My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

[Captain Echidna Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Captain Echidna]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

Sounds good. Tallows are a PITA, but they are more easily avaible (where I am they are anyway)
Mind you of course, biodiesel is a good way to go with them, as tallows become easier to work with. I did have the tallows set in a line, blew a hose off the pump and it then procceded to spray oil around the shed. Easy enough to get rid of, I sold the house.

[Guest Close David]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

She's Home!!!

It's taken over a week but Helga has finally moved in!
Grabbed a car trailer from the local servo at 7:30 tonight, shot up to the central Coast in a new top of the line Discovery mate brought with him (veeeery plush!) and was back home in 3 hours flat. Unloaded Helga in the side street so at least she had the dignity of coming in the driveway under her own steam..... Which immediately had the nosey neighbors out the front checking out what the unfamiliar racket was. Get used to it 'ya Sticky Beaks!!

The rain held off to a tolerable drizzle while we were loading her and she fired up first crank after sitting a week so she could be driven straight on the trailer, which nessitated reassurances to friend as to why exactly we were towing her

My mate and I were a little perturbed that the trailer had no tie down points on the thing whatsoever. Just a winch at the front. I drove her right forward to the stops and then tightened up the winch cable. I did take a few tie downs with me so I got under the trailer and anchored then to the trailer frame and attached them to the tow point and the tow bar on Helga.

It may not have been nessacary to tie her down ( She probably didn't mind, I hear Bondage is pretty big in Germany ) but the peace of mind was well worth it especially with the fact that it was raining and in my experience, wet steel and rubber don't afford a lot of grip.

I noticed tonight she has no dash lights or demister so I'll check for blown fuses and go from there if I have to. Also the windscreen leak appears to be substantial on the passengers side and I have noticed a patch of rust behind the battery holder so I'll have to check if it is the windscreen, a rust hole or a missing grommet that is allowing Helga's front passenger floor to be the only place in Australia currently under flood.

Anyway, after a very leisurely journey home on a quiet freeway passing the time reminiscing with a life long friend and son snoring loudly in the back seat, Helga is safely home. I'm hoping tomorrow will be relatively dry, so I can drain the tank and fix that problem so she can start her new life of prestige and glory running kids back and forth to school, sports training and fetching home the shopping.

For such loyal service I shall lavish upon her luxuries she hasn't probably seen much of since her last 275,000Km documented service like fresh oil, clean soothing bio fuel, grease, degreases, wash and polishes and general Maintainance.

Now shes home, the story will really begin!

[Captain Echidna Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Captain Echidna]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

Great news.
The dash lights probably has a rehostat behind the trip meter reset which needs fiddling. The whole instrument panel needs to be removed, this can be done by sliding two hook shaped wires down either side of the instrument panel and behind the whole lot to it out (it is only held in with friction) If fiddling the rehostat wire dosent work, it can be bypassed with a piece of wire.

[Guest Close David]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

Happy Days!

Despite having plenty of work to do, I couldn’t resist the temptation to go and have a play with Helga this afternoon and get her running right.

First thing I did was swap the fuel lines. While I had them off I noticed some strange looking fuel dripping from the line so I went and fetched a small diaphragm pump I have and pumped some of the fuel into a jar. The pump struggled to pull any fuel through the pickup line but what came through was very obviously just wrong! I was rather happy when I reversed the pickup lines and the pump literally squirted the “fuel” through. The liquid I drew was light yellow in colour no doubt from the 10L of B100 I put in her, but was extremely cloudy and completely non transparent. The smell of the 2L of metholated spirits I put in was also very evident. It may have done its job because there was obviously a lot of water mixed in with whatever fuel had been there before I came along.

I tightened up the reversed lines, fired Helga up and she is running sweet for about 20 minutes while I happily listen to her distinct Diesel clatter and pondered exactly what the heck is in her tank.
After revving the engine and becoming quite satisfied the problem was finally fixed, I grabbed my wallet and sunnies and headed off round the block. Helga went very well with no problems at all….. until I was thinking all was fixed and she started losing power again. Same as always, runs like a watch right up till the time she dies. I pulled over by the side of the road, kept her going… Just, and managed to get her going enough to limp round the corner and back into the drive way where she once again expired.
Shortly after she died, I fired her up again once more and she sat there purring away with not a hiccup for around another 15 minutes till I shut her off.

