. At least you have an expert at your side...

I wish you luck, that it will turn out to be something minor easily fixed :positiv:

And I have great respect for your stamina and motivation to do everything yourself :unwuerdig:

All the best, Hajo

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1144 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-05-13 4:32:30

Maybe a little late but many thanks for your words, Hajo.

It’s been a while, uh? Hope everyone is okay.

Well, times got rough, and will get rougher as this big global nonsense goes on, but it is my belief that everything will be fine and better than before when all this settles, hopefuly in a not so distant future. The Big Boss does not play with dyes.

Anyway, this is to show that I have never quit, just paused writing a few weeks (months?) ago because I got caught by some kind of lack of enthousiasm due to the environmental crazyness and the fact that I had screwed up with the gearbox.

The thing is that I disassembled the gearbox starting for the rear cover without taking the whole thing out from the frame, and soon realized that I had made a huge mistake when assembling the rear cover and its components. Because of that, the fixing dots of the big plate of the high and low synchronizer cone did not match the corresponding holes in the front part and, when I bolted and tightened the cover back in, everything went out of place and under pressure I broke the inner rims of the cover without even noticing it. That’s why the low and high gears did not switch and I had trouble with the reverse and had the enerving rumble everywhere. I broke the cover.
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I broke the cover.

Yes. I broke the cover.

After all the meticulous and careful work, I broke the cover.

Hmm…

Well, I felt dumb for a while, as usual, and then I began to look for solutions. I sat in front of the computer and searched anywhere in the world where there could be a new cover and found a couple of places in Moscow and one in Belgium, none in Germany.

The price was almost reasonable for the part, but to make it come from the store in Moscow to San Felipe was absolutely ridiculous. No way. There had to be another solution.

I made a little search and found out that the same cover was used in many Mercedes Benz of the same age, despite not being 4x4 or 6x6, so I looked the domestic market in search for an old or dismantled truck or an old or dismantled gearbox that matched the same profile.

After a little while, the Big Boss, as always, showed me that I had had the solution right in front of my eyes all the time. The cover was part of a truck that I had been looking every now and then, targeting it as donor for the Merkabah of brake components, including the 40 liter tank that broke from rust. It was parked aside the road that goes from San Felipe to Putaendo, a nice little town upstream the Putaendo river, for at least four years, and the guy finally decided to sell it as he had no resources to invest in its revival.
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After a couple of interviews with the elusive owner we agreed over the price, that was kept as low as possible, and I had no more option but to buy the whole truck if I wanted the cover of the gearbox.

So, after all, the cover was just 2 km away from home, it came with a bigger and more powerful V10 that used to run before the truck was put on hold, and a bunch of used though useful components including a whole rear axle, just in case.

The big problem was that nothing worked at that time: long rows and lot of waiting to enter any government office to make any kind of paperwork. Plus, the owner worked as an international truck driver with long stays out, so at the time of these words I still have no spare truck to put my hands on.

In the meantime, I have been occupied with the new house and I though it could be of some interest to show how things have gone with it. The garage/workshop/shed was finally closed as the gates were completed and installed. It was pretty welcome as the weather changed and colder winds began to blow from the Aconcagua valley carrying lots of dust and the autumn with them.
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Ramón, the builder, was busy building the short wall to delimit the little garden from the entrance road, and he had a lot of tasks to accomplish after that. It was a long and hard work.
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I was also busy with my regular work, for a change, and servicing the bikes and the old Montero. I finally got the new cardan shaft for Heidi from the dealer, though the rubber boot was in very bad shape and the spare was out of stock so they had to import it directly from… wherever, so she was obliged to keep grounded for at least another three weeks.

Being able to work in my own workshop/garage came with a pretty good feeling. Many hard working years to get it done.

When getting my hand greasy, I always have good company, though, sometimes, it is hard to work when someone asks you for more caresses every two seconds.
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I went to the mountains on the dirt bike one of those days, not properly dressed, again, and -again- I went down the hill in a not so quite properly fashion. Riding was great, but too much dirt and slippery rocks and very poor grip from a worn out rear tire played the same trick and got me to the ground. It started to seriously look pretty serious.
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1145 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-05-13 4:40:10

I then went to the store and asked for a new MX tire. I was surprised by the size of the knobs, but actually it was just the normal dimensions of the knobs from a regular tire not so abused as the old one. Ops.
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The shop is pretty big and very comfortable and makes it easy to work on the bikes simultaneously, but it also remarked the need to have a multidrawer tool chest or some type of mobile platform to set, organize and work with the tools right at the side of the bike or the car. I looked for some nice and good looking toolboxs in the internet and, of course, I thought it twice when confronted with the price of the things. There had to be an alternative, I thought, asked for it and waited for the answer to come along.
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The days passed, the short wall building progressed and the weather became unstable with some days of extreme heat and others with cloudy skies and chilly winds. The house, pretty slowly, looked a little more like the original design.
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I resumed the weekend runs after a few months pause due to a ligament problem on my left knee, and it felt good to do so. This time, though, I have to take with me all the ten dogs and run through and around the walnuts and the peach trees to complete the appropriate length of the run. It is actually funnier than I thought and I do not miss the long paved circuit I used to run before and, of course, I see no one around.
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After a little research, I found the right air compressor for the workshop/garage and got it from a big store in Santiago. It has a 3 HP electric engine and builds up to 175 psi, enough for my expectations.
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One given day, some days later, my “new” drawer tool chest came to me directly from the dismantling of a nursing home that went into bankruptcy due to economic debacle secondary to the “pandemic”, in the shape of a hot food cart which heating system was broken. It came for free and needed a little work but, anyway, it came along. For you to see how things work.
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I took my holidays, out of the high season as always, but just to profit of the fact that my father was finally available to come to help me to build the furniture of the closet, the pantry, the kitchen and the rest of the furniture of the house.
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Having my old man with us for three whole weeks, except for the weekends, of course, was pretty special. We worked pretty hard from nine to eight and shared a lot of nice moments. We reached to finish the pantry and the walk-in-closet, very tough and clean furniture, simple and elegant and easy to maintain.

While we were working with wood, the guys of the firm that I chose came to install the photovoltaic system on the roof of the garage. As it was in the original plan, every aspect was ready and built thinking on such a system so I got a great discount for saving them a lot of time and effort during the installation. Good.

