glitchwrks

Interesting read about one young man's service and adventures on the DEW line: http://www.dewlineadventures.com/

A lot of people do seem to blindly follow the GPS. Back home, they got so tired of truckers getting stuck down at Little Beaver State Park (WV) they put up signs telling them not to follow the GPS. We had another one, closer to the farm, trying to get from Hinton to Princeton and decided to take what everyone calls The Hoover Highway (gravel one-lane built during the depression). The Hoover Highway is fun enough in a straight truck, this guy managed to get halfway down the mountain with a load of shingles before he got too far over on the shoulder and the shingles went over. I hear everyone in Mountain Creek has a new roof now :p

160 mile trip down to Blacksburg for some stuff from the surplus auction. No problems, even did fine on the grade on I-81 south up to the Christiansburg exit. Glad we got started early, it's getting hot out there! Amy had to run over to Our Daily Bread and grab a bottle of Evian and a chocolate croissant -- she said it seemed appropriate in a French truck 😛 The fan clutch seems to kick in around 180 *F and cut out at 160 *F. It cycles maybe every 5 minutes on the highway, more on hills. Anyone know if this is normal for Midliners with the Renault 5.5L diesel? The fan tried to eat the radiator at some point in this truck's life, wondering if it's just reduced cooling efficiency due to the loss of some tubes. Truck never gets over 180 *F.

I'd like to see an actually scientific, end-to-end study done on how much this actually reduced pollution, not just at the exhaust of the piece of equipment but along the entire chain. I'd bet that after you factor in the added production costs, supply chain costs of delivering extra fuel, refining costs, etc. it's at best a wash. Talking environmental factors, not dollar factors -- we already know that's a loss 😛

The Chevrolet C65 log truck will do that sometimes, we've determined it's the double check valve on that particular system. Same if you hook up a hose and use an air tool off of it.

Sad to hear that about both Warn and Summit. Another positive experience with Jegs, I've bought parts from them for several years. Everything has always shipped promptly, I've had them overnight parts for emergencies too.

That was one of my and my brother's favorite little kid books growing up! They still sell it, we saw it set up with little toy steam shovels at one of the book stores around here not that long ago.

Apparently filters are one thing that the Mack parts guys do still carry for the Midliners, or there's a Mack cross to something newer. They put actual Mack filters on mine at the truck shop.

Put 400 miles on the truck, US-501 to US-29 down to Winston-Salem to pick up a robot arm for a friend. Truck did fine! Got around 12 MPG apparently, better than the little Isuzu box truck I had, and the empty weight of the Midliner is about equivalent to the GVW of the Isuzu! Headlight dimmer switch is apparently backwards, or the plugs in the headlight sockets are. No gauge lights work. Had to buy a can of WD-40 and spray down the pivot points on the driver's seat...it started squeaking something awful. Truck will apparently do 70 MPH no problem, but it's up around 2300 RPM so probably not great for fuel consumption. We were around 60 MPH most of the time, on the open highway. Anyone who has come up US-501 knows you're not going the speed limit there 😛 Amy took a couple pictures of it at the fuel depot north of Danville on US-29, pretending to be a real truck:

Filter numbers: LF531 - Hastings # for oil filter FF981 - Hastings # for primary fuel filter FF980 - Hastings # for secondary fuel filter Just got back from the Lee Hi service center, two hour job took all day 😛 Couldn't do an alignment due to the kingpins being too sloppy, mechanic said they're not dangerous, just too worn for alignment. Tie rod has been bent and attempted to straighten out at some point. Parts guy called the local Mack parts place who told them, "kingpins for a Midliner? Your truck's totaled! If we had it, it would be $600 a side." Fortunately they gave us the Mack part number for the rebuild kit. There must just be a lot of hate for these old frog-dogs, we found a half-dozen parts suppliers who at least show the rebuild kit in stock. So much for unobtainium! Had them change the oil, fill the grease fittings, and check the transmission/rear end oil. Went to air up the tires and got a bulge in one. Kinda wondering now if the previous owner had deflated a little to hide dry rot, and I'm certainly surprised that the inspection place didn't mention it, being as how it was inspected yesterday morning. Oh well. Bought 6x used virgin tires as the steers were the least bad but also not great. Figure it's better to pay now than to have to pay sitting on the side of the road, or worse yet, cause an accident.

Shop took a look at it today, mechanic said it was almost certainly crud or moisture from poor maintenance of the air system by the previous owner. They sprayed some air line cleanout/dryout chemical in there and worked it back and forth a few times, more or less no leak after that.

