UAZ joins the fleet

[Driver_Neil]

After a few days dedicated to the landrover I found myself waiting for parts (still am!) so I get back on the UAZ. The new feul senders have arrived from Poland so I started to remove the access hatches in the floor to get the old senders out. Drivers side came off easily without removing the seat although I subsequently removed it. Probably because there were only 3 bolts fitted. I found out the likely reason why on the other side.

The sender and pickup were then liberally sprayed with WD40 and left to soak whilst I switched to the other side.
This is where the fun started - seat had to be removed to get the bolts to turn then only 3 bolts came out. The fourth - in the worst possible place, the corner by the filler neck seems to have the captive nut broken loose and just spins.


The folded lip of the access hole stops a spanner going on it and the proximity of the tank top rules out mole grips. So the plan looks to be drop the fuel tank on that side enough to get a pair of grips on the loose captive nut so the bolt can be removed then refit the tank and removes the sender. the plate could be lifted just enough to give the sender and pick-up fittings on this side a hefty dose of WD40 too.


Returning to the drivers side I had a go at removing the 6 screws hold the sender in - 2 came out freely, 2 came loose then stuck and 2 and stuck fast so another dose of WD40 was applied and left to soak.
Since then the tools needed to get a broken thermostat bhousing bolt out of the landies cylinder head arrived so I swapped back to that. The remnant is now out so hopefully - weather permitting - tomorrow I will have another crack at the UAZ.

 

[Driver_Neil]

First off - good news at last! I got a nice new V5 in the post this morning from DVLA. Historic tax class and early build date. Just need to talk to the insurers on Monday to get the reg num changed on the policy and the new number plates made up and we will be road ready.

Now back to the realities
On Satruday I finally managed to get the sender on the drivers side fuel tank out today - the remaining screws had to be removed in small increments with mole grips as the cross-heads were badly screwed up. I am going to have to order new screws I think as I do not think these can be reused. Screw size looks to be M5 x 12mm.
Once the sender weas in - it still read half a tank even though the tanks was almost empty. If you look at the old and new senders the float is on the other side on the new one so I need to see if it might be catching?

Old sender




New sender




When the old one came out it looked to be covered in rust which - in a fuel tank - is highly worrying. But I lowered a small LED torch in through the sender hole and had a look - the tank internals looked to be clean so I can only assume the rust came from the old sender which was stuck solid when it came out




Next will be to lower the passenger side tank so that I can get the mole grips on the loose captive nut and undo the final bolt from the access plate. The tank can then be lifted back into place and refitted and the business with the sender repeated.

What I did notice today was the seat frame on the drivers side - seems a wee bit broken!!!




Today my daughter had a dressage contest so I only had a short time to work before we had to load the dogs in the cars and go watch her compete (she placed 5th!) So I started off by placing a trolley jack under the passenger tank then going to undo the retaining bolts on the straps. There ended plan "A" as they were seized solid. Been soaked in penetrating oil for a couple of days but nothing had worked.
So I started on plan "B" - clamped a pair of mole grips on the loose bolt head, poistioned them so the body stopped any movement and drilled down through the centre of the bolt head with a 5mm drill. That got the had popped off, the remains dropped free underneath ans thus the access panel was free. Then I found the screws holding the sender in this side were well and truly f*cked - way worse than on the other side and an ordinary crosshead screw driver wouldn't move them. Some heavy swearing, sweating and cursing got one partially free - it rotated about 1 turn then jammed again. So in deperation I used an cordless drill in screwe driver mode and noticed that in a low torque setting the vibration of the drill skipping antucally was rotating the screw... Tried it again on another nand it worked there from solid. Murphys law being as active as ever it worked on all but one of them. That one I had to drill down through the head till it popped off and then I could remove the sender. As per the other side - it was rusted solid. That left me with the remain of the screw in the threaded hole. So I drilled down through the remains using a 4 mm drill and tried to use an eZ-Out. That didn't work as I felt there was more chance of that snapping before the seized screw moved so I then used a 4.5 mm drill That was enough and the remains were removed with minimal - if any - damage to the threads. The hole was sealed with duct tape as I now need to order new screws for both sides.






If the weather holds for tomtorrow I will try and get the starter out before returning to the Landrover - once it is out the UAZ cannot be progressed further till the new screws and the replacment starter arrive.

 

[Driver_Neil]

Finally got the starter out! Had to remove the fuel pump as well then I could feed the starter up through the cap between the front side plate and the distributor. Now to wait for the replacement.