The team was very professional and the quality of the work was optimal so I was gladly impressed, for a change.
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1146 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-05-13 4:52:34

After a couple of days, the system harvested from the sun up to 5500 watts/hour, enough to supply our needs from 10:00 hrs to 18:00 hrs, though it menaced to collapse at each start of the bench saw.
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I went to pick the granite covers for the kitchen furniture directly from the builder/cutter. I was very impressed with the bridge crane they had to help move the big and heavy pieces of granite and marble. I definitely wanted some like that in the garage/workshop though not so big, of course.
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It was heavy stuff indeed, and to deal with it I had to borrow Eduardo’s Ford with the crane and have him to help me with the maneuvers, especially with the big piece for the kitchen island. We struggled a little but finally all the pieces were standing safely on the ground.
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I also used the crane of the truck when installing the hot tub. Fortunatelly the arm was as long as needed and the tub was not as heavy as to turnover the truck and go into Youtube as the asshole of the week.
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What was supposed to be a fast and easy job turned to be a little complicated installation due to the semi earthed location of the tub, but the guy was very professional and polite so we worked together for a couple of hours until the tub was leveled and correctly located, the filter was installed and all the connections were checked.
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A few days later the water heater arrived from… guess where… yes, China, but someone there did not read the purchase specifications and they sent a pretty powerfull heater which consumption exceeded the capacity of the electric system of the house.
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I installed the overbuilt heater no matter what, hoping it would work at least three to four hours per day with the power combined of solar and grid electricity as, at least, the wiring installation was capable to sustain such currents. If the consumption was too high and the system collapsed, I would disconnect one of the two heating elements to cut the power needs in half, which would still be 25 amperes.

I made all the fittings connections but I left the electric ones to Ramón. With the pretty damn lockdowns I was not sure when this would be possible, though.
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Profiting of the time, I put my hands and efforts on the irrigation system. There would be only a few square meters of grass around the house in front of the main bedroom, just enough to frame the hot tub and lower the amount of dirt around and to give the cats some safe place to walk on out of the house.
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1147 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-05-13 5:02:15

As the water pressure available is not very extraordinary, the irrigation had to be pretty partialized and many irrigation stations were needed. I bought an ad hoc multistation regulator and seven electrovalves and installed plenty of pipes to make sure not a single centimeter of the garden received less water than needed.
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Then, I moved quite a few cubic meters of dirt and flattened the whole terrain and got it ready to receive the grass. It was very hard shoveling work though my back stood. This is how it still looks today, waiting for the moment to go to get the grass.
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At that time, a few weeks ago, Regalo the princess of cats passed away. She died of a fast developing kidney disease and we could not do much to help her. We got her when she was two days old with very little odds to survive and we stayed together for more than ten years. She had a good life.
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In the meantime, the front wheels of the Merkabah kept on losing pressure through the unsolved valve leaking, and both tires got dismounted. I had her on the pins, of course, so she was always safe.
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As the prospect of working in the new garage/workshop was closer everyday, I got the pieces and assembled the rear suspension of the cabin in order to get the truck ready to be towed. It was also supposed to be a simple task, but the hydraulic jack of the cabin refused to work, hmm…

To make the story a little more difficult, the cabin was very close to the steel beam of the attic, so I had first to jack down the truck and then use a manual jack to bend the cabin, just enough to get the spirals and the shock absorbers introduced and assembled without hitting the cabin. Hmm…
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I built a new tow bar using the remnants of the old and bent one and made sure it was as strong as possible to stand the towing of Spare II. Then, using what was left of Spare, the original truck, I brang the tools to the new workshop/garage and made a cross member for the tip end of the frame of Eduardo’s Ford Cargo and installed the Rockinger tow couple in it. It went pretty well though I did not care much this time for the paint and finitions.
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As I am aware that the times ahead are ment to become even harder in short terms, I decided to equip the workshop with all the tools and gadgets I could get before the present shortage of supplies gets worse. I bought a series of electric tools such as circular saws, a router, a bench grinder and so on, and also got a new and powerful battery charger/starter, enough for what I pretend to do at home.
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Mr. Jinx, the king cat, finally accepted being moved in the new house. It took quite a few months for him to get used to the new place. As you see, he is no longer worried and, along with our other two more cats, enjoys the good and lazy life.
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At the moment these words are being written, I still wait for the owner of Spare II the truck to come and sell it to me, I still wait for my father to come again and continue to make the furniture of the house, and still believe the world will get better.

Cheers to everyone.


Pairoa

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1148 Beitrag von lura » 2021-05-13 6:27:34

Hi Pairoa, Your house gets more and more comfortable. You have nice ideas. I like it, really good. :D
Gruß
Bernd

Gewinne Zeit durch Langsamkeit

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1149 Beitrag von Slarti » 2021-05-18 21:07:35

Hi there Pairoa,

some mistakes you do only once, as they are connected with so much emotion, they stick with you. :frust:

Your learning curve certainly is steep :angel:

In your case, the effect to get another „spare“ maybe very good in the end...

Wish you all the best in closing this deal.

Cheers, Hajo

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1150 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-06-17 3:53:45

Things always happen for a reason, I am pretty aware of that fact, Hajo. Thanks for your words and thanks for yours, Lura; the house is indeed very comfortable and pretty warm despite the chilling days we are going through, with absolutely no need for extra heating.

A few weeks ago we started to plant some creepers that eventually will cover the fence, and Ramón finished the lighting. I really like how it came out and it will be really awesome when the plants grow and the creepers blossom in springtime. We will see.
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This is the tampering with the water heater of the hot tub. Still don’t know if it will work.
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Finally, last weekend, we gathered with the owner of Spare II, and we made the deal. There was a scrapped car on the rear part of the frame of the truck and Eduardo an I were a little worried about using the crane to download it in order to tow the old Mercedes home as soon as possible.

The guy made it simple for us: he just asked our help and together we kicked the poor Hyundai out portside and it fell down with a soundly crash. It was not nice to see, but it was the fastest way.
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Next, I payed the price on agreement in cash and connected Spare and the Ford Cargo via the brand new tow rod. I went up in the cabin, submersing myself in a swamp of dust, loose parts and garbage and Eduardo began the towing with a controlled pull.