I had no idea there was a get-together in Schoharie! We were in Troy for five years, had friends in Schoharie that we visited now and then. Northeast trucks often look a little rough but still work hard 😛

As noted in the Midliner project thread I now seem to have an air leak at the exhaust port of my foot valve. I did a hard stop before coming up the driveway and suddenly dropped to 30 PSI on both circuits and couldn't build past that at idle. I was able to rev it up to build enough to release the spring brakes and get up the driveway. I pulled the service side lines off the rear brake cans and got no backflow out of them. With the engine stopped, park brake set, and service brakes not applied, it was still leaking from the foot valve exhaust port. Reconnected the service chambers, chocked the wheels, released the spring brakes, and gave it a few hard, full applications...magically, the leak was way, way less but still present. I'd read a bunch of other BMT posts before making this one, and seen that a lot of people hose them down with WD-40 or some other very thin lubricant first, before replacing. I figure it's a piece of crud or some internal rusting caused by the previous owner's lack of maintenance on the air system (e.g. not blowing down tanks). It's a pretty new WABCO foot valve (looks like it was put in probably 2015). I'm planning a three-hour trip down to Winston-Salem and back later this week, is this something I should just bite the bullet on and have replaced now, or see if I can give it a workout and free it up?

Fixed the reverse lights, new 3-wire cable down to the transmission area, two wires from the switch terminals, one to the line that runs to the rear of the truck. Cube relay in the dash. Works fine, and should have plenty of power for a backup alarm. Installed new wiper blades and got a state inspection. Alignment shop was busy all day at the truck stop so that will have to wait until tomorrow. I stomped the brakes hard on the way up to the driveway and suddenly got the low air light and the spring brakes came on. Couldn't build over 30 PSI at idle, it was losing air through the exhaust on the foot valve. Checked chambers, no leaks from spring to service. Still leaked with park brakes set anyway. I was able to overcome the leak and get it into the driveway. A few additional hard applications with the wheels chocked and park brakes released and it stopped leaking. I'm guessing it's moisture or crud in the air system, there was a lot of water in there when I bought the truck. Thinking I may have the shop just replace all air lines, check valves, and the tanks. No idea what that'll cost me, but probably a lot less than having to get it towed and then having the service done! Don't have time to knock it out myself before our first planned trip.

Finally had some time to wrench today! Parts from anythingtruck.com/Mutual Wheel arrived promptly, perfect fit, worked exactly as it should. LED lights came in. VERY HAPPY with the TecNiq 3/4" grommet lights and interior dome lights, I've always bought TruckLite for the quality on LED stuff, but the TecNiq is much cheaper and actually may be heavier duty construction. Everything is potted in epoxy, it looks like it's probably vacuum potted as there's no air bubbles. I'll post pictures tomorrow, but this is what I did with the corner marker/turn lamps on the front: I removed the old pedestal lights, and enlarged the holes to 3/4" with a step bit. That's three holes per side, so there's three 3/4" amber grommet lights in the holes in a vertical line. I made up a little harness so that the center light is the running light, and the upper and lower lights are the signal lights. I like the look, and they are quite bright -- much brighter than the old pedestal lights. Visibility from the side isn't as good as I'd like it to be, so I'm going to replace the door reflectors with combo reflector/LED 2.5" grommet lights. Already pulled the driver's side door card and made sure I won't drill into the window regulator :) Slight SNAFU with the light replacement, after I got the new LED lights in, left OR right signal would cause both front marker/turn lamp sets to flash, like I had the hazard switch on! The rear was fine though. Turned out to be about a 25 ohm short between the two, I'm guessing they run together in the dash harness and got pinched or something. So I cut the wire off of relay #3 that runs to the left turn signal, insulated/stored the stub, and ran a new wire. It was only a few feet of wire, and problem solved. The cab wiring is pretty traceable given how much of it there is behind the dash, adequate variety of color codes. Drilled out the stuck/stripped fasteners on the front of the truck in the grille/lights area. Fun job...NOT. Chased all of the rivnuts that weren't stripped. It'll be getting stainless hardware to prevent rusted mess problems in the future. And lots of C4A copper anti-seize. Squared out the holes in the bumper and mounted the license plate (it had been sitting in the dash). I need to either find a replacement bumper or have a new one fabricated, the bent one that's on there looks like crap. Mounted a new cheapo license plate light on the back, it's pretty dim but it'll do for now, planning on replacing the whole light assembly back there anyway as it looks like someone caught it on a loading dock...more than once. Reverse lights seem to be an issue of the switch on the transmission not getting power. Switch on the transmission is good at least. Factory wiring has the full current for the reverse lights going through the transmission switch, since I want to add a backup alarm and extend the life of the switch I'll be relaying it up in the cab. This must've been a persistent problem, it looks like the switch was replaced at least twice from the poor splice jobs down at the transmission. Wiring back to the lamps is fine. Seems like Renault bucked the trend and used heavier-than-minimum wire for pretty much everything, that's a nice change! Tackled some interior problems. Freed up the adjustments on the driver's seat. I'm wanting to replace it with air ride but the old suspension seat will have to work for now. Dash sure comes apart easy in these things! Four screws for each panel. I junked the center and passenger sections as they were busted beyond repair. I'm not sure if I will just make custom replacement panels or do a more involved wraparound style dash for it. Driver's wing window crank problem solved, someone busted the backing plate out of it, probably tried to force it. I took it apart, degreased, and relubed, so now open works but close requires manual assistance or the worm drive gear just pulls itself out the back. I'll make a new backing plate for it. Fixed the window and door gasket seals, looks like they weren't put in properly after the truck was repainted from Penske yellow to the current white. New low air sender screwed in and tested, not fully wired in yet. It now builds air much faster! Now that it's not leaking profusely I can tell that the park valve leaks when in the park position :) Not bad but enough that you have no air after it sits for an hour. Oh well, I wanted to get rid of the goofy toggle type (European?) park valve and go to the standard yellow square pop-out type. Unloader does in fact unload. Still think it could use a real air dryer.

