My (NASTY) 70hp Mercedes Diesel TM

[AshleyMckendree]

You've all been asking for it... Now here it is :|

Be warned it is a disgusting sight. Waste oil spewed all over it from a busted line then belt shavings covered EVERYTHING. Also Duct tape, 2x4's, hand prints... you name it

Specs:
70hp - 132lbs Torque
Rebuilt - 1983 Mercedes 4cyl Diesel - Running on 100% Veggie oil

5MP Sutorbilt

Some kind of General pump

Also Bawb will like seeing the GREEN belts

And notice my space age Red Power twist belts on the pump, i friggen love it. Best belt ever.

[attachment=2:2swe3hri]mercedes machine 001.jpg[/attachment:2swe3hri]

 

[AshleyMckendree]

More pics

 

[AshleyMckendree]

It's all in the back of this truck.


No the NPR does not look like this any more, this is what it looked like the day I bought it.

 

[Phoenix Phil]

Thanks for posting. Nice piece of equipment, allot like Ron's Big Red he got pimped, not pretty but very effective. Degreasing and a couple coats of paint and it would be pretty for all the fussy pants people out there.

Where did the motor come from? What CU or Liter?

How many miles on it when you got it? How bout a picture of the truck now?

Thanks again!

 

[AshleyMckendree]

Thanks guys,

Phoenix: The motor came out of a 1983 Mercedes 240D, the odometer was stuck on 138k
And It's a 2.4 liter (om616)

Me, dad, mom, my Sister drive these old Mercedes as personal cars,
so we bought the car this engine came out of for parts but did not need the engine because we have the 5cyl version (300d's)

FCC:
Funny you ask because we actually almost used a Pumps pulley.

That is actually a 3 groove Damper pulley off of a 7.3 Ford Diesel engine... It bolted up PERFECT. It was a little TOO good to be true, but it works! LOL


Here is my baby (My wifes yaris behind it) (she hates these loud smelly things lol)
[attachment=0:983h660c]300d 001.jpg[/attachment:983h660c]

 

[John Watson]

Ashley, Thanks for the photo's, I am not trying to be knit pickey, critasizing or trying to be an asshole, (damn, thats a hard one not to do) but my early back ground was building stuff with junk shit to begin with. So please bear with my rambling,,

First off I am known for over building with heavier materials. I noticed you mounted your #5 on its side for ease of plumbing hook ups and from what I see you used 1/8x 1 1/2 angle. I would have used 1/4 as a minimum attatched to 3/8 plate with a slide type belt tensioner. I would have welded 1/2 nuts to the plate and use the 1/2 bolts with double nuts to adjust. what did you use for your adjuster because I see a hump in one of the green belts? ( I know of nothing faster to take out the bearings and eat belts on blowers.)

You have made that thing so it can breathe, good for you.

I can't see the frame you are using so no comment,

That ABS plastic pipe has worked great for me. I have a #5 vertical plumbed with the same stuff and size. Mine goes into a 200 gal fiberglass tank and was shaft driven.

What are your plans for heating your water? You sure got lots of options, Heat exchanger, Lpg, multiple, a vegtable oil fired burner would also be neat. You could get alot of parts needed of an old steamway unit..Their newer ones are 12volt compared to the 120 volt ones I had alot of trouble with those..

Anyways you probobly got most of it all thought out, You look like your doing a good job, Keep it up if I can help with your thinkin things out feel free, I am also bass akwards on a lot of things too..

 

[floorguy]

hey how you like that twist belt???

where did you get from and how much $$$$

 

[AshleyMckendree]

John: I greatly appreciate your constructive criticism, thats why I posted it here.

The photos where actually taken while the machine was On and thats why the belts look like they are uneven. They flap around a little when the machine is on.

Currently the water is heated by a Stanley Steamer "Pancake" exchanger (Greenie said its a Helicoil type)
I have plans to add an exhaust exchanger, but not sure where to start as I don't have the $$$ to buy one.
Although I do have a friend with a Lathe and a Milling machine that could aid me in making one if i had some decent plans.

I also have a Little Giant 3ht that needs the coil repaired.

Either way I need to do some work to get serious heat

FloorGuy:
I LOVE the Power Twist belt, and I'm heavily considering buying 5/8 P-twist belts for my blower if they can transfer the Power.