He drove at warp speed (15 km/hr) through the rocky and dry riverbed and the streets, scorted by Carmen and Eduardo’s wife in the Montero with a couple of pretty complete tool boxes, just in case.
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The trip was almost uneventful, except for one turn taken so straight that the tow rod bent a little for I could not turn the steering wheel fast enough. It was heavy as hell, especially at low speed.

Anyway, we made it and finally arrived home. We then planned carefully how to get Spare II inside as there was not much place to maneuver.
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And, in fact, there was not enough place for both the trucks to ballet together, so we attached the old and faithfull Montero instead and made the last back and forth movements in slow 4x4 pretty easily.
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1151 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-06-17 4:04:46

Initially, I wanted to park the truck behind the garage/workshop, hidden from the view, but Ramón had cleaned and flattened the earth there, preparing the soil for the projected orchard.

So, Spare II would probably rest in peace for a long period of time right in front of the garage. Not the most hidden place, but WTH.
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Later on, inspecting the interior of the cabin more calmly, I found some features that could be of use if I was on the mood of making more changes to the Merkabah. The steering wheel was pretty comfortable, but more interestingly, the steering column was adjustable in height damn pretty smoothly, and the dashboard was also in pretty good shape. The later, though, was less attractive just by thinking of the myriad of wires to relocate if I dared to think of swapping the dashboard.
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Seemed that the previous owner wanted to make lots of changes in his aborted plan to revive the truck, and he left the wiring harness and a lot of stuff all over the place. Easier to get the wires, though, and it is always good to have them.
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I had lots of things to do before sinking into the scrapping of the truck so I made sure the windows were closed in case it rained and forgot about him until the new weekend came.

In the meantime, Ramón and his team (of two) cleaned and flattened the front yard, shoveling many cubic meters of earth and moving quite a few kilos of stones and big rocks. They even removed the pile of dirt that I used to jump with the WR450.
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Once the yard was flat we were able to move on with the planting of the trees.

Spare II waited silently on the back, looking at some more interesting stuff than vehicles passing by, I guess. I decided to enclose the hot tub, if not, the dogs would do a mess with the lawn and there would hardly be any privacy around. We wanted also to create a place for the cats to go outside without interacting with the dogs. They were all together in the old house, pretty crowded indeed, but now there was a lot more dogs and they instinctively act as a pack, not good for any cat. Better safe than sorry.

So, I asked Ramón to build and install a short fence. Once ready, I would seed the grass instead of putting the grass mats that I did not like too much last time we used them in the old house.
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Do you remember the deep cycle batteries my father gave me some time ago? Well, they were still operative, being charged at least once a year by the laziest battery owner of the world. I built a trolley, with steel profiles from scrap and two pieces remaining from the inner U beam frame from Spare, the original, and the guys from the company installed them as part of the solar circuit of the house.
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It worked pretty good. They are not the strongest battery pack in the world though they manage to store enough power to reach at least midnight, then the inverter switches to the powergrid until the sun shines again, and for me that’s enough… for now.

This past week I got two more tools: one is a massive air impact wrench for the Merbabah and the trucks and the tractors, and the other is a more modest one for working with the cars. They had been tested and approved at the workshop so I decided to get them too as it is planned to install the air compressor with a few connectors sparsed in the garage, and I am off with the manual tightening and loosing of the bolts and the wheel bolts of the Merkabah and the rest of the old steel.
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Finally, I had a few hours to work on the truck and started by taking out the cardan shaft to expose the rear flange. Interestingly, the bolts were not pretty tight, making the job less a PITA than initially thought.
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The flange and the rear cover were also loose and there was no big struggle when removing them. At that point I was confident that the main cover, the only reason for having got this far into this mess, was going to be loose too, and that I would have not to fight against rust and the demons that stick together all the big and heavy parts of the engines and the gearboxes of old abandoned german trucks.

And I was right: just a few maze coups in the right spot and the cover was loose. Good.
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1152 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-06-17 4:23:44

Brang the Ford Cargo near Spare II, now officially dead, and deployed the crane to help with the weight of the cover. I maneuvered a few minutes to free it completely and, very slowly, lifted up the part high in the sky to avoid hitting the cabin and loaded it on the bed of the Navara. The job was done.
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Finally, after a couple of months, or more, I had the spare to mend the worst mistake I had done so far in the history of this project. I was happy again.

During the weekend I took the dogs out for a run in the country and Tripo, the three-legged Irish Setter, went into the irrigation pond to drink a little. Of course, he couldn’t get out because of the slippery slope and I had to undress myself and pull him out of there. Almost every one of the dogs had got caught before in the deadly trap and we have let them do so to show them better not to get in the water no matter how thirsty they become when out for a run, but seems that Tripo did not learn from watching the example of what not to do.
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When I made the effort to pull him out, though, I felt pain in my left knee. Hmm…

In the afternoon, the disgraced truck was cannibalized and a lot of components from the braking system was removed and stored momentarily in a dirty box, waiting for the right moment for cleaning and eventually replacing or complementing the air pressure system of the Merkabah. There was a lot of them and so I started to imagine how many inventions could be done with them.
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Monday: a new day for the Project. After lunch we headed for the workshop carrying the spare rear planetary housing cover. I still had some doubts and feared that, despite having the same code, there were differences between the original and the replacement. Fortunately, even if there actually was a difference, it was of not of critical importance and I could manage to go through it and use the cover. Good.
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I would have to replace the shifting fork because it was not the same, but it seemed to be a not so difficult task, or so I hoped.

The planetary cluster was the next step. I had to disassemble it to replace the bent synchronizer cone and that meant to remove all the components of the synchronizer mechanism, which I did not like too much, especially the detents of the sliding collar, and the big roller bearing, which I liked less.

Anyway, taking out the speedometer bearing was not an issue because it only needed a little warming and the gentle use of the puller, but when the turn came for the roller bearing it did not move a single micrometer. I knew it was going to be hard, even impossible, but I definitely did not want to destroy it. It was something bigger than the price of the bearing and the fact that it was brand new, it was more like a necessity of the soul to remove it without tearing it apart, even if I had to put a new one in its place no matter what.
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I was at it when the time to go home arrived and I left the bearing under traction with a few drops of magic Würth loosener. Hope is the last to go.

The next day, yesterday, I resumed the task though I brang with me the powergrinder with a couple of cutting disks just in case my more gentle approach went to nowhere. Nobody at the shop, actually, seemed to be prone to bet a coin for it.

