MontanaChinook

Did you just wire it to the coil? I may do that at some point. But on the 78, there's a nice gap between the speedometer gauge and the other gauges, where a little one like that could fit. Dudevato, over at the yahoo site, has some photos up of his set up. He took the dash apart and did some plastic molding and worked in a tach and made it all look OEM. Really nice.

Well next time I drill holes in my camper I'll know how to do it better... A baffle, eh? Do you think maybe that's what that big bulge is behind my fridge? It kind of serves as one...

Can't exactly figure out what you mean. Do you mean putting the door up where the black vent is, and the black vent where the door is?

Actually after I noticed that the first was lower than the next couple, I figured I could just make it look like I meant to do it by having the last one or two slope back down to where the first one was. Didn't work out quite like I meant it to, but more or less... Can only be so accurate on a sloped surface, with a 2" hole cut-out drill bit

One thing to remember is that Toyota didn't put a stronger engine in any motorhome, period. Toyota made trucks. Then motorhome manufacturers bought those trucks and built motorhomes on them. Toyota didn't design any truck with an RV in mind. 22RE is powerful enough for a motorhome. My 20R is powerful enough for my motorhome. The only V6 Toyota was putting in their trucks up until the time they stopped allowing RV manufacturers to use their trucks was the 3.0. Not the best engine they ever put out...

Well so far so good. Like I said, in 45 degree weather, it had no problem getting down to 32. We'll see how it does in the 70s next week! But good enough that I'm considering it "done" for now, and moving on to other things. I will not try to convince anyone that these are perfectly straight...

I have enough space. This thread is getting long so I don't blame you for not reading the whole thing, but we went over the fan thing. Ideally I would have installed a fan. But I wasn't completely sure my fridge was even working yet, was short on time with lots of other projects going on, and figured I'd start out with the vents, and if the fridge works and is worth the work, add fans later. Even though it's better to do it all at once, and while the fridge was out...

Great, thanks.

Wouldn't repel water very well... I could have just made long, horizontal cuts in my door, with short vertical cuts at either end, and bent them up, basically making my door a louvered vent. But I just don't have the tools, or patience right now, to do that. I'm ready to hit the road and have enough to do just getting my stuff back in the camper, getting the engine back together and tuned, and just getting the fridge back in. Which, by the way, had no problem getting down to 32 degrees this evening on gas. When it was 45 outside... But it's clearly doing something. So that's a good sign.

Even that is too big. My door is something like 12x7". Either way, it all comes down to retrofitting something into the existing door to create a little airflow, which is exactly what I'm doing. Short of doing something a bit more fancy like Karin is thinking up.

That's pretty cool. Well, I know that many times while I'm doing stuff I have the thought that "if I just knew a little more or had someone with a ton of experience around, there must be a better way to do this" etc. But...oh well. I just drilled a 2" hole in my aluminum access door and put one of those plastic vents in. It looks like there will be plenty of room for two more at some point, so it should work. Assuming my fridge even works, it will be much better ventilated now that it was before.

Yes, this would be the perfect situation for a 3D printer. I also think I'm not going to be able to find a vented lower access door for the fridge. I looked around online for awhile and didn't see anything even close to the size of my door. So...I had one little 2" vent left, so I drilled out a hole in the middle of the door and put the vent in there. Might do two more at some point when I buy more vents. But for now, there will at least be a little air coming in from the lower door. A friend of mine was getting really into scanning and printing and showed me an app he had on his phone a year or so ago. He took a couple pictures of a sculpture at an art opening, and showed me how his phone then had a complete image of the sculpture. You could view it from any angle, spin it around, flip it over etc. Very cool.

I haven't done all the tests you guys suggested, but while I was letting it run today I pulled out the multimeter and checked the voltage at both batteries. 13.75 at the truck battery, 13.9-ish at the coach battery. I'll try those other tests in the next couple days. Was just doing a quick check while it was running but I was more concerned with making sure my engine wasn't eating itself after I put it back together. On the plus side we just had a week of 50s and 60s so all the stuff I was thinking I'd have to do in 20 degree weather has been really so nice to work on, out in spring weather and sunshine.

No, it was the last time. Two years ago, I put on a new oil and water pump. The new water pump must have been putting out a lot more pressure, because within a couple thousand miles, the head gasket started leaking. Exterior leak, running down the outside of the block. So I pulled the head, had it tested and cleaned, then put it all back together with new gaskets. I've since taken it all over the country. Then just this winter decided to get the head rebuilt, so I pulled it all again. So no, I haven't driven on it this time. But the last time I remember the same thing: one or two of the cylinders 1/4 full of coolant, and empty the next time I went out to work on it, so obviously it drained down into the oil pan. I let it run today and bled the coolant, and it stopped trying to overheat. Oil looks completely water-free...

Hmm. Ok, thanks. Damage would already be done there (not that that's any reason to avoid further damage), because I didn't do that last time I pulled the head, and have put 20,000 miles on it since then. But I'll look into further flushing. Thanks Fred. I'll check that out today. I used a large "clicker" style torque wrench for all the bolts, but that doesn't mean something didn't go wrong. I'll make sure it's still holding torque today.

