FLU419 SEE HMMH HME Owners group

[jstark45xd]

One more thing to look into, at some point. My temp gauges show about 160 degrees no matter what. Well, once the engines are up to temperature.
How accurate those readings are I haven't checked.
They'll get long-life coolant in the spring, and that'll be the opportune moment to look into any problems with the cooling system.

I've watched mine go the whole range of the gauge. I live in the desert and pushing some of these hills out to the claim and back it's gotten hot! Cools it right down when thermostat opens though!

 

[The FLU farm]

I've watched mine go the whole range of the gauge. I live in the desert and pushing some of these hills out to the claim and back it's gotten hot! Cools it right down when thermostat opens though!

Rarely gets to 80 here, which obviously plays in. And since the (bionic) heater works very well, I know there's some temp in the coolant. Also, it's easy to tell when the engine really is warm by observing the oil pressure gauge.

Speaking of gauges, yesterday I noticed that the Volt meter was reading a bit low. Turns out it was the rear fans. Kinda handy to know when they come on, now that I know to look for it.

Oh, and the SEE got used today, too, but not for snow blowing. Stuck a tractor in a small irrigation ditch. Tried winching it out, but with nothing to tie the Postal to and unable to operate both the winch and tractor at once, that failed (need to hook up that remote winch control I bought a few years ago).
Too chicken to do the "put one in drive and try driving the stuck one out" on the slippery surface, using the SEE was the most logical solution. Piece of cake.
I don't think the SEE noticed that the tractor was tied to it. I couldn't feel it.

 

[The FLU farm]

Potential air leaks, but not in the fuel system this time.
Two of the tires that were dismounted for wheel widening had slow leaks, and now I know why. It wasn't the tires per se, but rather the sad state of the wheels, particularly in the bead area.
Wanted to grind down the outer weld since it ended up right at the inner edge of the Pitbull tires' bead, decided to clean it all up, and found almost severe rust in one wheel.This was far from the worst bead, but in retrospect I'm surprised that it was only a slow leak.

The worst wheel had paint flaking off just like the CARC on the body of the SEE. Big flakes, and more rust than I've seen even in wheels that has had Fix-A-Flat in them for years.
After a fair amount of work with a paint removal disc, there are still deep pits in the bead area on this worst wheel (no, I'm not done cleaning this one up yet). Now that hunt is on for a really good bead sealer.

So the moral of the story is; break down the beads on your FLU and have a look-see. No, it's not fun work, and nobody will ever notice that anything was done should you hit the show circuit, but it might save you from having tires go flat for no obvious reason.

 

[burquedoka]

Normal op temp should be between 180-220F. My thermostat opens at 220F. As for air pressure, my buzzer goes off at 90psi.

Normal OM352 operation should have the thermostat open between 78-80c (172-176f). Not sure if you were implying you have a different thermostat on your SEE or not, but 220f for your thermostat to open doesn't seem right to me.

 

[BigBison]

An OBD scanner would be useless as OBD reads digital protocols, the readings available from the diagnostic port are analog DC and anyone with a multimeter can duplicate the output with the exception of comparing a real measured value against recommended values stored in the diagnostic scanner.

Right. But, once I've figured out the pinouts on the diagnostic connector, an A-D converter can be used to interface with any OBD scanner. Which is more a tedious task, than a difficult one! Pretty basic electronics. I like the approach of converting the existing diagnostic wiring to the OBD standard, better than the approach of an ad-hoc phone app or coding a laptop/tablet computer to understand a FLU, but nothing else.

 

[The FLU farm]

Normal OM352 operation should have the thermostat open between 78-80c (172-176f).

Thank you! That's what mine seems to do, so one less thing to worry about.

 

[The FLU farm]

Got a chance to install "the SAE version" of a tank drain today. Not yet test driven, and adding a 90 between the fitting and valve probably wouldn't hurt if driving in brush or over large rocks as it hangs a bit low.

And I also found the most compelling reason not to run regular ladder type tire chains, on radials or otherwise.Crossed a 2-lane road (bare pavement) and the chains were out of sync.
With the worn out shocks on the SEE that made for a surprising amount of side to side sway. Must've looked funny, though.

 

[BigBison]

For a farm tractor a SEE is built and finished pretty well, not so much for a modern truck but these are all close to 30 year old pieces of equipment. They were built in the Unimog factory. The SEE is a 419 series but really its just the final evolution of the 406 series. The more modern looking heavier chassis 1000 to 1300 series was around in 1976 while the 419 SEEs were built into the late eighties. The SEE is based on the old CASE units and I expect that by the time the US government decided to buy the SEE, Mercedes probably was ready to close the 406 factory until the US signed a contract for 2500 SEEs. I expect the day that the last SEE rolled off the line, that was it for 406 series. The infamous 300K Arnold Mog is a 1977 which looks far more modern than a 10 year newer SEE. The good thing about being the last of the series is they had plenty of time to correct bugs in the 406 series. Apparently the SEE engine cover is rubber insulated while early 406's weren't and early 406's had plastic cooling fans which tended to shatter when they hit the water while fording, SEEs have far beefier aluminum fan. The heated windshield may also be an upgrade. I also think there are some internal engine upgrades.