I warmed the bearing up with the heat pistol, again, and then applied little but net strikes to the puller arms with the hammer and, suddenly, the bearing gave with a pop! Great.
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It was necessary to have many pops because it moved one milimeter at a time but, eventually, the bearing was completely out. Did not inspect it to see if it was marked or dented or ruined in any form and left it for later. I wanted to disassemble the whole thing, replace the synchronizer and see if there was harm done by the pieces of metal broken loose from the cover.
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There was little metallic debris on the gears but not any damage on them. I went out to buy a few more liters of diesel and bathed and brushed them all clean from the metallic powder.

I made sure that everything was fine and then I began to struggle with the sliding collar and its detents and springs. There was no way, at least then, to put them in and correctly assemble the synchronizer gear, even if both Don Patricio and Nico, the mechanicians working with my brother-in-law, gave me a very helpful hand.

As it became pretty late I gave up, momentarily, wrapped the gear cluster in plastic film and went home. Next session I would figure out, again, how to get the synchronizer assembled.

And that’s all the news. Hope you are all okay.

Pairoa

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1153 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-07-22 5:16:41

Nothing too exciting… but at least some progresses have been made.

Last time, I was struggling with the assembly of the synchronizer parts of the gear cluster. Later, though, I used a set of elastic hooks and a piece of Wood to keep pressure on the sliding collar and have both hands free to accomodate the detents. After a lot of tries I finally succeeded and installed the bloody detents and the rest of the components of the synchronizer and, then, I checked the state of the big ball bearings left from the disassembly of both gearboxes.
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As expected, both were damaged, even if the newer one, which came from the Merkabah, was minimally dented due to the extraction process.

With no alternatives, I asked for a new bearing, which price almost doubled since I bought it the last time, and the dealer promised to deliver the next week. Hmm…

That weekend, at home, I found out that the WR450 had a flat precisely when I badly wanted to go for a ride on the mountains. I found the tire spoon levers in some box and decided to try to repair the tire myself. Last time I tried I made a dozen punctures with the pointed and sharp levers so I used the powergrinder to round them off.
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Well, I successfully dismounted the tire and got the inner tube, not without a little struggle, though. I found the 8 mm spike that caused the puncture, took it out and applied the ad hoc patch to the tube. After a few hours of curing I tried to mount the whole thing back, but it got very difficult. In the end I did it, clearly, but when I tried to inflate the tire nothing happened. More than probably I broke the tube, again. Hmm…
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I shrugged, as usual, decided that I had done my best and took it to the professionals. At least I tried.

The same day, the solar brothers came to replace the inverter that was giving some trouble as it did not commute between the grid, the panels and the batteries as expected, and the electric bill did not notice any participation of the new photovoltaic arrangement.

It was the first time, to their knowledge, that one of these inverters had such malfunction and, naturally, it was Pairoa’s luck.

I helped them with the maneuver and everything went pretty smoothly. No one got eletrocuted, at least. From then on there has been no more problems with the inverter.
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Do not remember if I mentioned it but the batteries of both the Beast and Heidi got exhausted and I could not recover them from death, not even with the help of the new battery charger/resuscitator. They were the same age and seemed that they did not like the current low temperatures.

The usual guy in Santiago delivered and a couple of colorful made in USA batteries, for the price of one original battery, arrived to the shop. As there were no signs of ball bearings for the Merkabah I took them to the country and installed them. They were bigger and more powerful and I hoped they would last as long as the original japanese ones. We would see.
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My brother-in-law and his wife began, finally, to clean the plot next door. Their house project, delayed for so long, was facing the moment for the real start.

They began by removing the big logs and stumps that were wrongly placed with the aid of the faithful old Valmet. I was happy because I suddenly had a very nice place to practice jumping-the-log right next to the house.
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1154 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-07-22 5:23:56

Time was always a problem as I had to cover my colleague when he took his well deserved holidays, and the regular work was pretty hard, so I could dedicate only a few hours a day, some days, to the project.

The cleaning of the cover was pretty annoying as there was a lot of oil and dirt fiercely stuck on every corner.
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When I could handle the spare cover a little less greasy, I addressed one major issue still left in the oblivion: replacing the hi-low shifting fork. Evidently, the forks were not the same and while one used a couple of bearings the original shifting fork of the gearbox of the Merkabah used a couple of bronze blocks. They were not interchangeable so they had to be removed and replaced. Hmm…
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Not pretty easy but, after a while and with the help of the press, the shaft gave with a big thump and the fork of Spare II was free.
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The shaft itself was in pretty good shape, though the original shaft of the Merkabah showed a pretty sad status when, on its turn, was taken out from the cover. It was not corroded but the oil was long passed off warranty.
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In the end, it was a good thing having to disassemble this last piece, if not, probably the contaminated oil would have sooner or later make it fail.

I think that at this point there is no component of the Merkabah that had not been unbolted, serviced, flatened, repaired, replaced, repainted or resuscitated. Well, maybe there actually is something left untouched, but I cannot say what at the moment.

The thing is that, finally, the gearbox had the right replacement of the broken cover and the right low-high gear shifting fork. There was a couple of oil seals of the fork shaft that needed to be replaced, though, and I still could not get the big roller bearing from the dealer in Santiago.
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At home, in the country, the peach trees from the renewed orchard were the lasts to loose their foliage, and the winter landscape was slowly completed.
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1155 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-07-22 5:39:11

The next working sessions, short sessions as I have had very little time to get my hands dirty, with grease I mean, I dedicated myself just to finish the cleaning of the cover. It was really dirty as previously said, and after a little effort it went from this…
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…through this…
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…to this.
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The job was not complete, of course, if I did not also take the metallic pin out from the original cover as it was missing in the spare cover.
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At that moment, I was still waiting for the new bearing and the oil seals to arrive from somewhere else to assemble the gearbox. This time, though, I would ask my brother-in-law to assist the process to make sure everything fits and is allright before even thinking in bolting the cover back.

