"Wheel Alignment"

Before the Thanksgiving break I was given the assignment of checking the wheel alignment on a Freightliner truck in our shop. After being previously shown by our instructor, watching some videos and going over "A Common Man's Guide" Me and another student teamed up and began to the Alignment Mastery sheet we had printed out.

The first step was to set the Toe-in on the truck.

After measuring the to see how much we needed to adjust the Toe-in, which turned out to be 1.25 inches





We were then able to adjust the tie rods and get our Toe-in to the proper specification.

We adjusted the tie rods on both sides 5/8 of an inch bring us to what should be a zero angle in the Toe-in.







After getting the steering axle adjusted we then moved on to checking and setting the thrust angle on both the forward drive axle and the rear drive axle.

Once realizing that the thrust angle was off about half an inch, we were able to get underneath and adjust the angle back to zero.

This assignment was pretty simple, however before the lesson in the shop and the discussions with my peers about wheel alignments. It would have been much more time consuming and frustrating to do this assignment. This was my first wheel adjustment on a heavy duty truck and most of what I learned was fairly new, especially getting down and turning the wrenches and making the adjustment. This was an awesome little assignment and has taught me that without to much difficulty I can perform or help perform a wheel alignment and know what a thrustline is and how to tell if it is true along with a lot more I wasn't to sure about before.

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Yesterday I got the opportunity to go to the Pacific Marine Expo in Seattle Washington with my instructor and peers from the diesel technology program I am in. I have never been, which is kind of hard for me to believe considering I fished for so many years. Anyways it was an awesome experience and I will be going next year. There were so many vendors there was no way I was able to talk to all of them. I saw some really cool new technology and was able to talk to some people I have in the past really wanted to talk too. The guys at TCI scales and weighing equipment answered a question that has been bothering me since about 2004. The guys at Foss Maritime were really nice and gave me some good insight on how they started out at Foss and if I was interested in possibly working for Foss where I might want to start. Oh and I had an awesome conversation with one guy at Marco Global about there latest powerblocks and pot haulers, I have to say there B33 2 speed powerblock is pretty awesome. Like I said before this was an awesome experience and I look forward to going next year. Here a few pictures from this year.

This is a L250 GE Tier 4 Marine Engine being on show by Hatton Marine. This 12 cylinder engine is able to put out 5000 horse power.....
These Engines are being ran in ferries and large tugs here in the northwest.

This is a Reintjes WAF 3445K gear box with a 3.036:1 reduction.
These are also used in some Washington state ferries.

This is a Perkins M300C 1106 series marine engine.
This engine is a medium duty engine and has a rating of 225kw @ 2400rpm and a peak torque of 1050 @ 1400rpm....
These engines also have a world wide fuel tolerance ranging  from biofuel, kerosene and aviation fuel to standard diesel.

This is a Tier 3 John Deere marine generator being shown by Pacific Power Products.
The engine is a inline 4 cylinder.
The Generating system is Hanco and has a rating of 60 Hz @ 1800 rpm. and a kWe of 154prime/169max.

This is a Yanmar engine 8LV-350C 350 MHP with Hamilton 241 jet.
This is the lightest weight in its class and has 995lbs of Bobtail.

This is a Tier 3 C7.1 Marine Generator Set being shown by Caterpillar.
This is an inline 4 cylinder engine with a rating of  50Hz to 60Hz at 1500 to 1800 rpm.

This is a Hydro cooler or Refrigerated Sea Water System being shown by Pacific West Refrigeration.
This particular system was a 25 ton RSW system.

Air cans, crimping and a problem with the Kenworth.

This Last week I have spent a lot of time online reading and watching videos about air brakes and air brake systems. I also spent some time in the shop taking apart air cans and working on an assingment that had to do with exactly what I had been studying.

New air can for both park and service brakes that I took apart to see what was inside.

  I have to say I jumped right on trying to figure out why the parking side of the air brake system on the Kenworth was getting air when the parking brakes were released. From my research and many of you tube videos previous to this assignment, I knew that the problem would have to be in the air cans. After a class discussion on the problem and how if the diaphragms in the air cans had been compromised then air would be leaking from the can itself. That not being the case I was however still drawn to the air cans for the simple fact that it was the only place I though the systems could be mixed.

The problem was air exhausting at a constant rate from both the Relay valve(above) and the ABS modulator valve(below) exhaust ports.

 With air in the system I was able to pinch off a few air lines to locate the the air can I believed to be malfunctioning. As you can see I did locate it and it was at the rear front right air can. After taking apart the air can I found that there was a small hole drilled in the wall separating the service and parking chambers, simulating a bad seal on the push rod. Problem identified.

I was also given the opportunity this week to crimp some air hose fittings as seen below.

 I think the main thing I learned this week was that it really pays off to do the research and understand the system to be able to find the problem and create a solution. Oh and also if you don't tighten the nut all the way when crimping, the insert will stay in the fitting. Learned that one the hard way. :-)

Week 6
Hours 150ish

A "clicking" near the wheel ends?