My dream Unimog is the uber-rare 5000. As far as I can tell, there's no two-axle vehicle on the planet with a higher GVWR. I should probably suck it up one of these days and get a CDL so I can drive 3-axle vehicles (legally), but as a small business owner, I'd prefer to have the heaviest two-axle truck out there so my employees can drive it without I have to pay them more for having a CDL. Does anyone in America even *have* a Unimog 5000?

 

[BigBison]

Got a chance to install "the SAE version" of a tank drain today. Not yet test driven, and adding a 90 between the fitting and valve probably wouldn't hurt if driving in brush or over large rocks as it hangs a bit low.View attachment 662927

I've removed the chain from the air pressure relief valves on both my FLUs, because they tend to get caught on sagebrush when I'm going cross-country on my property. Convenient to have those chains, unless off-road where they become more of a liability than an asset!

 

[BigBison]

My Dodge may be ready tomorrow! Good thing, as I'm running out of pet food, coffee, etc. which I stocked up on before sending my DD off to the body shop last Thanksgiving. He's touching up the door sills, where the original silver two-tone paint is showing through. Cabover lights installed! My truck looks a bit strange with the two-tone paint on the bed only now, not the cab, but I'll be much happier for having this work done... even if it took a bit long because the body-shop guy caught pneumonia, delaying the work...





Yeah, taking longer than I counted on, but I'm hardly upset with the shop. I get regular progress reports with pics in my e-mail, couldn't ask for better service!

Yes, that's leather interior, next stop for the Dodge is the detailing shop, they'll be farming the driver's seat out for reupholstering. I take good care of my leather seats, but my heavy butt climbing in & out has torn out some stitching over the years. Still my fave pickup truck ever! I don't even have to unbuckle, to open the suicide door to let my dog in & out, so practical to my daily existence! I miss my truck, although it isn't a bad thing that I've been forced to DD my SEE!

I love that you can't tell from the pictures, and have to have a pretty good eye for color up-close and in-person, to even notice the cab isn't quite the same color as the bed anymore. A dab more blue, a dab less metal-flake, plus some pearl, I can't wait to see her again tomorrow (hopefully)!

It'll be a while before I put the crane-service body on it, my backup dually needing a new motor wasn't exactly planned, so I have a bunch of pickup-truck tasks piled up waiting to be done. Then she's back in the shop (which in some cases, means that garage I've rented) until hopefully no later than June.

 

[The FLU farm]

As far as I can tell, there's no two-axle vehicle on the planet with a higher GVWR.

Well, for example, anything with a Rockwell R170 rear axle would qualify as that axle alone is good for 23,000-lbs., and there's lots of those on the roads.

 

[BigBison]

The Texarkana GP loadout guy carries a huge flathead screwdriver in his back pocket, he doesn't even bother with trying the starter button

I'm stuck using my starter button, because I wouldn't know what to do with a big screwdriver. Pop the doghouse cover off, then what? I hate hot-wiring, like hooking jumper cables up to a starter motor instead of a battery because the solenoid's dead. Really though, my starter problems on the SEE seem to have more to do with the master cutoff switch, than the starter button... so I don't think a big screwdriver would even help with that?

Interesting, nonetheless!

 

[BigBison]

One thing folks in the US don't realize is that Mercedes is master in upmarket salesmanship in the US. We only see their higher end models. Mercedes apparently are quite popular as fleet vehicles in Europe and sell some very stripped versions of what are typically fully optioned out models in the US. Cab fleets and police departments don't buy they for the image I expect they get great fleet pricing. Considering the SEE is sold as a road going tractor I don't think fit and finish was an important factor.

Well, erm... *most* folks. I've been all around this planet over the course of my life. Cop cars & taxis, hard to say whether BMW or Mercedes has the upper hand, but those German fleets aren't the cheapest... but they do last forever enough longer to cost-justify their initial purchase. American politics is why American manufacturers have the upper hand here -- nobody's congressional district makes Mercedes bus/truck motors eh? Although they increasingly build lower-end BMW, VW, and Mercedes products here, or in Mexico or Brazil. The rest of the world is "the same but different" compared to here. If I were less lazy, I'd google up the most-popular truck motor on the planet, and it would probably be the Mercedes or Volvo, not the Cummins.