Finally, all the peaches lost their leaves as the middle of the Winter came. With my left knee with serious problems I could only accompany the dogs by walking through the trees, something very pleasant but lacking the energy-burning sensation that I love so much.
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At some moment, the big, heavy and expensive bearing along with the oil retainers for the shifting fork arrived from Santiago. Good.
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I had to work with the press and it was not as easy as supposed to get the fork and the shaft assembled and ready. It went pretty good though, and the final swing of the fork was pretty smooth.
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1156 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-07-22 5:51:36

Those days I also received, from the same guys I bought the winches of the Merkabah, the winch for the bridge crane of the workshop/shed. I chose a 1 tonner hoist with electric motor for lateral displacement and, when the time came, I would install some pulleys and cables to move the whole beam/bridge back and forth.
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Well, when I had a couple of hours free I went to the workshop and resumed the assembly of the gear cluster. Last time I replaced the big roller bearing it got in pretty easy, though this time it refused to slide gently at the touch of the gummy maze. Nothing stands the press, though, so it went in anyways with some gentle hydraulic pushes. The biggest problem was to take the gear cluster to the press, surfing all the cars and obstacles in the way. It was really, really heavy.
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Once the bearing was in place it was much more easy to put the speedometer drive gear back in and to finish the assembly, tightening for good the final thrust washer.
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It was a relief when the assembly of the gear cluster was finally complete. I watched the pictures and the schematics many times not to screw up with the order of the parts, as I had no choice for more mistakes.

But it was late, again, so I wrapped the thing, again, with plastic film and went home for the whole long weekend.

Next Monday, without the pressure of the neverending shift, and with the aid of Don Pato, I set the gear cluster on the frame, ready to be put in place according to the logical assembly steps I did not follow, unwillingly of course, last time.
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I made the whole procedure and the rest of the moving parts be checked by Eduardo, just to have someone else to blame in case the gearbox exploded or something, and then I went in between the framerails and by pulse installed the damn heavy thing, making sure the dots of the syncronizer cone matched with the ad hoc holes of the housing.

It was quite a challenge to do it by hand maneuvering in such a reduced place, but the portable winch was absolutely out of reach, hidden on the bottom of the workshop by half a dozen of semi dead cars and trucks, and I had no time nor will to wait for the path to be cleared at some moment in an uncertain future.

Anyways, my back stood and my left knee also, so the gear cluster was finally where it was supposed to be. Good.
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Without wasting any time, then, I prepared the rear cover, cleaned it for the tenth time, put the new gasket with lots of silicone gasket and, with the help of Eduardo this time, I managed to bolt it back to the housing. It was quite a struggle, not only because of the weight of the beauty and the narrow space to work within the framerails, but also because of the lubrication tube and the washers of the main shaft that needed to go directly into the exact notches with no play or whatsoever left no place for errors.

I used the long threads as guides, which helped a lot to stabilize the cover while also providing a good leverage to bolt it in.

In the end, effort and patience won and, when there was no more sun out there, the planetary housing was, finally, closed.
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There were some negotiations with Carmen and I was able to buy one extra hour and kept on working as I wanted to finish the job for good. So, I grabbed the speedometer drive housing, cleaned it and etcetera, and with a big smile I bolted it on. It was a really good feeling.
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After a quite long time the gearbox was ready to run, again. Next working session, I would connect all the pipes, all the levers, all the switches and the cardan shafts to see how good the gearbox works. I am pretty confident that this time the job was done properly. Tough, expensive, steep and long learning curve, but in the end everything comes together.

Next time I update these pages I hope only good news will be written. Fingers crossed.

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1157 Beitrag von tooFATtoDRIVE » 2021-07-22 6:37:46

Superb work and narrative, as always!

Very impressive project indeed :unwuerdig:

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1158 Beitrag von Willi Jung » 2021-07-23 9:35:35

Hello Pairo,
I'am with you in mind. Hope everything gets well. Thanks for telling us this great story.
Willi
Der wieder nur noch mit dem Steyr tanzt
- Steyr A 680 GL mit Hesskoffer

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1159 Beitrag von Madoxen » 2021-07-25 13:02:16

Well done Pairoa, what a releaf getting it all back together. Fingures crossed for a succesfull test.
I am looking forward to the next installment :spiel:

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1160 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-08-22 5:10:17

Thanks for the vibes, guys. A little late but really appreciated.

Unfortunately, the news I must start this update with is not pretty good news at all regarding personal health issues and of course about the Merkabah, though I must confess that I was aware that sooner or later something was going to brake, it always does when you force the machine near its limits.

The thing is that the orthopeditian, a friend of mine and old classmate, asked me to do an MRI, and it showed that the left knee was f***ed up. The meniscus had a complex breaking and many other little but meaningful traumatic diagnostic issues. Ops.
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You know there is something wrong when someone puts an arrow on your images pointing towards a blurred structure or a bizarre stain, but when it reads “breaking”, you are certain that it is severe.

No more running for Pairoa. Most likely forever. Hmm…

Fortunately, though, I had not to quit my fitness routine, swimming and, more importantly, bike and dirtbike riding. That was veeery good news.

There were also problems with the Merkabah, as highly expected, but let me continue with the story that involves the workshop, the truck, the new house and the whole life.

Ramón, the builder, finished a deal he had with his previous employer and at some point he resumed the work on our house. There were, and still are, many jobs to complete.

One of the most important and urgent tasks was to build the base structure for the granite boards of the kitchen furniture.

After a couple of days the island was in position and so almost all of the bench.
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I needed my father to complete the wooden part of the job and the definitive installation of the granite, so Ramón installed the old sink simply applying the steel sergeants and connected it to the drain while waiting for the old man to arrive. Hmm…

Gabriel, Ramón’s son, was commited with the painting of the shed/workshop, and he worked a lot trying to do it as fast as posible, with me after him urging him to do it properly… and fast too.
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The next time I went to the shop I connected everything electric and air driven to the gearbox and made sure the truck was safely placed on the stands as I wanted - and hoped - to make all six wheels spin like hell this time.
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The mighty V8 cranked at the first turn and spew a lot of smoke, protesting for the long pause since the last time. Slowly, very slowly, the air pressure built up and I tried to move the shift lever with the clutch pedal stuck to the bottom. Felt good, but could not engage, again, reverse nor any of the low gears. The rear wheels spinned like crazy on high range but not in low. It was pretty weird.

I made a few tries and stopped, more than anything because many protesting voices rose from the office. There had been a mistake, and I could not figure it out where or when. Did I make something wrong, again? Clearly… but what? I paid pretty much attention to every detail of the assembly of the box this time.

