hydraulic pump priming and a part ID - advice please....

tim · Post by **tim** » Tue May 03, 2011 1:39 pm

I put a post up in March about this but no-one bit. The old regulator on the white BX is still dripping away, and now it's warmed up we've made some progress on dismantling the scrapper. I now have a replacement regulator cleaned off and ready to fit.... the idea of 'gluing' up the old one is a pretty good one for a 'quick fix' but having seen the underside of the unit I doubt very much that I'd have achieved a 100% seal if only due to the difficulty of degreasing the thing properly in situ. Two questions for you guys; first, Haynes say 'prime the pump after refitting regulator' but the dibbles don't tell you how. Is it basically the same procedure as spheres, i.e. backing off the pressure valve on the regulator a few times, or is there something else I need to do?
Second question, mounted above the regulator and connected to it by various solid pipes, is a secondary unit. a stubby cross shape with five ports and a number, 587411. What does this do??? You can see it included in the Haynes diagram of the hydraulic system but actually labelling the items doesn't seem to have occurred to them. I have the spare of that too -should I change it while I'm there given that the original has done nearly 300,000 miles?

ken newbold · Post by **ken newbold** » Tue May 03, 2011 3:02 pm

Priming the pump is done by filling the main pump-feed pipe at the reservior end, you will find a small funnel useful.

The other part you mention is the flow distrubution valve, this sends the fluid to all the various components in the system.

tim · Post by **tim** » Tue May 03, 2011 5:55 pm

Thanks Ken - I had a vague idea that's what it was but couldn't prove it!
The 'tick time' on the wagon has always been fast and changing the sphere didn't help, so I'm hoping a newer regulator might help that, as well as fixing the leak. As I didn't get any answers as to how the plastic cap is sealed to the regulator, I'll strip down the old one and let y'all know. I printed off the 15-page Tramontana stuff about hydraulics and will overhaul it when it's off so we have a functioning spare on the shelf. Polite question - is it possible to do something with the search facility on this site? I never had much luck with it and when I typed in 'hydraulic pump priming' today it gave me nearly 2000 matches, most of which didn't involve hydraulics at all! Am I doing something wrong?

sdelasal · Post by **sdelasal** » Tue May 03, 2011 6:24 pm

tim - on the search utility, check the 'Search for all terms' box instead of the 'search for any terms' and it'll return 10 hits for you. Steve

ken newbold · Post by **ken newbold** » Tue May 03, 2011 8:01 pm

By "plastic cap" I take it you mean the round green thing that's fastened on by two allen screws? I'm afraid it's just a contact fit, there is quite a strong spring behind it so take care.

I think the plastic distorts with age, heat and pressure allowing it to leak, I've sealed these in the past by slackening the screws, drying off (several times) then using silcone sealant and retightening the screws.

tim · Post by **tim** » Tue May 03, 2011 8:38 pm

Green? All the three we have are black..... Can't trust Johnny Crapaud, what? Always changing things.

tim · Post by **tim** » Wed May 04, 2011 5:04 pm

Obviously we know what happens if you remove the entire regulator, but doesn't the same thing happen when you remove the cap? It would be a quick fix but does the regulator empty out all its fluid, and how much bleeding/priming is therefore needed? My original post in March was based on the guess that there would be some kind of seal between the cap and the body due to what I assumed would be fairly high pressure - but a simple contact fit suggests that it's not so pressurised. What does the spring do??
Thanks, Sdelasal, that worked! Wish I'd known that months ago...the strangeness of computerspeak.