At the end of this last week, me and my peers were given the assignment of "finding the clicking near the wheel ends of the of the Kenworth in our shop when the key was turned on." Knowing that this clicking would have to come from the electrical side of the air brake system, I was immediately drawn to the ABS part of the braking system. After doing a little research, I was able to identify the actual valve making the clicking and researched the part number. This lead me to the Bendix web site where I was able to identify the valve/s in question as the M-32 ABS modulator valve.  Valve shown below.

M-32 ABS modulator valve Part # 300386N replace with Part # 801666

This is the print out of the service data sheet I used to help understand just exactly what was going on inside the ABS modulator valve.

At this point I began to remove the ABS modulator from the truck so I could get an actual look at the diaphragms, springs, ports and solenoids or the insides of the valve.

The delivery lines that go to the air cans at each wheel end per side.

 The first step was to remove the air lines and electrical lines connected to the valve

.

The supply line to the ABS modulator from the Relay valve.

The three pin electrical connector that supply's power to the solenoids.

After removing the ABS modulator from the truck, I began to take it a part.

This is the ABS modulator with the Exhaust port and solenoids removed.

The exhaust port cap

The two solenoids and there housing.

I think the main thing I learned from this assignment was what actually goes on inside one of these ABS modulators. Like how the solenoids are energized and move into the down position allowing the brakes to exhaust or how One solenoid is in the down position while the other is in the up position when the antilock application is held in position. There are lots of little details that go unnoticed and this assignment definitely clued me in on air brake and anti lock systems along with reminding me again that it is important to pay attention to small things and do the research and understand the system.

Week 7
Hours 180ish

Wheel Bearing Adjustment...

Over the last 2 weeks the main focus of me and my peers has been air brakes and air brake systems. To start of we were all asked to perform 10 wheel bearing adjustments and post about them and what we have learned.

This is a picture of the primary nut or inner nut being put on after wheel bearings and seals have been replaced.

After the inner nut has been tightened by hand the first step is to tighten it down to between 200 and 300 ft. lbs.

After the inner nut has been torqued down to spec (preloading the bearing), the inner nut will need to be backed off  one full turn and then torqued back down at 50 ft. lbs.

After the inner nut has been re tightened the spindle washer can be put on. You may need to re adjust the inner nut too line up the dowel pin.

Now the inner nut can be put on.

Once you have the outer nut has been hand tightened, it will need to be torqued down to between 300 and 400 ft. lbs.

The next step will be to test the free play in the wheel bearing adjustment. This will be done with a dial indicator.

The free play in the wheel bearing should be between .0005 in. and .005 in. the closer to 0 the better. 

I found wheel bearing adjustments to be very easy not too time consuming, it seemed I spent more time on getting the tire off and back on. I think what I will take away from this assignment for this part of the program is how important it is to preload bearings when called for, and how important free play is.

Starting and charging systems check, this was my main focus this last week. I was very sick the better part of the school week and wasn't able to attend class. So what I did do was watch countless videos on YouTube of people performing starting and charging system checks on various types of vehicles, tractors, heavy equipment etc. When I finally felt better, I decided to practice what I had been watching. I spent some time on Saturday at my moms house performing starting and charging systems checks on 2 Honda accords a Mazda 626 and  a Toyota camry.

This picture shows me testing the battery prior to any other tests to make sure I have a battery that is in a good state. As you can see the reading on my volt meter 12.98v is telling me that the battery is in a good state of charge.

This shows the one of the leads going to the pos. side of the alternator as I test the voltage drop across the pos. cable.

This picture along with the the one to the right show me testing the voltage drop between the pos. battery post to the pos. post on the alternator. Again I had a very except-able reading on the volt meter of .166v.

 This picture shows the reading I got while testing the voltage drop on neg. side of the starter and battery connection.Once again the reading on the volt meter of .024v is good.













Where are my gloves......

This picture shows the reading given while testing the charging voltage at the battery. 14.14v is again good.











I got to say by the end of the day on Saturday, I was feeling pretty damn confident in being able to test smaller vehicles starting and charging systems. However I haven't done a starting and charging systems check on a Heavy Truck, this will be my task for this next week.

Another thing I happen to do was take a 25 question pretest on Air brakes. I DID NOT PASS. 15 out of 25. So what did I learn? That I need to spend a little time in the books and on the web and figure out some of the things I don't understand about air brake systems. I can already tell that what I do know is only the tip of the what I don't know iceberg.






Week 2
Hours 14ish

It is nice too finally be back in class, summer quarter was fast and not a whole lot of hands on. So yes it nice to be back in class and listen to discussions and put my hands to work rather then just my brain.

In the first week of class there was a lot of discussion on doing voltage drop testing and finding parasitic loads using a volt meter and amp clamp. We also where shown how to do starting and charging system testing using a volt meter and amp clamp. after watching a few videos and watching Jeff show the whole class on a test board, I was feeling comfortable enough to go home and do a little testing on my roomates 1954 VW baha bug. Everything seemed to be in order except for the green death.

We also went over wire gauge sizes and looked at several different types of connectors and terminals. Below is a picture of some Weather Pack and Deutsch terminal testing leads I made in class. I was also able to practice crimping some battery cable ends.

I really enjoyed watching Jeff re-solder a circuit board for another students BMW. I have soldered many things but never a circuit board. Needless to say I think this is something I would like too and need to try.

Week 1
Hours 20