Quite heart fallen at this latest disappointment, I figured that I had only one more possibility although I didn’t think it was all that likely….The fuel.
Maybe there was still a slug of water sitting on the bottom of the tank or something that was being pulled up now and then and was blocking the fuel pickup although given how she idled for so long, I put this as a long shot.

I wandered out to get the sample of the fuel I collected to take some pics and have another look. By this time the sample had been sitting about an hour and I noticed a white soap like looking substance covering the bottom of the jar I carefully cleaned before I filled it. The layer was maybe 3 mm deep and as well as the soap looking material, also had a lot of dirt and grit in it. Obviously the amount of material that has settled out of about 250 Ml of fuel is rather significant.

With Pickup time for the kids looming, it was off to fetch them with a detour on the way home to pick up some supplies to implement the final strategy to get Helga running marathons rather than just short sprints.

Being too anxious to do the job properly and braze some copper pipe to the lid of a 20L drum as a fuel pickup, I simply drilled a couple of tightish holes and pushed the tube through. To make sure the pickup tube didn’t roll up in the drum, I fashioned a support out of some coat hanger wire and used this to make sure the hose would pull from the bottom. The return line was just placed in the hole and angled so the fuel would take a gentle path down the side of the drum to avoid aerating the 10L of fuel in it.

The lines were run through a hole in the firewall to the drum which I sat on the passenger’s seat floor and held firm by sliding the seat up hard against it.
Upon firing Helga up, she quickly pulled the bio/veg mix through and didn’t miss a beat in purging the fuel system.
After a good long idle and revving of the engine till she got up to temp, with heart in mouth I set off up the hill out of my driveway hoping Helga would at least take me to the next side street off the main road before expiring.

I made the side street and started circling the back streets not game to venture far from home lest the return journey be by Shanks Pony. After about the 5th lap of the block I set the trip meter and started making bigger circles of the local area.
At the 10 KM mark I pulled into the servo and pumped up the tires with Helga happily idling away with just a feint haze coming from her nether regions giving off an aroma that many people I am sure thought was coming from the KFC just down the road.

After venturing a couple of KM down the road from home, Helga did herself proud with a faultless run right back up the main road touching the breakneck speed of 80 Km/h (which never felt so fast) and back home to the cheers of my kids who had camped out on the front fence waiting to see if dad was coming home with his new Maiden or as a solo act. After one more run round the block with excited kids in the back seat, it seems Helga’s first obstacle; running for more than 5 Km, has been conquered.

All this trouble caused by a load of dodgy fuel. The sample I have doesn’t look a lot unlike some I saw at the bio picnic so maybe Helga could be another victim of VP or similar rubbish imitation fuel.
I have to say that this is a huge relief in knowing that the problem was something simple because if this hadn’t been the solution, I would have been out of places to look. I did notice when driving Helga with the clear lines on the tank that there are a stream of tiny bubbles coming through on the return line with some larger ones appearing after full acceleration runs. I’m pretty sure all the fuel lines are as tight as I can make them so either I’m overlooking something, some cavitation is normal or that bolt on the top of the fuel filter which seems to have a mashed washer is leaking air.

In any event, she now runs as she should which is a great relief and will be ready to be pressed into daily Taxi service and shopping trolley service in the next couple of days.
Next thing will to find where the torrent of water is coming from in the region of the front passengers foot well which I think is too excessive just to be the windscreen.

I problem down, 5,483 to go!

[Guest Close David]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

Rehostat?
Ya don't say! Not knowing it even had one, the problem could just be it's turned right down. Been there, done that on unfamiliar cars before!
Thanks again Chris, I'll see how that goes.

I was sitting in the car today with the owners manual trying to familiarise myself with all the controls and features but I missed that one.