Checked for strange noises, loose connections, the high-low valve connections, etcetera. The winter sun went down and we had to go. I was disappointed but, more than anything, I was puzzled. The Merkabah was not happy.

The next morning, Gabriel finished to paint the kennel and was applying some more paint on the container. There was still the roof of the terrace and the front and the doors of the workshop to go, but it looked pretty good already. In gray paint the house/shop ensemble was barely visible from the street, and almost completely disappeared from sight at noon. Good.
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After lunch, the guys from the plant nursery came and planted the trees that we had ordered one week before. I had made quite a bit of holes for more than thirty trees, but they ran short of some of them and some of the holes remained empty. Carmen would have been pretty happy, if it was not for the lacking magnolia tree.
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And, finally, Eduardo, my brother-in-law, gave the go to the building of his house next door. Ramón would be the builder and Eduardo himself would supervise the build.

Only then, Ramón officialy tracked the terrain and began to measure on where to put the foundations.
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At the shop, when I could get there, I knew I had two problems: one with the gears and one with the ranges. I went after the high-low range valve as the first suspect at hand. If there was a problem with the range the valve needed to be checked. Too long standing waiting for the revival of the gearbox, could have it been ruined somehow?
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I took it out and made a thourough check to see how it performed, and it was okay. Cleaned it up and put it back into place. Nope, it was not the valve.
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Got a call and had to leave without an answer to the problem.

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1161 Beitrag von Madoxen » 2021-08-22 10:56:00

Hey i had hoped that it was all going to go smoothly this time, realy hope you find a quick solution.

Sorry to hear that your knee is kaput, it is something i am familia with.

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1162 Beitrag von tooFATtoDRIVE » 2021-08-23 22:32:46

Everytime Pairoa posts on here, it is a wealth of knowledge with great pictures! Many thanks for that. Keep your posts coming as these are super interesting. The narrative is awesome too, pretty cool.

As for your knee issues, it is sad to hear it. However, as you mentioned, there are still other sports to follow, like your fitness routine, swimming and bike and dirtbike riding. Still plenty fun to be had!!!!

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1163 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-08-26 0:38:06

Hi, Madoxen: yes, it is not what I was expecting, but nothing has been smooth and clean or easily fixed regarding this project. But I have learned to keep calm, overcome problems and errors and self inflicted wounds, and look for solutions. Oh, I would really like to finish this, of course! but it is far from over.

Thanks for the encouragement, tooFATtoDRIVE. I have done many things wrong and hope others might take notice of them too and learn how NOT to do things. And yes, there is a lot still to practice and burn energy with.

Next day, the foundations of Eduardo’s house were clearly drawn on the ground. Looked like it was going to be fast, hopefully.
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Ramón also resumed the work on the garage/shop, and began to build the workbench and the shelf for the tools and stuff. I would finally be able to make some order and install the compressor, good.
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But, the inevitable but, he was a little distracted when descending the stairs of the main entrance of the house and put his feet in a hole and, suddenly, he was on the ground with a sprain of his right ankle, with severe pain. Everybody agreed that this was not the best moment for him to be grounded, of course.

That weekend I profited to fix Carmen’s intercom. I used the battery I still had left from the previous unfruitfull repair but, this time, I made a very distinguished approach and soldered the tiny wires making a lot of attention and preparing the whole assembly very carefully before any attempt of soldering.

This time it worked, and I replaced the dead battery with no big trouble.
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Tired of being stupidly locked down, we all profited to go out for a little ride when the restrictions eased up, and we went to the near northern mountains. It was a nice short trip, though the dryness made the whole place look like an arid desert. The few trees that still stood and gave nice shadow were too crowded because we were not the only ones to go out and enjoy freedom, so we rode back home early, not without really appreciating the moment and the dry but beautiful landscapes.
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Back to the Merkabah.

I decided, finally, to check the entire mechanism of the high and low cluster, so I unbolted the speedometer drive housing, took off the annulus lock of the big ball bearing and then, almost with tears in my eyes, unbolted and removed the planetary housing. I did not drain the oil as the level was supposedly below the level of the cover, and it was, luckily.
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Using the portable winch, this time, I took out the gear cluster and checked the heavy ensamble of steel to see if there was something wrong. Eduardo gave me a hand and checked the engaging mechanism, the fork, the sliding blocks, and everything looked, worked and was, supposedly, nominal.
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Had to go to work and left the checking incomplete.

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1164 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-08-26 0:54:03

The next day, Gabriel finished the painting of the shop/garage/shed. Now it was externally complete, and that was really good news. Ramón was at home, his home, complaining and fighting with his plaster boot.
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I cranked the engine and, using the clutch not letting the revs go up to avoid a major oil spill from the open gear housing, Eduardo checked the main shaft, the solar, and how it moved in relation with the shifting gears… and there was a still the problem of not engaging reverse. Hmm…

Eduardo pointed out that there was a confict between the shifting rod and the high-low air valve that I was not aware of because, when checking, I was always in the cabin and left the shifting lever in neutral when descending. Hmm… maybe the long shifting tube had been straightened too much and that caused the problem.
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I used all the tricks with the adjustment play to clear the conflict but, when checking again, with the engine running, did not work.

Checking this and that, time passed by and then we all had to leave. I had a bad feeling about how things were developing. I was sure that the gearbox was correctly assembled, so maybe there was a problem with the shifting rails inside the gearbox itself.

Eduardo’s house construction was progressing along with the building of the irrigation pond for the orchard. The excavator was very useful for this purpose and made things a lot easier when trasplanting the near 400 peach trees that needed to go to make room for the pond. It was also very good to have the excavator to trasplant the old oak tree and other trees that would have neither survived modernity.
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Back to the Merkabah, again.

I made the decision to take out the lateral cover of the gearbox to check the shifting rails, though I cranked the mighty V8 and tried to shift gears again, just to be sure that things had not magically fixed themselves during the night. No, they usually do not do that, Pairoa.

Went on with the plan and prepared the site to move the cover of the gearbox out a little to verify that the rails were correctly assembled. After making room in the surroundings and draining the oil, the gearbox was opened, again, and the synchronizers and the rings and the forks and all of it were checked. It looked and worked perfectly. Everything seemed to be okay. I closed the cover with only one bolt and went home.
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In the afternoon, when I was looking at the pictures of the first disassembly, I suddenly noticed that there was something wrong, a simply though pretty huge mistake that could explain the problems with the gearbox: the connector of the shifting shaft seemed to be connected the wrong way with the shifting strut. Plop.

