Oil-bath air-cleaner question
Shag
How much oil do y'all run in your oil-bath air-cleaners?
OK, I'm trying to "do the right thing" here. On every other Beetle
I've owned I always ripped off the oil-bath air-cleaner and replaced
it with a paper element air-cleaner, but I've always had problems with
the carb throat icing up when it gets cool enough outside. I'm
keeping the oil-bath air-cleaner on this one. I just now took it off
and looked at it for the first time since I bought the car. There was
about 1/4" deep of oil in the bottom of it and most of that was
sludge. I probably literally only poured out about 3-4 ounces of
oil. I soaked the entire assembly in gasoline and then scrubbed it
clean and let the filter element piece dry out. I read in my Muir
book (yes, I know... I know...) to use about 1/2 quart of oil in the
oil-bath air-cleaner. I put in about 1/3 of a quart and it looked
like an awful lot of oil in there... Which brings me to my question:
How much oil do y'all run in your oil-bath air-cleaners? Oh, and I'm
guessing the weight of the oil isn't particularly important? I put
straight 30-weight oil in there. Thanks in advance for input.
bug '59
"Shag" <trav...@gmail.com> schreef in bericht
news:1192108412.8...@57g2000hsv.googlegroups.com...
If I'm not mistaken there is a thin red line ;) on the inside of the
cleaner.
Roger
Shag
> "Shag" <travis...@gmail.com> schreef in berichtnews:1192108412.8...@57g2000hsv.googlegroups.com...
The Muir book mentioned that but I didn't see one.
Eddie
http://picasaweb.google.com/feuerkafer/Fuelfilter/photo#5120101125496223426
--
Eddie
1965 Beetle
http://picasaweb.google.com/feuerkafer
"Shag" <trav...@gmail.com> wrote in message
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Karl
number....] and it is .8 of a pint. From here:
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/archives/manuals/69bug/page50.jpg
Other years are here:
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/archives/manuals/type1.php
"Shag" <trav...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1192108412.8...@57g2000hsv.googlegroups.com...
Shag
> Since you did not give the year..... I used 69 [because I like that
> number....] and it is .8 of a pint. From here:http://www.thesamba.com/vw/archives/manuals/69bug/page50.jpg
>
> Other years are here:http://www.thesamba.com/vw/archives/manuals/type1.php
>
Ah! Great information. Mine is a '64. I didn't realize it would
vary so much. For my year it says .53 US pint. So about 1/4 of a
quart. I'll drain a little bit of mine out since it's over-filled by
a little bit. Thank you.
Dangermouse
Shag
> What are the potential consequences of over/underfilling the oil bath?
I'm not sure but my guess is it would invalidate your social contract
or something along those lines. *cough* :-)
Jan
You might want to clean the inside of the air cleaner.
Some of them didn't have that red line, for some reason.
Many do, very bright and way down near the bottom
Jan
Jan
LOL
The oil level would block air intake into the carb. You'd suffocate the
engine. If it was low enough to let some air in, it would idle ok but
run out of breath when you tried to drive it.
Or possibly even suck in oil, which I don't think could happen but in
theory... :)
Berg
The supposedly red line is right at the ledge, where it goes to a larger
diameter. Equal for all, as the horsehair lid will stop a tad short of
this. Was it horse hair? I know it is an organic substance on the early
ones at least.
Again Mr Hoover can elaborate if he's in the vicinity..
J.
Michael Cecil
Mine doesn't so I've always guessed on the oil level. I think the next
time I mess with it, I'll measure exactly the right amount of oil and mark
it with some paint.
--
Michael Cecil
http://macecil.googlepages.com/index.htm
http://macecil.googlepages.com/safehex.htm
http://macecil.googlepages.com/hackingvista.htm
Berg
It is not Horse hair, been trying to look it up, but nada.
It might have been coconut tusk in the early ones(gets worse and worse
this, does it not?! :)
J.
Al Adams
Al Adams
"Berg" <bo...@bogus.com.Invalid> wrote in message
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Shag
I cleaned it pretty good with gas-soaked rags and just didn't see the
line. I don't know if there was ever a line there or if maybe there
was one and it got rubbed off from cleaning over the years or... ?
Anyway after draining a little oil out of it so that it wasn't over-
filled I drove to/from my son's school to pick him up about 20-mile
round-trip and I drove 35 miles to work in the VW again today and it
did great. :-) Now I just gotta do something about the heater...
Gary Tateosian
Try hooking it up....
Glad I could clear that up for ya...
Veeduber
>
> Again Mr Hoover can elaborate if he's in the vicinity..
>
I already did :-)
Type in 'coir' as your search-seed and see what you get.
-Bob Hoover
Berg
You see Mr. Hoover, coir is not a recognised word in either of the
languages I know.
I did not even know such a word existed in U.S. English..
But who am I but an ignorant soul.
J.
Must admit I thought I had read something you typed on the subject.
I have a legit copy/issue of the Sermons, is it described there?
Respect.
P.J.Berg.
Karl
http://www.madehow.com/Volume-6/Coir.html
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/coir
"Berg" <bo...@bogus.com.Invalid> wrote in message
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Veeduber
>
> Must admit I thought I had read something you typed on the subject.
> I have a legit copy/issue of the Sermons, is it described there?
>
Probably.
