nameless 98 amtran re

[quickgrits]

There was some discussion about this bus here: http://www.skoolie.net/forums/f6/hel...ama-15808.html It's a 1998 amtran re with a t444e and at545.
Now that were moving ahead i figured i should start a thread here.

Update on mechanical issues: I changed the oil and filter and installed a scanguage d. After doing that and clearing the codes the intermittent power problem I was having was gone and it showed no new codes. I am very pleased about that but the scanguage will only show a maximum of 11.4 psi boost pressure which I believe is low? It also still seems sluggish to me (Though I have nothing to compare it too - maybe that's just how it is?)

So, I've checked or done the following: checked fpr screen - it was clean, checked map sensor line - clear, changed fuel filter and screen, looked at intake side of turbo - no play, rotates freely, measured mileage and got about 8.5 mpg mostly hiway driving. I removed the ebp sensor and tube. The tube was completely clogged so I cleaned it out as best I could and re installed. This made no difference so far as I can tell. So I'm wondering if the sensor may be bad or if a bad sensor or clogged tube would make any noticeable difference?

One other thing I'm wondering about is the cooling fan clutch. It feels pretty stiff all the time and the fan seems to me to be blowing pretty hard at idle before the engine is at all warmed up. We drove about 300 miles on a 40 degree F. day and both the bus's gauge and the scangauge showed about 185 degrees on average. So I'm guessing that the clutch may be too stiff and is wasting energy and cooling too much.

[quickgrits]

As for progress on the conversion, the biggest thing so far is getting the solar power station up and working and mounted temporarily in a dog house.



400w of panels, 4 6v golf cart batteries, bogart sc2030 and tm2030. and a 3000w modified sine inverter. I basically went by Handy Bob's suggestions. I highly recommend reading his blog if you want to learn about rv sized solar. https://handybobsolar.wordpress.com/

The bus is not near grid power so we're using this for power for the conversion.

We've got the seats, floor, ceiling panels and wall panels out. I wire I removed a lot of excess wiring and patched the holes for the upper caution/ stop lights.



The fiberglass insulation looks pretty good to me so we're going to keep it and put an additional 1/2 inch of rigid foam over the fiberglass and framing. That will get covered with luan.

We drove to Bunkhouse Conversion RV in Red Bay AL. and picked up 4, 40g. water tanks, a tub/shower pan, kitchen sink and faucet, and a bunch of luan with vinyl on one side that was manufactured for use in rvs. This is a good place for salvage, surplus and used parts. Benny (?) is a nice guy and they have tons of stuff. Get there early in the day if you go because it will take a while to find what you want and they close at 4:00



I would rather have gotten 2 larger tanks instead of the 4 40g. We'll end up hooking 2 together for both the fresh and grey water. I wonder if there's anything wrong with doing that?

Where it is:


pressure washing prior to sanding:



The water is coming from a 300g. tank filled from the roof of a barn which is a little ways up the hill.

[WanderWoman]

And so it begins!!! Looking forward to watching your progress!
Sandi
www.thismidwifetravels.com

[Njsurf73]

Originally Posted by WanderWoman

And so it begins!!! Looking forward to watching your progress!
Sandi
www.thismidwifetravels.com

water will find its own level. I have a similar plan. I will connect them with pipe at the lowest point and have a shut off between them.
I would think it would be important to make sure they are the same level or one may fill to overflow before the other is full.

[PNW_Steve]

You will get bits of solid matter in your grey tank. Make certain that the interconnect plumbing is large enough that it does not plug.

I use a 5/8" garden hose to drain my grey tank and every 3-6 months I have to blow it out with pressure water to clear out the crud.

[quickgrits]

Originally Posted by PNW_Steve

You will get bits of solid matter in your grey tank. Make certain that the interconnect plumbing is large enough that it does not plug.

These tanks I bought have 2 threaded 3/8" and one 1 1/4" port. For the grey tanks I'll try and figure out how to connect the two with 1 1/4" hose and have a valve and hose connection between them.

The fresh side will be a little less straightforward. The water pump I'm looking at wants a minimum of 1/2" pipe so rather than feeding it with one of the 3/8 holes I'm trying to figure out how to use the 1 1/4" for the filler inlet as well as for the supply to the pump.

[Njsurf73]

Originally Posted by quickgrits

These tanks I bought have 2 threaded 3/8" and one 1 1/4" port. For the grey tanks I'll try and figure out how to connect the two with 1 1/4" hose and have a valve and hose connection between them.