I assembled the connector the wrong way.
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Checked with the last pictures of the truck and, yes, I screwed up once again. This time, though, I laughed a lot at my own stupidity and felt a big sense of relief. That, alone, could be the cause of the truck for not reversing, or engaging? I hoped so.

That weekend, they finally delivered all the promised trees and Carmen was particularly happy with the magnolia tree. The flowers blossomed a couple of days later, and they were really magnificent.
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1165 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-08-26 1:14:42

I was strongly discouraged from running, though I was authorized to ride hard trying not to hit the left knee, of course, and that’s what I did. I was happy to do it, and even happier to wash the bike out of all the dirt and mud.
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Then, when I could, I went to the shop with the big hope that everything would go right, for the first time in a long run. Took out the loose lateral cover and checked every component of it pretty carefully. Shifting between reverse and the crawler gear was very easily performed with the fingers. The shifting rails and gears and everything else inside the gearbox were okay, period.
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Prepared the new gasket, cleaned all for good and, with the help of Eduardo, closed the gearbox which is always a little tricky. Then, filled it up with oil which took me half an hour and... it was time to go.

Had to go to Santiago and profited the trip to pick the drone from the service store. Did I mention that I flew it into the trees and it went down over some pile of rocks and lost the camera and one of the motors? No? Well, they managed to resuscitate it and delivered an almost new drone for a little fistfull bucks.
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Repeat after me: I must not get the drone down because it will hurt.

The next working session at the shop, the first I did was to correct the position of the bloody shifting connector. I then crancked the mighty V8 and waited a little for my brother-in-law to assist me with the movements of the main shaft/solar, hidden from my position in the cabin.

Eduardo shouted that the gear was moving and that there were forward and reverse movements. Good.

He also said better not to close the rear planetary housing until finding what was the cause for the low gears not to work, but I decided later to close it anyway. Wrong.

Carmen came out protesting for the toxic exhaust gases that went into her office so the tests were over for the rest of the afternoon. Ops.

I installed and bolted the cover of the planetary housing on with the help of the portable winch, pretty easily this time, and then I put the odometer housing back in place.
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I did not fully tighten the bolts, though, always remembering the wise words of Don Pato: sometimes you gotta assemble four times the damn box until you got it right!

The construction of the irrigation pond continued while the building of Eduardo´s house was a little stuck due to Ramón’s injury to his ankle. The pond was really big and inviting for a training session with the dirt bike. Unfortunatelly, after a few rounds I was informed that there probably may be problems if the inspectors found bike tracks on the sides and slopes of the pond. So, no more bike riding on the pond, hmm…
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1166 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-08-26 1:45:36

Well, not as expected, when the Merkabah roared the next day and the air pressure built up, I still could only take the high gears out from the gearbox and the low gears engaged only for a brief instant before going to neutral no matter if the puller piston was adjusted and working properly. Hmm… I was very disappointed, and Eduardo reminded me his last famous words: I told you, Pairoa.

So, I shrugged, and started to rethink what was done, what was left undone, and so on. Oh, I was pretty tired.

Back to the workshop a few days later, I stared a few moments at the big and bulky lot of steel and started to clear the area and disassemble the gear housing for the third time. Life is hard, especially when you do not listen to your brother-in-law.
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I opened a few milimeters the cover to check from the outside if the moving parts ranges were apropriate, always hoping to find something wrong that explained why the low range did not work, but everything seemed to be okay.
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We found, though, that without putting the speedometer cover on, the gear cluster moved back and forth two milimeters and that amount of play made a noticeable difference when engaging and disengaging the low range synchronizer when checking it by hand. Did not have to do that.
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The problem is the lack of locking of the detents of the synchronizer ring when pushing it to the low-side! was one of the hardly sustained hypotheses, but inspecting the old ring we found that the detents had no physical blocking mechanisms on either side of the synchronizing mechanism, only in the neutral central position, which was never the case because the gearbox worked or in low or in high ranges, and not in neutral.

There was a problem with the adjustment of the gears, there was a tolerance/play problem? Most likely.

So, out with the gear cluster again, check it again, measure everything, compare, and argue what is good and what might be wrong, the typical do you see this movement here? No, I can’t see a f%+#ng sh#t! type of discussion.
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I mounted the planetary cluster on the cover and fixed the synchronizer disc, blocking the shaft for the and aft play by bolting on the odometer housing too, that way we could check if such play had an actual role in the disengaging trick of the low range in the actual setting.
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We checked it by hand, took pictures, made measurements and guessings, and finally the creative team had to surrender to the reality: there was something with the play, but we could not determine what was the problem.
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Unfortunately, no manual from ZF for this gearbox is available to check tolerances and admissible play for the components. If any of the readers of this page knows where to find the ZF 5 S (K) -110 GPA gearbox manual please, please tell, shout, phone, email or write a letter to me. It would be very much appreciated.

Even if there was no progress for the mechanical problems of the Merkabah, at least her new home construction and outfitting had been resumed as Ramón could firmly stand on both his feet again. Also, the building of the pond was complete and the building of Eduardo's house went on. All in all, these were rough but good days.
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Many greetings to you all. Always keep the faith. Everything is going to be allright.

Pairoa

CesenaCar3-1992
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1167 Beitrag von CesenaCar3-1992 » 2021-08-30 13:41:39

Hi Pairo I am an MB truck mechanic in Italy, congratulations for the fantastic reportage of the repair of the whole vehicle, from the mechanics to the really great all-round bodywork 😊 I have been following you for a few years and a few years ago I overhauled a ZF 5 S group 90 GPA mounted on a vehicle with crane and tipper very similar to yours, I joined this forum to ask you if you can send me a picture of the gear plate with all the codes. With a bit of luck I think I will be able to trace a complete workshop manual for overhaul 😊 I'm waiting for your news

Nosilentrunning
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1168 Beitrag von Nosilentrunning » 2021-08-30 18:04:56

Hi Pairo,
Unfortunately, no manual from ZF for this gearbox is available to check tolerances and admissible play for the components.
Maybe it helps to again specify what has been changed, and what is still original? If I remember right, engaging the high/low gears was not a problem when the gearbox-journey started.
So, if only new parts were replaced, they should be in spec (with like, a 99.X% chance I suppose). I'm not sure if during assembly, anything can be misplaced by pressing it too far/not far enough - are you 100% confident it's the play?