I bought a 5ft section at Grainger for $38 bucks I think, and have plenty of links left if any break on me.


FCC:
I will eventually be doing something like this:[attachment=1:1zwxm4gh]drive plate.jpg[/attachment:1zwxm4gh][attachment=0:1zwxm4gh]drive plate 2.jpg[/attachment:1zwxm4gh]

Except NOT that long!

That way I could put a pulley on there that is MADE for B belts


Those pics are from a Home Brew Genset somone made from a VW diesel engine, here is the link to his site: http://www.oldengine.org/members/jdunmyer/genset/

 

[Ron Werner]

Got machine that'll last you a loooong time Ashley. Best part about it is if something goes wrong, you can get it running again. Whats with the green belts and the power twist belts, never seen those before.


here's how I last fixed the big red for belts, using 5VX belts and 10" sheaves. Got the belt tensioner from Johns Machine Shop and had to modify it more to make it fit properly.

The old girl beens sitting since July1st, fired it up just for a few hours to flush the lines with some antifreeze.

 

[AshleyMckendree]

I know you have a Judson now, But why did you stop using your big red? seems like a powerful unit.

 

[Ron Werner]

It was just getting to point where I was fixing it all the time, though if I was to do an overhaul of the motor and the whole unit, it would last for another 12000 hrs. Plus I think I was getting truck envy. I was hearing about how this truck would do this and that and I wanted that performance.
I wanted something where I could pull up to the house, pull in the hose, and just go to work, knowing the machine wasn't going to need pampering to keep it going. Right now it has an exhaust leak that needs fixing.
As a word of warning, if you can compartmentalize your engine area, same for those PowerClean laddies with diesels, WHEN, not IF, you get an exhaust leak it won't get black all over your equipment and hoses and chem bottles and walls.

I've been thinking what I'd do with this tm. I'll never get enough for it if I sold it, carpet cleaners are too cheap 8) SO I'll be keeping it for a while yet. I've put too much into it to throw away for a meer $5000. Hell, the new sheave system alone cost me close to $3000 by the time I was done. And it ain't gonna break!
If I needed to, I would mount this unit in a cube van, and arrange things much like in the CanAm truck, complete with separate engineering compartment, equipment and chem/mixing compartment. She'd be quiet to. I ran it the other day and realized just how quiet it runs, and how much more quiet it would be if it was in an insulated box. Its got two honkin silencers in parallel, all you hear is a rush of air and the sweet whine of a running engine.

 

[Chris A]

I bet both those TM's sound great running, like old diesel farm tractors.

 

[Greenie]

$3K in sheaves...ouch

Ash, you have enough hicks in town that can weld, get some 5" SS tube and some 1/2" SS tube and get busy making a poor man's HX, just make sure your cold inlet is at the BOTTOM, and you Hot output is on top along with a pressure releif valve fitting, the rest is fabrication preference, reference Kevin Brenny's pic here, just put more than 5 tubes if you can.

 

[Ron Werner]

it was 3g in getting the sheaves all set up
tensioning pulley
re-modifying/reengineering tension pulley
belts, more belts, more belts
sheaves,
installation of sheaves.
it was like $200 here, $300 here, $300 there, etc etc

 

[AshleyMckendree]

Ron,

Those green belts are the equivalent of Bx belts (They also have equivalent of Ax) and I bought them at Car Quest for $18 per belt.
There called "Gates PoweRated" and they are all green...
I appreciate Bob Vawter for turning me on to them.


I have not put allot of hours on them, but by this time on my last 3 sets of B belts they had worn down + glazed and slipped like crazy because my setup is not aligned well and my drive pulley is off a Ford diesel and not made for this application.

So I would say if they can hold up to what I am giving them, they would last 3+ years for anyone else.


As for the Red "Power Twist belt" I have been equally impressed with it. I just put it on my pumps pulley and took how many links off I didn't need, then "Twisted" them together and didn't even have to adjust the pump or anything.

I would love to know if these belts would work on a #5 blower, if these green belts ever give out.

 

[Ron Werner]

I forgot to say one thing I REALLY appreciate about the CanAm...No Coolant.
I was forever trying to keep the Big Red cool, it over heated all the time. Twas just an inconvenience, just cool it down and she'd go again, but really irritating some days.
One of her quirks was that if I had the truck pointed nose up on a slope, it would overheat move often, if it was nose down, she would run all day till out of fuel. Never could figure that one out.