The basis of virtually everything I've written about Volkswagens can
be found in VW's factory manuals, service notes, or bulletins. At
some point Volkswagen must have described the fiber they used in the
air cleaner. The only difference between my stuff and the manuals is
that they are describing the repair & maintenance of NEW vehicles,
whereas I'm talking about vehicles that have accumulated up to half a
century of wear, presenting the mechanic with problems not found in
any of the manuals (but occasionally covered in a Service Note).
As for coir, it's interesting that the learned definitions cited by
Karl were obviously written by someone one who has never actually
handled the fiber :-)
The coir fibers used in automobile air filters come from the outer
husk of mature coconuts. The fiber is triangular in cross-section and
happens to be hollow, which is why a coconut floats as well as it
does.
The significance here is that the triangular fibers give them a lot of
edges that are quite ragged at the microscopic level, making them
natural dust collectors, especially when soaked with kerosene to act
as an easily replaceable 'glue,' trapping the fine particles of dust
until they can be washed away, the procedure for which is mentioned in
the manuals.
Another point of interest is that German companies were the primary
source of coir from about 1875 until the mid-1930's, and that coir air-
filters were used on some of the earliest internal combustion engines
(which date back to the late 1850's). When Henry Ford got into the
business in a serious way and found he had to buy his coir from
'foreigners' he tried to find a substitute and eventually settled on a
metal mesh, similar to a modern-day pot scrubber. It didn't work as
well as coir but Henry was a control freak with paranoid tendencies
who felt he had to have total control over all the materials used to
manufacture his vehicles. (His hilarious efforts to produce his own
rubber is still used in business schools as a good example of how not
to run a business.)
Finally, for all the newbies out there, John Muir was an obvious
admirer of Henry Ford and, based on his book, far more familiar with
early Fords than Volkswagens, citing repair procedures that worked
quite well on the Model T but were horribly wrong for a VW, such as
removing nuts axle & gland nuts with a cold chisel, setting fire to
brake shoes & clutch disks, and a few hundred more. If you own an
antique Volkswagen it deserves the benefit of information found in its
factory service manuals.
-Bob Hoover
Leopold Stotch
Question for you Bob, have you ever seen an air filter where the coir
fibers had deteriorated to the point where they would require
replacement? As you alluded to earlier, the VW engineers may never have
contemplated what 50 years of being bathed in oil would do to their coir
fiber filters. What is your preferred cleaning method? I was thinking
of dumping my filter in a parts washer in a solution of "Simple Green"
and water.
Where would a person buy coir fiber if it did need replacing?
Berg
Ultrasonic bath if you have access to one.
J.
Leopold Stotch
I do have a small ultrasonic bath, I might get the cleaner in it. Would
you use a water based cleaner or kerosene/mineral spirits?
Veeduber
> Question for you Bob, have you ever seen an air filter where the coir
> fibers had deteriorated to the point where they would require
> replacement?
Yes, many times. But not deteriorated in the sense you mean. The
most common problem was having people try to burn them out, following
the procedure used for the Model A Ford air-cleaner.
In the others the fibers has become brittle, falling out in little
pieces when the canister was shaken. I assume these were soaked in an
inappropriate cleaner containing a chemical that attacked the coir.
(I know lots of guys use gasoline or diesel fuel as cleaning solvent
instead of kerosene.)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> What is your preferred cleaning method?
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The manual calls for soaking the canister in kerosene for 30 minutes.
(We simply turned it upside down and filled it.) Then sloshing in a
bucket of kerosene, then allowed to drip/dry for 24 hours.
In dusty climates or areas having few paved roads, cleaning the air
filter (and changing the oil) was required as often as once a week.
(The dust gets sucked into the sump, hence the need to change the
oil.) If running in flour-fine silt, as found on many dry lakes, you
may need to do this once per DAY.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Where would a person buy coir fiber if it did need replacing?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I don't know. There used to be junkyards specific to Volkswagens,
where you could buy a replacement air cleaner. When that isn't
available you may wish to consider a turbo-type air cleaner as used on
farm equipment.
Disposable, treated paper filter elements are another option but you
usually have to fabricate a suitable housing. This is pretty easy in
an early bus, where you fit the air cleaner to the roof of the engine
compartment, but more difficult in a bug, where you usually end up
with something similar to the '74 & later models.
Something you DON'T want to consider is an air cleaner made of window
screen and gauze that depends on some kind of Secret Sauce for its
filtering abilities.
-Bob Hoover
Leopold Stotch
>
> Something you DON'T want to consider is an air cleaner made of window
> screen and gauze that depends on some kind of Secret Sauce for its
> filtering abilities.
>
> -Bob Hoover
>
Oh no, would not consider one of those K&N "magic" filters. I think my
original VW filter is still in pretty good shape. Just trying to think
for the future, about what might break down the road sometime and what I
might have to do to fix it. I've got lots of parts stashed away just
because certain parts are getting hard to find in good quality or in
some cases even getting crappy South American or Asian spares is getting
a little iffy.
I did do a little hunting around the internet and did find someone who
sells 22lb bales of coir fiber. Way more that I would ever want and
more $$ than I'd want to spend. Of course, you might be able to get
then to sell you a few handfuls cheap.
https://protected11.purehost.com/d30053026/index.asp?sh=welcome&op=-1&cid=9&sid=39876822
Berg
I would use water and a mild detergent used for manual dish washing.(I
have a name, but would not mean much being a Norwegian product).
J.