In a previous post you mentioned the contact between shifting rod and high-low air valve. Maybe the gears need constant air pressure to stay engaged? Is the valve OK?

A more detailed picture (maybe with a finger pointing to what's not staying engaged) might also be helpful to help from "far away" :spiel:
SK1729AF mit OM442 - WSK400 - ZF16S190 auf 14R20 Hutchinson

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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1169 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-09-02 1:40:07

Sorry for the delay in answering, guys, and thank you very much for your help.

These have been pretty busy days, with a lot of regular work. It is always like this when springtime is coming; don’t know why, but it’s true.

@ CesenaCar3-1992: the gearbox coding plate has been lost through the ages along with the warranty, though if there still exists a repair or servicing manual of any of the 5 S series it would anyways be of much help.

@ Nosilentrunning: the conflict between the parts resolved when putting the shifting connector in the right position. About the plays and tolerances it was a matter of following the same path you suggested: what was new, what was the same, could have been some misplacement? Maybe some damage?
Well… let me continue as there has been some interesting developments and/or delays in the whole plan… if such a plan actually exists.

Eduardo brought the generator we bought for the irrigation pumps and as backup for both houses in case of a blackout. It was a great beast that had to be kept safe and dry, so it needed an ad hoc place to stay until the building of its stall was complete.
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Naturally, the best place at hand was the garage/shop/shed, so it went inside along with all the construction stuff for the building of Eduardo’s house. Unfortunately for the poor Pairoa there was not enough room for him to play with his toys or make any major work as there was literally no room for that. The bikes were almost pressed one against the other and taking them out every morning to go to work was not a simple move.
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This we do for the family, with a smile.

Talking about family, I had to go to Santiago and spent a few minutes at visiting the Casales at their shop. Francisco was going on with the building of the storage boxes of the MAN. He was doing a very good job, and the quality of the work was superb.

He had bought a couple of years ago a mega hyper gigantic press bender for a couple of bucks in an auction and it was very easy to work with it. Of course, he offered me to use it when I was ready to build the boxes. Hope it would be sooner than later.
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Francisco’s office is like any mastermind’s place you could expect to find, with an incredible amount of organized disaster in which he knows exactly where each and every single piece of paper or screwdriver is located.
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Work prevented me from stepping on the workshop for some days, during which they began to cover the pond with the PET membrane. They worked pretty fast and pretty well.
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Those days the peaches and almost all the trees began to flourish at once. It is always a great spectacle and the country was filled with many exquisite profumes of flowers.

It was expected that there still were left many days of extreme cold so it was a little early for the plants to flourish, but nature has its own moods.
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Re: Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

#1170 Beitrag von pairospam » 2021-09-02 1:47:53

A couple of days after they began to work, the covering of the irrigation pond was complete at the last noon time. They then began to build the water intake to fill the pond. Then, we will bring the crocodiles in.
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When it was the turn of the Africa Twin, she refused to start as the battery, after a little more than two and a half years, said it was over. I ordered a new one and she was then very happy to go on a ride again and get rid of all the dust she was cumulating inside the crowded garage/shop. Oh, I really like her.
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When I finally was able to forget a little about the regular work and play again mechanics, I took the gear cluster of Spare II to the shop to inspect and to compare and see what that heavy mass of steel parts could teach me about the heavier one from the Merkabah.
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I was reluctant to disassemble the gear cluster and ruin another zero km ball bearing if I was not absolutely convinced that I could fix something without having to disassemble the bloody thing.

So, I took apart the foranean cluster and measured and inspected everything, again, to see if there was a chance that any play or misplacement of spacers, locks, rings or parts could cause any problem with the engaging and locking mechanism of the low gears.
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No, it was not a matter of play, there had to be another reason. Eduardo approached and urged me to disassemble the cluster of the Merkabah and assured that we would find the problem there, inspecting the actual thing.

I would not disobey the one who knows, at least not twice, so I shrugged and got the rear cover out of the box, once again, and then the gear cluster. I was getting very used to do it so everytime I handled them it was easier and faster and the initial fear and fatigue disappeared completely.

Extracting the speedometer gear was as easy as always warming it up a little, but taking the big roller bearing out was a totally different thing. This time it was Eduardo himself to give me a hand and we managed to extract it without any damage, except for the aching of our hands.
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This time he urged me to disassemble even the crown and only leave untouched the planetary carrier. There was quite a bit of filthy oil and rust in between the pieces so it was a good thing to do.
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We inspected the inner bearings and he judged that the races had enough wear to deserve pensioning. To me they looked okay but, WTF.

Eduardo asked me and himself what could have happened when I closed the planetary housing the time I broke the cover, what sort of damage could it have suffered, which part. I followed his thinking and remembered also that I actually had the gearbox work for a brief period of time, and it did it not pretty smoothly.

He charged me with the job of cleaning for good all the pieces (who else?) and went to the office.

I was at the oily job when he returned, with that odd look, and asked me to show him the synchronizer body. I handled it to him after cleaning the inner face and he almost shouted: this is it!

There were minor though pretty clear signs of wear on the contact surface that were even more noticeable when compared with the synchronizer body of Spare II.
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“This is your problem, Pairoa. The piece somehow suffered when you pressed the cover, and this tiny amount of wear is enough to disengage the self blocking mechanism of the low gears”. And then followed a long letany of I told you to disassemble long ago… you lost a lot of time… you could be driving her at this moment… and so on. He enjoyed it, and I had no choice but to allow him to hurt me.

I promised that I would follow his advice more often, but if this didn’t fix the problem I would kick his ass twice a minute for a couple of weeks.

It was not coincidence, of course, that I had got a whole truck and a whole gearbox and I had a lot of interchangeable gears, including a pretty healthy synchronizer body, between the Merkabah and Spare II. This was the Big Boss helping, as always.

And this is where I stand at the minute, waiting for my shift to end to go and assemble the gear cluster and to test, first, if it really works and then close the planetary housing for good.

Thanks for the good vibes. I am counting on them.

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