Archive for the 'modification' Category

Brake Upgrade

Published on August 18, 2010 in exterior, modification and parts. — 1 Comment Tags: brake.

Finally another upgrade to our van. Converting it from a single piston caliper to dual pistons including slotted rotors and braided steel brake hoses. Main reason for that: We wanted more stopping power. Specially with the bigger wheels you had to press hard on the brake till the loaded van actually came to a stop.
I knew from talking to friends it was possible to upgrade the l300 brakes with the brakes of a l400 respectively Montero. So off I went to source the parts and ended up with Power Slot rotors, Hawk LTS brake pads and Russell brake lines. The calipers were only available as oem parts. Due some stocking issues with the Russell fittings it actually took a few months to get all the parts together.
Anyway we worked two full days to make this modification right, but in the end it was totally worth it. The biggest surprise (at least for me) was as we changed the long rubber hose in the back to a braided steel hose. The pressure point at the pedal felt so much strong and not spongy anymore. Doesn’t matter how loaded the van is, I feel now confident to stop it without any delays.

Challenges:
There were a few challenges during this modification.
First it seems like there is no 7″ DOT braided steel brake hose available which would be necessary for the front top portion to make it a nice fit. We used 9″ instead. Not ideal, but works.
Second, you need to make new metal brake lines with tiny curves on the calipers. So make sure you have the right tools including tube cutter and flaring tool.
Third, it took us a while to figure out the right bracket to attach the hose to the caliper. Main challenge is you don’t want to hit the brake line neither with your bump stop, nor with your wheel.
Fourth, you need to trim the head shield to make the dual piston caliper fit.

Last but not least a huge thanks to “lazygreenfox” and “Golf Cart” for their help on this job. It is great to have such a good Delica community in Vancouver where everybody can learn from each other!

Here are the part numbers I used for this job:

Rotors:
Power Slot 126-46040SR
Power Slot 126-46040SL

Calipers:
2x ‘92+ Mitsubishi Montero front left/right caliper semi-loaded

Brake Pads:
1x Hawk LTS HB214Y.618

Brake Lines:
4x Russell 656012 (9″)
1x Russell 656062 (24″, shorter is fine if you don’t have a lift)

Brake Fittings:
8x Russell 641411
2x Russell 641431

Misc:
2x Russell 683942 (90 degree bracket)
2x 3/16 in. o.d. SAE inverted flare metric brake line with 2 pcs. M10 – 1.0 long tube nut fitting
DOT 4 Brake Fluid

Rebuilt struts

Published on July 1, 2010 in modification. — 0 Comments Tags: struts.

One of the most common problems on a 15 years old Delica is the weak tail gate strut. Specially if you add on a ladder, the back door comes done quite easily and sometimes doesn’t stay open at all (in the cold). Apparently these stock struts are from very good quality, so it makes more sense to recondition them than to buy new.
I heard nothing but good about Frank from Strut Wise in Langley who brings all sorts of struts back to life and even builds them from scratch to your specs.
Meeting him was already a pleasure. It seems he is one of the few guys left who understand a real workmanship. No wonder people from around the world sending him their struts. After I picked my rebuilt struts up I was very satisfied with the outcome. They looked brand new and worked like it as well. He even made them stronger than the stock struts was. Well worth the money.

One tip for new l300 owners: Check the lower bracket of the struts. If you read the “E/N” upside right you are all set. If its upside down take both struts off, swap sides and rotate the lower bracket. It will give you an extra few inches when you open the door. You head will like it :)

Pressure Valve Blocker

Published on June 27, 2010 in modification. — 0 Comments Tags: engine.

One temporarily downside of the snorkel was the constantly releasing of the pressure valve under load. That had to be fixed. I could have just bought a stronger, adjustable valve, but it was way more fun to build my own adjuster. The most important part is to find the right strength of coil spring. Canadian Tire had a good collection and after a few tries I found the perfect fit. The rest are just scrap of aluminum and stainless steel hardware. All in all just a few bucks.

It works great and the annoying sound of the pressure valve under load is gone till the pressure hits about 18psi. I usually try to stay blow 15psi, though.

Side Step

Published on May 20, 2010 in exterior and modification. — 0 Comments Tags: paint, welding.

With the higher lift we use the side-step below the sliding door quite a bit while camping. After crawling under the van I discovered that all tubes from the step are just welded on the bottom and had no strength on the top. Not really ideal, so I took it of and brought it to Metal & Wood Products to get their opinion on it. After a couple of days they made the whole step stronger and reduced the flex.

Another problem was the rust. I already knew from our old van, that the side step can rust quite fast due the rock-chips from the front wheel (even with mud flaps). Therefore I cleaned and sanded it properly and used a few coats of black rocker guard as protection. The hardware is now also stainless steel. We will see how good it holds up.

Modified bull bar

Published on May 20, 2010 in exterior and modification. — 1 Comment Tags: bumper, paint, welding.

It was time to work on the front bull bar. In general I was quite happy with the standard set-up we had on our old Delica, but wanted to improve a few things. To clarify it right from the beginning we are not planing to install a winch as well as there is no need for any Hi-Lift Jack points. It don’t have to be a heavy-duty bumper, more a light-weight protection of the front and a mount for fog lights.

The first step was to take the plastic cover off which I was not planing to use anymore afterwards. Unfortunately after the cover came off quite a few big metal brackets were welded to the bull bar. So I spent a whole night grinding everything unnecessary off. After cleaning up I had to figure out a mounting system for the planned fog lights in the middle of the bumper. In the end a metal plate was welded to the middle tube with three brackets attached to it. Also the main mount for the bull bar got a few additional welding spots to make it stronger.

Next step was cleaning, sanding and priming. As the first coat I used rocker guard to prevent any chipping. The second and third coat is white Tremclad.

The two main brackets which hold the bumper to the van were quite rusty as well as all the bolts. I used rust primer and again Tremclad, but I had to find new bolts. Not as easy as I thought. It turned out just one place in Vancouver sells fine-thread metric high-grad bolts: West Coast Fasteners Ltd.
The original bolts are grad 7, which is not very high specially when you use just ONE bolt to tow the whole vehicle. Therefore I bought grade 10.9 to give it more strength and used stainless-steel washers.

Next step: Mounting the fog lights…