[Captain Echidna Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Captain Echidna]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

I first had to work out where the rehostat was, before working out mine didn't work. It is a common problem.
Glad to see it is running and performing important tasks, like showing the kids you can do things with your hands.
I did wonder, this sounds remarkably like my boat, which would work, then under load would stop, and after a while go again. It was a fuel blockage rather than poor fuel which stopped it. Dont get me wrong, what is in your tank I suspect only loosley falls under the definition of diesel fuel, but could be another problem.

[Guest Close David]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

Had a bit more disappointment with Helga this morning.
I went to start her up to move her to pull the tank out and couldn’t get her to fire. I think I may have put a bit too much WVO in with the bio but it was still liquid and flowing though she just wouldn’t light up on it. I purged the air with the diaphragm pump I have, (that has to be the way to do that job!!) to no avail despite leaning on the glow plugs pretty heavily which all seem to work.

I purged the system again with some bio and after a little coaxing, she came to life again. I was under the impression that as long as there was veg oil flowing they would start, so either I’m wrong or something else with Helga is.

First job was to get the substance imitating Fuel out of the tank which was accomplished rather efficiently with the use of a 1” electric pump with the pickup hose shoved straight down the filler neck. Can’t do that with an unleaded car! Even at the rapid rate the pump pulled the fuel out, the various gunk could be seen going through the pipe.

I Jacked up Helga’s back end and had a good look round and was pleased with what I saw. No leaks from the diff, only a tiny bit of moisture from the shocks and some dampness that was obviously coming from the disintegrating fuel hose as pictured below.
The exhaust has a hole in the pipe just before the resonator so I might just cut the pipe back and put a piece of straight pipe in place of the resonator which I don’t think will be too loud.

The hose on the pickup was held in place by a clamp that was facing a direction that would have made the last time it was accessed before the diff was installed at the factory. A not too strenuous pull snapped the hose and the Pickup was unscrewed while I avoided the forewarned shower of fuel that defied being sucked up through the fuel lines.

Once I had the pickup out, I was pretty amazed the car was able to run al all. The gunk was caked on at least 3mm thick and was a rather interesting substance, rather rubber like in consistency. I couldn’t see any place at all that would have allowed fuel to go through to the pickup so how the thing managed to run at all like this is beyond me. It was not a case of debris clogging the pickup progressively; the thing appeared to be solidly plugged.

There was a lot of softer gunk on the bottom of the tank which was both a white soap like substance and rust colored as well. With the tank removed, I took the 20L drum out of the car and filled it with bio and coupled up the lines to the fuel lines now left exposed with the removal of the tank. Helga’s range may not be real far with a 20L drum substituted for the fuel tank but is sure makes for more boot space.

Helga Fired right up again and purged the lines on her own with no problems and after a couple of test laps round the block, I came back home, washed the grease and stink of Diesel off myself and headed off to fetch the kids who were very excited to see I had brought Helga but my sons Remark of “ Do you have enough money for us all to get home if we have to catch the Bus Dad?” showed they still had some reservations about her.

Not only did we get home without a hiccup, but also a bit later got to baseball training and back . I was a little concerned about starting her again if she got cold but with 10 Sec on the glow plugs, she lit up first crank. Hopefully, I’ll enjoy a repeat performance in the morning.

Chris, I checked out the Rheostat adjustment but unfortunately, no joy. I’ll look at pulling the dash maybe on the weekend and bridging it.

[Tony From West Oz Vice Chairperson of WARFA Find all posts View Profile Close Tony From West Oz]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

You may also have had a vacuum developing in the fuel tank. While you are under there, replace the lines on the other side of the fuel tank as well as the main one from the strainer. Also check the tank vent under the rear passenger seat. It is a funny shaped rubber piece which slips on the enf of a fuel line ending in that location. Blow and suck thru it to verify tit is clean. There should be some resistance to flow starting in both directions.

[gwalker Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close gwalker]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

Your photos really add to the post. How about a picture of Helga and your new fuel tank setup.

I'm doing something similar but have rego coming up and not sure how the inspection will go with 25litre carboy sitting in the passenger well.
George

[Guest Close David]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

Hello George,

Big progress has now been made! The passenger no longer has to sit with their legs spread or their knees up round their ears!

The 20L oil tin is now sitting in the boot where the fuel tank was !