I had my head rebuilt this winter. Put it all back together with new gaskets, filled up with water and oil. Started up just fine, ran really well. Temp started climbing, but then dropped down to normal. Then, because the head came off and water & oil mixed a little, I wanted to drain everything to get any crud out, so I drained the water and oil after it had warmed up. Water was fine. Oil came out very thin and watery and brown. Rocker panel had a bit of foam covering it. I re-torqued the head bolts, filled everything back up again. Runs fine, and it seems like the oil is looking fine. The temp keeps climbing past normal, then dropping back down to normal. So...I'm running straight water because I wanted to get some free fluid circulating around to clean out contaminants before filling up with coolant. I haven't bled the system yet. I left the oil drain plug off for a week this winter, just to make sure every bit of the oil and coolant drained out (because they mix a bit when you pull the head). I did not chase the head bolt threads, but I did blow them out with compressed air, and cleaned and dried them. I did chase them when I had the head off two years ago to put a new head gasket on, but I don't know if that would make them any cleaner... So...I did some internet searching, and saw that it's possible for quite a bit of condensation to build up in there, and that could cause quite a bit of water in the oil. It was pretty cold for a bit while the drain plug was open, and since closing it, without adding oil, we have had frosts, and it's been in the 50s and 60s during the day. I'm going to add actual coolant today, and bleed the system and see if it stops trying to overheat, and if I get water in the oil again. Just curious what your take is on this. It wasn't the full chocolate milkshake, covering the oil dipstick, but the brand new oil that came out after first running it was brown and thin. Under the valve cover was foamy. But not after draining the oil and water, re-torquing, and letting it run again.

I bought this, but haven't installed it yet. I had some of the same concerns as you and to do with what Karin brought up. But my little 160W inverter plugs into a cigarette lighter attachment, and I figure if nothing else, this one will be rated for higher amperage. So it's probably worth it just for that. But it also never hurts to have a couple more USB ports to plug into.

Hm. Well we'll see what I have time for. I'm doing so much just to get the thing ready to head out of town, I don't know if there's time to fool with fans right now. Got the head back on and everything attached, now working on the oil pump gasket and front main seal. Which means speedy sleeve. At least I got the crank bolt off and everything cleaned. Old seal out and new seal in. Though I'll bet the old seal was fine, and it's just the groove in the pulley causing my leak. So the sleeve ought to fix that. But then I need to cut those holes, get the fridge in and seal around it, and cut a new faceplate for the whole cabinet it sits in, since that got destroyed taking it out. Then put back together the rest of the countertops and other stuff I had to take apart to get the fridge out. I didn't think I'd be taking the fridge back out, ever, when I put it in there... And I'm planning on leaving around the 23rd. Still waiting on some parts, too, is the problem.

Crater lake is cool. I went there when I spent 2 weeks in Bend last summer. Yosemite is cool. I took Tioga Pass this last summer. Really pretty. The Redwoods are cool. Especially the smaller parks. Highway 1 is kinda rough. Extremely windy, to the point where it's not fun in an RV. You're turning so much, you'll only be able to go 15-20mph, and between watching the curves and watching out for bikes, you won't see a bit of the ocean. That's just my experience, though; you can try it for yourself.

Thanks Karin. Those would be really nice, but are still too big to fit in the space I have to work with. Hopefully 3 of those little 2" vents in a line will allow enough flow.

Where does it say Sundrader? It looks metal. Sunraders were a one piece molded fiberglass camper. If it's an 81 with fuel injection, someone swapped engines. The 22RE came out in 1985.

You can look up the ingredients for the Red and Pink. Even they aren't exactly the same. Red dye or not, it is Toyota's own formula. Whether it really makes any difference or not in the life or your engine, they do believe that it's formulated to work better with Toyota engines and will prolong their life. I go with it, cause why not? How often do you change antifreeze? It's still a pretty insignificant amount of money, considering. If I needed antifreeze badly and for some reason there was no dealership or any other place that carried it? I'd have no problem using some other coolant.

Good! I mean, not at all. I bought those vents I linked in my last post. But it's been cold, with warmer weather forecasted. No reason to work in 20 degree weather when 30s and 40s are forecasted in a few days. So for now I've been prepping my engine and gathering parts while the head was at the machine shop. Got it back yesterday. So I've been cleaning off piston heads, cleaning up oily crud all over my engine, etc. Head will likely go back on this weekend, then oil pump and front crank seal replacement. Once I know that I can get in the camper and drive it when I'm ready, I'll start work on coach stuff. Want to make sure I can get out of town, first. But next week I'll be cutting the holes for those vents. I'm going to wait on spending money on fans until I'm sure my fridge even works. I mean last summer it was DEAD. If it starts working again this summer it won't be cause I put a couple vents above it. It worked fine for four months without those vents. So for now we'll just do a "proper installation", aka vents where the installation manual says they should be, and see if my fridge is functioning. Then, later in the summer or whenever, I'll look into some fans, if I think I need them.

I get mail, but whether I have mail or not, I cannot see the envelope lately. If I have mail, there's a little red flag up there telling me, but I have to kind of guess at where the envelope link is, until I see my cursor change. If I don't have mail, there's nothing at all up there. It wasn't always this way. I know I used to be able to see the envelope, whether or not I had mail. Now I can never see it. The link is there, but it's somehow hidden.