Here I was thinking it was going to be one of these:

Hadn't contacted any of the local dealers or salvage yards, I figured someone on here might have something they wanted to sell, and that I'd check here first!

Looking for the door handle/pull/armrest/whatever for a 1990 Midliner. Pics from years around that look the same. It's for the driver's side, but it looks like the driver and passenger sides are the same.

Excellent, I didn't find any "Danger! Keep away!" type reviews, but it's good to hear from someone who deals with them regularly! I went ahead and ordered two low air switches even though the one is still presumably operational (at least not leaking).

Turn/Marker pedestal lights on the corners of the cab are beat and one has an intermittent connection in the socket. I removed one on Friday to find out that the insert nuts had detached from the cab -- one had apparently died the last time the lights were replaced, as there was a self-tapping sheet metal screw ran through the cab next to it. I think I'm going to ditch the pedestal lights and move the turn signals. I'm not 100% sure where yet, but if I end up with a custom bumper, I may just mount 4" round grommet lights in the bumper for turn/marker. I'm going to drill out the three holes for each pedestal lamp and put 3/4" amber grommet lights in the holes. Figure pedestal lights are more likely to get knocked off anyway! No one locally has a low air switch with 1/8" NPT male threads, so I ordered two Tramec Sloan 38035 60 PSI cut-out switches from these guys: https://www.anythingtruck.com/product/785-38035.html Haven't ordered from them before, so we'll see how that goes. I'll have to add a ground wire and change from ring terminals to spade terminals, but the wiring that's there has been hacked up a little to start with. I can't imagine the switches get a solid ground through the mounting straps for the air tanks, anyway.

Aw man, why did you have to post that truck?! What are they asking for it?

Filters seem to be no problem, there are NAPA Gold (Wix) crosses, the ones that are on it are Hastings. I've heard engine parts can be hard to source, but that these engines are also pretty reliable. This one had been sitting since last August and aside from a fair bit of diesel smoke on startup, it started instantly and idled nicely, so I'm hoping there's nothing major to do on it. I did dump a bottle of Stanadyne lubricity booster in, since the pump governor acts sticky on startup (you can stab the throttle, RPMs jump up, but then it plunges below idle and takes a second to recover). Inline injection pump seems to be holding up to modern ULSD fuel. I'm going to replace all of the belts and original-looking coolant hoses, I'm sure I can get the belts at NAPA, but we'll see how it goes with the formed hoses. I don't like using generic flex hoses if I can avoid it. And yeah, aside from a few dents and dings, mostly on the box, the truck seems to be in really good shape!

Yeah, I've seen plenty of 10SIs wired up just like yours, and they run fine for many years. We use them on pretty much everything on the farm, once the original alternator dies -- big trucks, the older Ford tractor, air compressor, welder, generators, etc. Apparently they're even a drop-in for Volkswagen/Bosch alternators on old VW diesels, as long as you don't need the tach output! Just thought I'd offer my understanding of what/why the other two terminals exist

On a 10SI, #1 terminal (the one that doesn't go to battery positive) can go to an idiot light on the dash. IIRC if you have the light hooked up, it'll start charging at lower RPMs but I may be remembering incorrectly. You wire from switched positive (accessory, ignition, etc.), through an indicator lamp, to the #1 terminal, if you want the idiot light -- personally I always hooked them up, even though I almost always had an amp or volt meter in the dash, since it'll come on as soon as the alternator stops putting out power. Just another warning mechanism! #2 terminal, the one that most people connect right to battery positive on the stud on the back of the alternator, is for charge sensing. IIRC the official answer is that it's supposed to run back to the actual positive terminal on the battery, so that the alternator's regulator can detect voltage drop and vary its output accordingly. Almost everyone connects it to battery positive right at the stud on the back of the alternator, which is fine most of the time.

Nope, MS200P! I like cabovers for the maneuverability and visibility. Apparently the CS cab shares the same cab part. It's definitely not super fast on the highway, but it's fine, and judging by the drop in diesel fuel it's doing OK on fuel efficiency. Better power than the 1999 Isuzu NPR-HD I had. I'd have probably paid $1000 more for an equivalent truck with overdrive, keep an eye out for overdrive if you plan on doing much highway travel. With the 1:1 top gear on the 5-speed it seems to really like 60 MPH on the interstate, which I feel is fine.