The fresh side will be a little less straightforward. The water pump I'm looking at wants a minimum of 1/2" pipe so rather than feeding it with one of the 3/8 holes I'm trying to figure out how to use the 1 1/4" for the filler inlet as well as for the supply to the pump.

Use valves. "T" it off the tank, valves on both sides of the "t". Reduce one to what you need and connect the other to your fill. Close the pump side when you fill, and your fill side when you pump.
Imho.

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[Jrcorkerin]

Nice bus and nice headway. I'm picking my first bus up next weekend. What all did AL require for registration? Any CDL requirement issues? Thanks!


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[cadillackid]

is the fan hydraulic or belt driven? im not familiar with a 444 in an RE bus..

you can look on one of the valve covers and there will be a stickewr stamped with the horsepower rating of your bus.. or you can run the VINB through a VIN search and I think its listed,, if your bus is a 190 or lower then it will be a dog on the highway.. if its a 210 it will pick up a bit but only after the revs are up..

there were a lot of changes right around 1997 for the 444E and some manufacturer TSI (technical service info).. getting the serial number off of your engine can help find those.
-Christopher

I have a 190 HP in my short bus and get 15 lbs of Turbo boost under 100% throttle... my red is set at 2600 RPM.

did you pay attention to any of the codes before you wiped them? those codes can help perhaps on the low boost issues if they are related to ICP or IPR.. those 2 items are notorious for causing issues on the 444E.. they control the amoubnt of pressure applied to the fuel injectors..

[quickgrits]

Originally Posted by Jrcorkerin

Nice bus and nice headway. I'm picking my first bus up next weekend. What all did AL require for registration? Any CDL requirement issues?

I had no problem getting it registered. It was just like registering an automobile. It's still registered as a bus though and from what I understand it may not be legal to drive it without a cdl because of the air brakes. They told me to bring it by and have it looked at when the conversion is complete. Then the registration can be changed to an RV.

[quickgrits]

Originally Posted by cadillackid

is the fan hydraulic or belt driven? im not familiar with a 444 in an RE bus..

you can look on one of the valve covers and there will be a stickewr stamped with the horsepower rating of your bus.. or you can run the VINB through a VIN search and I think its listed,, if your bus is a 190 or lower then it will be a dog on the highway.. if its a 210 it will pick up a bit but only after the revs are up..

there were a lot of changes right around 1997 for the 444E and some manufacturer TSI (technical service info).. getting the serial number off of your engine can help find those.
-Christopher

I have a 190 HP in my short bus and get 15 lbs of Turbo boost under 100% throttle... my red is set at 2600 RPM.

did you pay attention to any of the codes before you wiped them? those codes can help perhaps on the low boost issues if they are related to ICP or IPR.. those 2 items are notorious for causing issues on the 444E.. they control the amoubnt of pressure applied to the fuel injectors..

The fan is belt driven. I used the word hydrostatic earlier but i think I meant thermostatic. I may just go ahead and buy a new one and keep this one as a backup. Then I can compare the two and learn if the one I have now is good or not. If it is too stiff it would be robbing some hp.

This motor is a 190 hp and the bus is quite slow. That's fine with me I just want to be reasonably certain that it's doing all it should. I didn't know how much boost pressure it should produce so it's good to know that yours makes 15 - not a whole lot higher than my 11 or so. One of the codes that I erased was about the ICP sensor. The sensor itself looks to have been recently replaced and that code hasn't come up again after several hundred miles. When I get back into looking at the motor I'll get the fuel pressure checked and look into the IPR.

As for progress, the exterior is sanded and caulked and ready for paint. We're just waiting for window of good weather. We'll pull out the windows and clean the goop out before painting.

I made the flooring. We have a little sawmill and I had this pine sitting around that I'd sawed up last winter. Maybe a hardwood would have been nicer but a lot of this pine is 16' long and if I put the best of it in the most visible places I think it'll look nice. There'll be no subfloor to save a little height.



Cutting the tongues with a router:

[cowlitzcoach]

Originally Posted by quickgrits

I had no problem getting it registered. It was just like registering an automobile. It's still registered as a bus though and from what I understand it may not be legal to drive it without a cdl because of the air brakes. They told me to bring it by and have it looked at when the conversion is complete. Then the registration can be changed to an RV.

The CDL requirement most likely kicks in on your bus for more than 15-pax, more than 26,001 GVWR, and air brakes.

But once it is licensed and titled as an RV all you will need is a regular driver's license.

Just make sure that when you get to the point of having it inspected that there is NO possibility of transporting more than 14-pax plus the driver.