That Mercedes motor in our FLUs, is the bog-standard fleet motor everywhere else on Earth outside America (where Freightliner is owned by Daimler who sold Dodge to Fiat anyways, heh). It isn't a tractor motor, it's a bus/lorry motor. Last time I was in SF after my Dad died, was to sell the house so I stayed in a hotel on Fisherman's Wharf and couldn't sleep in past 6am due to all the tour buses lined up outside idling due to the Girl Scout convention staying there. I'd guesstimate that 1/2 of those buses were Mercedes motors, the other 1/2 Volvo, in this day and age. I didn't spot any GMCs, which are the awesome used American buses to buy for motorhome conversions, which I almost pulled the trigger on before I bought the (better for my purposes) '77 GMC motorhome.

It isn't the fleet pricing, so much as the reliability/longevity of the German products which put them ahead of everyone else from America to Japan to South Korea, etc. One thing I surely love about my Mogs are those motors -- pricey to service with experts few & far between HERE, but everywhere else on the planet, OM352 isn't an unfamiliar term -- like saying "Cummins" in America. The most popular taxi cab in China is their knockoff of the Toyota Crown, i.e. late 80's - early 90's Camry, fwiw.

Ditch the crappy fuel hoses, replace some metric fittings with SAE, and the OM352 is as reliable as a Cummins, here, and the cost of genuine, certified parts is actually a wash (as opposed to parts cost on a Mercedes sedan vs. a Camry, or Honda Accord) on the Mercedes motor (that's as much of an oddball in the US as a Cummins is outside the US) compared to Fleetguard parts for my Dodges.

I'm a big fan of motors, more so than the vehicles they come in. Honda & VW fuel-injected four-bangers... BMW, Mercedes, and Cummins straight-sixes... the 455 Olds LBC in my motorhome... the boxer-twin BMW motorcycle engine. When I get a Vanagon Syncro, I'll be getting one with the Subaru boxer-six upgrade, which is a bog-standard car motor here in snow country. It doesn't really matter how many of what vehicle I have from one year to the next, all my motors are on a very short list of reliable gear.

It pains me to say I'd rather buy a fleet of BMW or Mercedes taxi-cabs these days (Uber/Lyft aside), than Chevy. Daddy had a '55 Chevy back when I was born (with a cobra on the hood, no less), and right through to the modern day, the '55 Chevy is still a bog-standard taxi cab all over America because we used to know how to do what the Germans and Japanese and South Koreans are known for, while we've dropped down into a dead heat with the British and Italians for building crap. Don't even get me started!!!

 

[BigBison]

For a farm tractor a SEE is built and finished pretty well, not so much for a modern truck but these are all close to 30 year old pieces of equipment. They were built in the Unimog factory. The SEE is a 419 series but really its just the final evolution of the 406 series. The more modern looking heavier chassis 1000 to 1300 series was around in 1976 while the 419 SEEs were built into the late eighties.

Let's not forget that the 406 Unimog was designed in 1945, to serve a purpose where fit & finish really didn't matter, as evident even on my 1989 HMMH -- our trucks have other attributes which account for their being manufactured for fifty years! So the fit & finish of my '89 HMMH can't be expected to meet any closer tolerances than a '45 406, as it was never even remotely a priority on these beasts. The only fit & finish comparison would be a contemporary Willys Jeep... coin flip!

That style fuse was the default at the time, I see all sorts of Euro cars of that vintage with them so it may have been some sort of standard?

What I grew up with. The first vehicle in my family with plastic-cartridge fuses instead of standard European ceramic-type, was the '76 Bronco. We also had a '72 Bronco, a '76 "swallowtail" Rabbit, and a pair of VW Westfalia campers. Had we kept those vehicles until now and put them up for sale today, we're talking $1/2M easily. Not gonna say Daddy was an expert on vehicles or nothin', but ****, the nondescript vehicles parked in our driveway when I was a kid are all highly-desirable collectibles, these days. I can't hardly afford an early Bronco, heck I can buy two FLUs for what either one of 'em would sell for, now!

The VW Cabrio was made in Germany for global sales for 22 years; unlike the '80-forward Westmoreland PA Rabbits with plastic-cartridge American fuses, the '02 VW Cabrio still had ceramic euro-fuses.

I took the SEE to a nearby icy, snow-covered lot today to thrash it unmercifully and learn how it handles. Oversteer, four-wheel-drift, spin-outs, and all that. I'll need to repeat the process in the HMMH, same truck different handling due to the vast difference in front-end mass and resulting truck balance. I had a blast, got to know my truck...

...and blew out the 2nd-gear synchro. No surprise. No telling what my SEE had gone through before the Red River rebuild, or what exactly was done & not done then & there, but yeah 2nd gear (regardless of range, or splitter) seems to be where I spend most of my time in either FLU. No way to tell that synchro was on its last legs, before today. It's totally obvious now, gotta double-clutch the upshift or the SEE just makes embarrassing grinding noises from the tranny.

Bottom of the to-do list. More of a hassle than a real problem, who needs a synchronized tranny anyway?