 

[SRI Cleaning]

I have a commercial lawn mower that uses a belt between the motor and hydraulic pump. Every year the belt would break and it was a pain in the a$$ to change. Sometimes it would break twice in a year. I put on one of those gates green belts and it has been on there for 3 seasons now.

 

[Greenie]

We had a powertwist Red belt driving the Hypro pump on our old slide in, I used it cause the unit was direct coupled and was a nightmare to change a common pump belt, so the red belt was a no-brainer as soon as i saw it first used I knew most everyone could benefit from one, in fact i still have about 12' of it on the shelf, that same belt ran for two years before we sold the unit, and I know for a fact the guy put another 2 years on it when we took the unit back.....long story.

So jusut ask, and I'll sell you a couple feet cheap.

I would not try and drive a blower with it, it has it's limits, stick with your Gates Green.

Remember to drop a link out of it after a month of breaking it in, stretch factor.

 

[AshleyMckendree]

I was going to take your suggestion, but after a month my red belt hasn't stretched at all.

 

[floorguy]

We had a powertwist Red belt driving the Hypro pump on our old slide in, I used it cause the unit was direct coupled and was a nightmare to change a common pump belt, so the red belt was a no-brainer as soon as i saw it first used I knew most everyone could benefit from one, in fact i still have about 12' of it on the shelf, that same belt ran for two years before we sold the unit, and I know for a fact the guy put another 2 years on it when we took the unit back.....long story.

So jusut ask, and I'll sell you a couple feet cheap.

I would not try and drive a blower with it, it has it's limits, stick with your Gates Green.

Remember to drop a link out of it after a month of breaking it in, stretch factor.

oh you shit....we talked about this a while ago and told me about it...but you NEVER said you had any :x :x :x

ok hell what do i need to measure for length??? take a fabric measure tape and go around it??

jude freakin as...

I am going to relocate my pump to the top of the blower to...maybe help make a little more room, and a little less hassle with hoses...easier cleanup i hope to

 

[Greenie]

You axed me for some when you were here?

sorry....I missed that.

 

[floorguy]

nooo when you was out at johns thing...back in may...

 

[ACE]

Ashley,

That’s a nice set up. Why not clean it up a little and do a wrap or paint job and lettering advertising Green cleaning running on bio-diesel?

 

[AshleyMckendree]

Ashley,

That’s a nice set up. Why not clean it up a little and do a wrap or paint job and lettering advertising Green cleaning running on bio-diesel?

Thanks Mike,

I actually spent most of my day cleaning the machine up, drilling new holes in my tank for dual 2" ports (Just a single 2.5 port now)

As for a Wrap, I'm hoping to get a deal with a friend that has a screen printer.


Tomorrow I Will try to post better pics of the entire setup in the box, and better lit pics of the machine.

 

[lance]

How long have you been using the macine? How does it compare to the TM you were using before?

 

[Greenie]

Ash, if you use thin walled 2.5" tubing, and weld it in, you can slip a 2.5 hose Over the nipple, or put a 2" cuff inside the nipple.

Same applies if you weld in a 2.5" half coupling, then you can screw in a high performance part like this and have the best of both worlds:

 

[AshleyMckendree]

How long have you been using the macine? How does it compare to the TM you were using before?

Lance:

This machine has actually been re-incarnated several times over the past 3 months.
We only actually started using it as our "Money Maker" a month ago.

The machine that proceeded this one is basically a butler, but it was home made and had ALLOT less components.

As far as Comparison? It's a whole different world.

BUT To be fare to my previous setup, It was rock solid reliable. Cleaned VERY well. And made me allot of money.
I sold it to a competitor 2 months ago, and he prefers it over his 2003 Butler...

...Maybe it has something to do with the fact mine runs on 100% WVO and uses 1/3rd the fuel per hour of his Butler :mrgreen:


Jeff:

Are those Stainless Steel?

 

[Greenie]

Jeff:

Are those Stainless Steel?

No, those are aluminum that has been hard anodized (like all of my metal fittings), they would be more expensive in SS, and especially so in the madrel bend type elbow assemblies.

Gonna make some 4" and 3" as well.