 

[Driver_Neil]

Starter arrived and is now fitted. Was still a bit slow cranking over so I put the battery on charge foe a day yesterday and tried again today - certainly better and the engine burst into life so I think its the best I am going to get. Still very slow on cranking compared to, say a Series Landrover!

Next I looked at the fuel sender on the passenger side - had to deill out one of the 5 retaining screws but luckily managed to avoid damaging the treads. Way I found best to get the other screws out was to get a cordless drill.screw driver, set it on a very low torque, engage the bit and pull the trigger. Then the vibrations of the torque limiter slipping acted like an impact driver and gradually the 4 other screws came out. Same trick worked on the drivers side.
Once fitted I flicked the switch to test them Drivers side had < 1/4 tank by visual inspection and this more or less showed on the gauge. Passenger side had 3/4 of a tank but when selected the needle went to max deflection, same as for the neutral position implying an open circuit. So I tested for continuity between the senders terminal post and earth - nothing! So I removed the sender and checked it. There was a range of resistance readings ranging from one extreme - low tank - was 9.3 ohms. At the other extreme - full tank - was 94.9 ohms.
Then I switched back to continuity and this is where it gets weird. I had continuity from 9.3 Ohms up to 46.8 Ohms. Above 46.8 Ohms there was no continuity. So when the tanks just over half full the sender loses continuity - as the tank is nearly 3/4 by visual inspection check it explains why the gauge behaves as it does. What it does not explain is WHY there is no continuity above 46.8 Ohms.
Unfortunately the wife has thrown the two old ones away so I cannot check them.

Today I removed the drivers side sender and ran the same test on that. To my surprise - and horror - the same results were obtained so when the drivers tank gets filled over the halfway mark the gauge will go open circuit and show max deflection. WishI knew what to do next - I cannot believe two brand new senders will exhibit the same fault even given the standard of the old Soviet quality control levels.
This is baffdling me as, if there is an electrical path to ge me resistance reading from one limit of travel to the other surely there then must be an electrciacl path to and thus the continuity buzzer should have kept soundin

 

[Driver_Neil]

Looks like for now I will have to run with the weird senders - at least until I can find some good ones.
Brakes acted up next - after the starter was replaced the brake lights decided to stay on. As I had dropped the rather heavy starter onto the brake light switch I guessed it had to have been damaged so I got a replacement. that was where things went badly wrong. First I found the 3 way union that was supposed to be bolted to the chassis was, in fact, not. It was loose and free to move so as I hauled down on the spanner to free the switch I saw it flexing. And just as the switch freed up there was a plink sound followed by drips of brake fluid - both front rigid lines had ruptured. Took the off the next day - no fun when the temps were hovering around 40 deg c and the unions hadn't been disturbed since it left the factory. Got them off after a great deal of effort and took the to the local garage to get new ones made up. I told them the unions were M12x1 and I needed new ones as the old were rather rounded from my efforts to get them off. i also asked that they give me the old pipes back so I could use them as templates for the new ones - there were some "interesting" curves to copy. When I got them back I was told they had to reuse the old unions as the had n imperial ones in stock - and the original pipes had been crushed up into a ball. This marked one of the very few times I went absolutely Librarian Poo at the world!!! So it took another day with a can of beans forming up the new pipes to more or less fit where the old ones went and then bolting them into place, Once done the brakes were bled - only to find that not only were the lights still on but but now so were the brakes!!!
Turns out the actuator rod from the brake master cylinder was the culprit responsible for the brakes and brake lights staying on. I removed the boot from the adjuster nut, released the lock nut and wound the actuator in until I got free play in the linkages. I must have taken it a good 12mm at least, possibly as much as 15mm. Once I had the free play I tightened the locknut and replaced the boot onto the adjuster then checked the brake lights - they are now off all the time until the pedal is pressed.. So next is to go for a short test drive to see how well it goes and whether I need to adjust the brakes further. I hope not as there isn't much left on the adjuster now!!
Once the brakes were sorted and the under-guard plate bolted back on I drained the fuel out of the passenger side tank into a bucket - took 3 sessions as I only had a 20 litre bucket - and poured it into the drivers side tank, this being the only one currently the pump will draw from. Those filler necks - even when extended are not the easiest to pour into are they?? I must have lost a litre in spillage between the three pouring in sessions.