 

[BigBison]

I can hang the rear-end of the SEE out in power oversteer in 4WD, but not with diff-lock engaged. With diff-lock, at 15mph on ice, cranking the steering wheel all the way to lock while applying full throttle... more likely to tip the Mog over than break traction, even with the XL tires w/o chains. I had a blast, but that's the only thing that scared me, trying to oversteer with diff locks engaged, the inclinometer went awfully far towards where it was when the SEE was in the ditch last week... I went all cowardly and backed off. I'll try again in the HMMH, if I can, but completely different truck without the front-loader bucket!

 

[BigBison]

Hot-rodding around a skating rink in the SEE, I didn't encounter any understeer even in 2WD. I'd love to throw the HMMH around in the same conditions sometime, but I suspect I'd have "plowed" it right into a snowbank due to understeer, from the lack of heavy-ass loader-bucket mass several feet in front of the steer wheels. Remains to be seen!!!

I've been DD'ing the SEE for three weeks now, alls I can say, is I'd rather drive the HMMH, all potential understeer aside!

 

[BigBison]

I sideswiped my dog with the loader bucket earlier today. She bounced with it & wasn't hurt, but in her 3 1/2 years of life, she's learned to watch the steer wheels. The loader bucket on the SEE swinging around was new to her, and darn if that doesn't generate a high angular velocity, that my dog wasn't expecting because she wasn't watching the loader bucket swinging around, like, really really fast! I went for the brakes. On my FLUs, I'm learning that when I want to stop, I need to get all agro on the brake pedal.

My neighbor's backhoe has steer wheels up front where the loader bucket is, but it's also got 50% higher turning radius compared to a Mog, OK?

Brand-new from the showroom, these things hardly stopped on a dime, did they? Gradual braking with the air-boost, no problemo. But if you need to stop in a hurry, I don't think a tip-top air assist would keep me from over-running that with my foot, i.e. no power-assist. There's a critical second before the air-assist catches up, in an emergency stop, so yeah give the pedal everything you've got; the brakes work, but take waaaaay more effort than braking with, say, a loader-bucket of snow you want to dump over the pile so you're *gradually* braking while lifting/dumping the bucket... easy to be productive in the SEE when you KNOW you need to brake...

I'm talking emergency braking, like to keep from swinging the loader bucket into your dog checking out how tight the turning radius is. Which is waaaay tighter on the HMMH. The SEE bucket, wow! Once you're swinging that around, I mighta killed a lesser dog than my malamute with that, no joke. Maybe I haven't explained this very well, but while both the SEE and the HMMH have the same turning radius on paper, there's worlds of difference between the two in practice.

 

[BigBison]

I just spoke with my part-time, semi-local 406 buddy on the phone. I now believe that a '45 406 has better brakes than an '89 419.

He had to go, but promised to sleep on my notion of, instead of repairing my air-boost FLU brakes, I go hydro-boost from the PS pump like on his 406's?!?

Ugh. I've pored over the FLU manuals, but off the top of my head I don't know if the front hydraulics are the same circuit as the PS. Two different reservoirs, sure, but I lost the PS on the HMMH until I'd topped up the fluids in the rear tanks... or that simply fooled me into "problem solved" on that... I dunno, now I'm second-guessing.

The front hydraulics run the hose reels and loader/forklift on my FLUs, but is that the same circuit as the PS, or do they just share fluids, or what? Bueller?

Given all the issues with air on my SEE, wouldn't I be happier with hydraulic brake assist? Leave the air for the spike brake, for those rare times I expect to haul a trailer behind a FLU?

I don't care about concours restoration on my SEE, I care about getting real-world work done. If that means changing the brake power from air to hydro, so much the better. Air-assist brakes, on my SEE at least, I'm better off if I have time to give 'em a pump before I'm putting all my 250lbs behind my foot because I need to stop *now* before the air-assist catches up. Not a problem I've ever had with hydro-boost brakes, like on my Prelude or Dodge Rams, ya know? Or my buddy's 406 Unimogs...???

Or do I simply have more work to do on the air, etc. on my SEE to make its brakes work properly? If they ever did in the first place? Confused.

 

[BigBison]

All my extreme ice-driving in the SEE today, one thing I failed to accomplish, was locking up the brakes and sliding. More than a few inches, but an 8-ton vehicle taking that long to stop at that slow a speed, yeah it shoulda slid several feet if only all the pressure I was putting on the brake pedal *meant* anything. The handbrake's more effective.

 

[BigBison]

Parts-wise, I'm sure there's all kinds of Mercedes vehicles out there with hydro-boost brakes, which can bolt right up to a FLU, swap out the master cylinder and don't worry about the slaves maybe. Swapping out one Mercedes part on my FLUs for another Mercedes part that bolts right up and all I hafta do is make up some fluid lines... Maybe.