[cadillackid]

15 boost is stock.. an ICP code can be set by a defective IPR.. or if someone changed the oil and didnt fill the filterts before they started it... this sometimes can drain the HPOP..

what you want to see is that the commanded ICP is also the actual HPOP, those should stay close together.. and the duty cycle... at idle you shouldnt be seeing duty cycles on the IPR consistently high (above 40%).. you'll see a little more on a really cold engine as it uses more fuel till it warms up..

11 boost seems low.. if you take it in percentage your pressure is 25-30% lower than mine.. that seems significant to me.. check your turbo piping past the compressor and make sure something hasnt popped partially lose or is leaking where you'd lose boost pressure...

read the engine load factor if you can.. when that is at 100% is when you should see the boost at 15 or thereabouts..

therre was a fuel pressure regulator update that took the Pressure from 47 to 72... I mentioned it was done for an idle knock but on mine it seemed to give it just a tad more spunk... (butt dyno.. not measured)...

-Christopher

[quickgrits]

Originally Posted by cadillackid

what you want to see is that the commanded ICP is also the actual HPOP, those should stay close together.. and the duty cycle... at idle you shouldnt be seeing duty cycles on the IPR consistently high (above 40%).. you'll see a little more on a really cold engine as it uses more fuel till it warms up..

11 boost seems low.. if you take it in percentage your pressure is 25-30% lower than mine.. that seems significant to me.. check your turbo piping past the compressor and make sure something hasnt popped partially lose or is leaking where you'd lose boost pressure...

read the engine load factor if you can.. when that is at 100% is when you should see the boost at 15 or thereabouts..
-Christopher

This sounds like good advice. Next time we drive this bus somewhere I'll get into the scanguage again to see if it'll tell me commanded ICP, and IPR duty cycle. I haven't paid attention to the engine loading but I will check to see what the boost is when the engine load factor is at 100%. I've looked over the turbo plumbing and didn't find any obvious problems.

We've gotten it 95% painted but didn't get it finished before the rain. We'll have to wait a few days now for more painting weather.



Also, I've decided how the ceiling will work. Here's my little test example.
1/8" luan screwed into longitudinal runners which are notched for the steel ribs. There'll be sufficient space for 1/2" foam insulation between the runners.

[Njsurf73]

Originally Posted by cadillackid

15 boost is stock.. an ICP code can be set by a defective IPR.. or if someone changed the oil and didnt fill the filterts before they started it... this sometimes can drain the HPOP..

what you want to see is that the commanded ICP is also the actual HPOP, those should stay close together.. and the duty cycle... at idle you shouldnt be seeing duty cycles on the IPR consistently high (above 40%).. you'll see a little more on a really cold engine as it uses more fuel till it warms up..

11 boost seems low.. if you take it in percentage your pressure is 25-30% lower than mine.. that seems significant to me.. check your turbo piping past the compressor and make sure something hasnt popped partially lose or is leaking where you'd lose boost pressure...

read the engine load factor if you can.. when that is at 100% is when you should see the boost at 15 or thereabouts..

therre was a fuel pressure regulator update that took the Pressure from 47 to 72... I mentioned it was done for an idle knock but on mine it seemed to give it just a tad more spunk... (butt dyno.. not measured)...

-Christopher

Christopher, you may know. Will that scangauge work with a 466 as well?


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[mdeese]

Bus is looking great. I love your paint scheme, it really changes the feel. I plan on using that same method of insulation and utility paneling. I'm adding an extra 1/2in, this Texas heat is no joke. I am really looking forward to following your build, it seems our buses have a lot in common.

[cadillackid]

Lovin the bright and cheery color scheme!!!!

I should note that my 15 PSI boost is at 2500-2600 ROM under full load.

the scangauge D should work on a DT-466E as well.. actually any engine that has the 6 or 9 pin Deutsch style diagnostic port....

-Christopher

[Njsurf73]

Originally Posted by cadillackid

Lovin the bright and cheery color scheme!!!!

I should note that my 15 PSI boost is at 2500-2600 ROM under full load.

the scangauge D should work on a DT-466E as well.. actually any engine that has the 6 or 9 pin Deutsch style diagnostic port....

-Christopher

Thank you!
And sorry for the hijack.

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[quickgrits]

It's painted. I think it turned out nicely.





To blank out the windows I used the galvanized wall material that was removed from the interior. That was mounted to some 3/8 ply and held in the opening with blocks screwed into the frame. It worked well but I'm a little worried about the paint not being perfectly adhered to the galvanized.

A bad cold and rain slowed us down but now I'm working on getting the tanks hung. Should have that done in a day or so. I'm using 1/8", 1/4 X 1/4 steel angle and bolts. Lot's of drilling.

[Njsurf73]

Looking awesome

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