When the fuel transfer was complete I turned attention to getting the door mirrors fitted. Putting them where they look to be on the photos I've seen got the bolts hit by the door checks as the doors shut so I had to move them back and up a little. Could not go any higher as I could not reach up further to get the washers and nuts on!! Still - they are on now and when I get the new doors from Tarmot I will reconsider the locations. May need tweaking position wise once some miles are covered. As of now this is how the old bus looks:



Today was the first official test drive for the UAZ!! It went well with a few lessons learnt in the ways of things UAZ. The old bus started well after being left for 24 hours - first lesson learnt was to leave her to warm up a bit more before trying to drive off as the intial few hundred yards were a bit spluttery engine-wise. However as soon as it did warm up it ran and pulled strongly. Gears went in without crunching apart from 1st. Gear change was pleasant and not as vague as a Series Landie (the comparator for the day). Speedo was "interesting" to put it mildly - although calibrated from 0 kph the vehicle was actually rolling a few yards before the speedo started to register and then it flickered reading approx +/- 10 kph for any speed. Either the cable is sticky through lack of use or it needs replacing. Or it is routed incorrectly and is being tapped by the cover plates. What ever - something to be investigated. Turning circle was a bit bigger than the Landies but once I knew what to expect it was not a problem. The ride was surprisingly smooth given the cart spring technology suspension - most notably over speed humps. The Landie tends to try and compress the spine when going over them faster than 10 mph whereas the UAZ rolled over with minimal discomfort at 50 kph (30 mph). There seems to be a lot more vibration whilst rolling as compared to a Landie - the door mirrors in particular moved a lot whereas the Landie's are still. That could be down to the UAZ doors being basically f*cke*d and falling apart though.
Overall I was very pleased with the run and am now looking forwards to a longer one tomorrow to get to the Ford R&D centre at Dunton, just off the A127.

 

[Another Ahab]

Once the brakes were sorted and the under-guard plate bolted back on I drained the fuel out of the passenger side tank into a bucket - took 3 sessions as I only had a 20 litre bucket - and poured it into the drivers side tank, this being the only one currently the pump will draw from. Those filler necks - even when extended are not the easiest to pour into are they?? I must have lost a litre in spillage between the three pouring in sessions.

It is amazing sometimes how the designers of these kinds of things can get a basic detail like this (convenient fueling), so wrong, you know?

 

[Driver_Neil]

It is amazing sometimes how the designers of these kinds of things can get a basic detail like this (convenient fueling), so wrong, you know?

Yeah - add that that the fact that unlike a Lanrdrover if you switch the fuel tanks then you have to also switch the gauge over - UAZ engineers don't seem to have discovered micro-switches, And that the UAZ does NOT like drawing from the passenger side tank - I suspect the pump lacks the necessary "oomph" to do this so you wind up just running on the drivers side tank.

Got the big run over today - and it went well. Only problem was binding brakes which included a nasty tendency to pull to the right when braking hard. So some adjusting to do there tomorrow.

 

[saddamsnightmare]

August 3rd, 2015.

What's to complain about the UAZ grille, it kind of looks like they stole the idea for ugly from a 1960's International Harvester!

 

[Driver_Neil]

So - a belated update!
At War and peace it behaved well in the deep mud after we worked out how to engage 4WD. A few weeks after I was on the way to another show when a loud squealing started from the front - somewhere. it started getting loud and expensive sounding so I turned around and went home, missing the show. When the daughter mk1 was free we went for a short spin and she listened as I drove. then reported the sound was coming from behind the dash, not the engine bay. Only thing rotating there is the speedo cable so I disconnected it and went for another spin - no more noise. Ah - I think - dodgy cable so I ordered a new one which arrived in time to be fitted ready for the Red Oktober day at the Ace Cafe in London in October. On the way there the squealing returned and I noticed that when it did this the speedo started reading wildly - at pone point the sat nav said I was doing 50 kph whilst the speedo was reading 120 kph....
On the way home I looked down and noticed the speedo dial slowly rotating in the housing!! Obviously a fooked speed head so another one was ordered which arrived the other day, I need to swap the glass out as the old one has the MPH overlay on it then fit the new one. Never had that happen to me before.
Another "feature" noticed now the rains are back non-stop is there is no way of tensioning the roof or supporting it to stop rain water pooling in it so I now a couple of cammo net baskets on poles wedged onto the rear seat frame pushing the roof up to stop the pooling, I found out the hard way that a LOT of water collects there which is heavy - so much so it had pulled the rear window surrounf away from the top of the glass leaving a hole big enough to put my hand through.

 

[Another Ahab]

So - a belated update!
At War and peace it behaved well in the deep mud after we worked out how to engage 4WD. A few weeks after I was on the way to another show when a loud squealing started from the front - somewhere. it started getting loud and expensive sounding so I turned around and went home, missing the show.

Expensive noises are kind of scary.