A big thanks to everyone who came out. We had a wonderful time and it was good to see old friends. Especially thanks to Thomas Foster for finding a venue and taking the lead on reserving the grounds. I think we’ll be back. In fact we’ve already started planning next year’s event over here:
We’ve seen a lot of new faces in the group over the years, but some have stayed on. There were several more that wanted to attend but had vehicle troubles or health issues that interfered right at the last minute. Still, for everyone that did attend, we had plenty (PLENTY) of good food, demonstrations and in-depth discussions. Some of us stayed up way too late, and everyone got up early. The kitchen facility was excellent, and the showers were just fine. Billy brought a grain puffer cannon contraption, which was very loud and very fun to watch. Most of our food was heated up in a rocket stove oven, also from the Norths. Wayne gave rides up and down the twisty backroads for anyone who would ride with him. And we ran my electric wood chunker for awhile, which is always fun.
Yeah, I was showing off my 5-minute fix to a 4+ years long problem. This old van just refuses to kick the compressor on. Still fully charged with the original freon, no leaks, all the wiring is good. Troubleshot this one many times over the years, I think it’s an issue with an ECU pin. One day it was really hot and I just really wanted some A/C before a trip. So I snaked a piece of 12/2 through the firewall, wired up a light switch, and bypassed the compressor relay. Now, you better turn it off before it freezes up the coils, also during stoplight idling in hot weather (no idle compensation), and when the vehicle is off (battery drain). Otherwise it works great. Wife is happy, and she can operate it reliably. This is literally what keeps this 380K van on the road, she won’t drive it without air.
Another fun quirk, I have to reach under the dash to change the valve from hot to cold. The cable broke, and you can’t get them anymore. No big deal, twice a year I change it over. Never really use it in the halfway spot anyhow. I can do it leaning over from the drivers seat.
you would need to put a meter on the ecu pin to see if it is sending a signal. corrosion, could affect it, or the pin could be non-functioning, but usually that is because it was wired wrong at some point or shorted, since you probably didn’t mess with it until after there was an issue. It might be a thermostat circuit that isn’t working. Like there is probably one on the compressor to make sure it doesn’t overheat, and there might be one on the coils somewhere that detects if it is too cold. They make a ‘resettable’ thermal fuse that basically has wax in it and when it gets too hot it melts the wax and breaks the circuits. then when it solidifies it works again, but those go bad after a while. But you probably checked all that.
THANKS for the nice pictures of truley dedicated wood gas vehicle souls, i would have liked to been there this year, THOUGH i am sure you folks had good times, testing tuning and Happy all went well.
Thank you Thomas , and every one who organized and helped with this get together .
We geatly enjoyed the time ,good to see Wayne and all who came very well worth the time and drive
The Lord Willing we will see you all next year.
I think we did. I’m not sure I remember what it was. But I think it will be posted in the other thread as soon as it is finalized. First weekend in October I believe…Thomas was going to verify