Not really much to see, just a drum with a couple of clear tubes coming out of it. I haven't got to cleaning the tank as yet, just came back from a workout with the dentist but Helga seems to be running well now she has clean fuel and can actually get some into her.

I was doing some measureing and thinking today and worked out it would be easy to put 3x25L plastic drums in the space where the original tank went. This would give a little more capacity than the original tank which I believe is 60L. Of course you could also get another 2, 25L drums on each side of the boot which would give you some decent range and still leave a reasonable amount of boot space.
I always just throw bags and stuff that isn't dirty on the back seat anyway.

Once I get Helga a bit cleaned up I'll take her out for her first Photo shoot. Several people have now commented what good condition she is in which only makes me roll my eyes thinking about what I know her to be really like.
Big difference between looking OK and Being in good condition that's for sure!


Tony, I'll certainly be replacing the hoses from the tank. I bought some fuel line in bulk the other day so I now have enough to replace every line on the car again, including the steel lines!
I have done them all on the front end and there isn't much left of the tank hosess to put back anyway now. When I was under the car yesterday I noticed the breather with the funnly little bell shaped fitting on the end so I'll test it is flowing before I pit the tank back in and thank you for the tip on that. I also noticed there is a breather that goes up underneath the filler neck but wasn't attached to the tank. I haven't traced it yet but is this for the Diff or the SLS ?

Tony, I haven't looked into the finer details of doing an SVO conversion yet but I'm just wondering, where do you put the pollock valve on the cars you have converted, Under the bonnet or in the boot?

[Tony From West Oz Vice Chairperson of WARFA Find all posts View Profile Close Tony From West Oz]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

The hose in the filler neck is the drain so that your fuel does not spill out over the paintwork. It goes thru the boot behind the RHS side panel and drips near the drivers side rear tyre. Put a cup of water thru it to check.

I put the pollak valve(s) under the bonnet, near the spring mount for the front suspension, close to the IP. I put the heat exchanger on the inside of the wheel arch behind the headlight (passenger side of (RHD car)

[Guest Close David]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

As incredible as it may seem, it looks like Helga has gained herself a following so for all those that have rang and emailed me, I thought I would post an update and a pic of the Lady herself.

The last few days have been pleasingly uneventful with Helga slipping comfortably into family life. She has now won the trust of the Cook and the kids who are no longer making sure they have comfortable walking shoes on and change for Bus fare before we take Helga out.

I still have'nt got round to cleaning out the fuel tank but I did upgrade the drum in the boot to a plastic one so I can see how much fuel is left. At this stage, she dosent look real economical but that could be due to the longer warm up times When I go out to check she is going to fire up or if I have to grab the keys to the other car.

I am noticeing the temprature seems to fluctuate wildly though I'm not sure if it is the thermostat or something to do with the gauge/ electrics. OFten the gauge will sit just off 40 then jump a little above 80 then down again. Generally happens after taking off from the lights and when going along she always reads cold. I have noticed the radiator hose on the left when facing the engine is surprisingly cool when the other hose is too hot to touch so perhaps the thermostat has jammed open. as soon as I can find a gasket for it I'll open the housing and put a new thermo in for good measure.

I added a sort of water injection which is nothing more than a 1/8th plastic tube going into the throat of the intake through a hole in the air cleaner lid. The other end goes into a bottle of water with a non return valve in the middle.
So far about 400Ml has been drawn through into the engine in about 50Km. As time permits I'll get a small pump and wire it to a switch so I can increase the amount of water going through. I added the water as an aid to keeping the injectors and rings free from coking and deposits.

For those waiting for a glimpse of the heroine of the story, here she is in all her unwashed or polished glory this afternoon. Should come up pretty nice when I do get to giving her a buff and a polish.

[Tony From West Oz Vice Chairperson of WARFA Find all posts View Profile Close Tony From West Oz]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

Helga is beautiful.
Is there any significance to the sign on her parking bay?

[gwalker Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close gwalker]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

Nice pinup!
George

[John H Member Find all posts View Profile Close John H]

Re: My new girlfriend, Helga the 300D

Hi all,
David
Helga looks very elegant what a wonderful photo, my boss still likes white though.

Regards
John H