Air con-to fix or not to fix

[Tomnistuff]

Since this thread appears to have calmed down a bit, I thought I would add one last subject that might be of discussion interest.  At least I might learn something from the opinions of others.

In my opinion (not worth much since everybody has one), the best looking add-on A/C system for Mercedes is the Behr unit in the first photo, but I suspect it’s too big for a Pagoda.
It is symmetrical in the car, provides air to both foot wells as well as the cockpit and looks to me like it was designed as a part of the interior.  In other words, it doesn’t look too “add-on”.
I don’t know enough about the others, Frigiking, Kuhlmeister, Behr and Thermoking, but I’m not attracted to passenger-side under-dash units.

In my explorations of the manufacturers of hot-rod A/C systems, I noticed a great similarity between one feature of some of them and the heating system in our Pagodas – the fans and motor design.

The second photo is a sketch that I have modified from the well-known Pagoda heating system exploded parts sketch.
 
It removes the heat/defrost air distribution box as well as the fan module and reuses some of their parts to adapt a Southern Air Superfrost or an Old Air Parts IP-800HC heating and cooling unit to fit in their place.  The heating portion of the unit would be unused, or could be used (with heater hoses and more firewall holes) to increase the heating capacity of the total system.

If feasible, this concept would retain existing left / right heat control and the existing dash vent outside air function.  In addition, it would use the existing heat/defrost cable to provide the same function by switching from heat to de-humidified defrost.  The existing fan switch position could be used.  A new location for a temperature switch would be required.

There are other modifications/features that could be included with extra effort, like heat and A/C from the existing outside vents on the dash.  The only thing I’m not too happy about is the need to fabricate a sort of console like the car in the first photo, but a console in a Pagoda might look pretty good.  I don`t even know enough about these cars to recognise the car in the first photo.

The heater and A/C hose inlets and outlets of the evaporator/heater unit would be a challenge, since they would pass through the “air collector covers” of the fans.  It would probably require some creative ideas or a bit of foam, butyl or asphalt putty to eliminate air leaks in the fan system.

My last comment is that my rule (for me) would be to not make irrevocable changes to the car.  Like Jim Villers, I believe in doing no harm.

I used to be a purist, but I’ve decided that at my age, it’s more important not to be a masochist.

Tom Kizer

[w113dude]

Hey Tom,

I like the idea, more than that I love your drawings, WOW.

[Tomnistuff]

Thanks, Shaun, but I only modified the existing illustration and added a few parts and flow lines.  Don`t give me too much credit.
I posted it to get suggestions and opinions about whether it will work.  The Southern Air A/C unit is only 10 inches deep (front to rear) and by using its fans to replace the existing fans, the unit stays well back of the front of the dash, leaving room for hoses and connections.

I'm waiting for more accurate dimensional info from Southern Air, along with photos of the rear of the unit showing the inlets and outlets for the heater and A/C hoses.

We'll see if it packages.

Tom K.

[Jonny B]

Tom

The is the best quote I have read in some time!

"I used to be a purist, but I’ve decided that at my age, it’s more important not to be a masochist."

[Tomnistuff]

Thank you both for your kind words.

I said in my last post that I was waiting for accurate dimensions and photographs of the rear of the Southern Air Superfrost heater/evaporator housing.  Well, after waiting 4 days for an answer to my email, I decided to give them a call and talk to technical support.  The phone was answered by someone who sounded like me – a southern U.S. accent.  He was a really nice friendly fellow, but apparently uninterested in my problem of needing to see the back of the housing and needing dimensions.  He had no other photos and didn`t seem interested in taking one.  I could almost hear him say, “Dimensions?  Dimensions?  We don’t need no stinkin’ dimensions!”

I finally wormed out of him that the width between the ends of the two fans is about 12 ½ inches, one-half inch narrower than the Pagoda fan housing – perfect!

I searched the web and found a paper written by a guy who installed one in an MGB.  He had some photos in his paper.  Knowing one dimension, I scaled and proportioned the photos to get the remaining dimensions I needed – isn’t mathematical proportioning wonderful?  I even roughly corrected for perspective.

I know that most people would have just told him to go to hell and that I would buy one somewhere else, but theirs is the smallest in the critical dimension by about two inches.  It`s only 10 inches front to back.

I still have to verify by measurement and perhaps a mockup that the sketch that I attached above and the illustration that I’ve attached below are compatible, and that nothing gets in the way of my accelerator pedal leg.

The illustration is what I had in mind to make.  It’s feasible, I think, without irreversibly changing the car.  My car is Dunkelblau (Dark Blue 332) paint and dark blue leather, and will hide my upholstery errors better.  I chose the photo to modify because it`s easier to see detail on light colors.

Please be kind.  I’m not an artist.  I’m the opposite, an engineer.  I think I`m going to do this and let the next owner put it back the way it`s supposed to be if he wants to.

Tom Kizer

[juilkema]

Where do you get the new Frigking panels?

[66andBlue]

Hi Tom,
what happened to your console project? Any progress?
Should be something for long winter nights. 

[Tomnistuff]

Hi Alfred,

The project is still alive.  Here’s the status.

I modified the schematic a little bit to reflect further thinking and a different A/C evaporator unit.  Some final configuration changes will have to wait until I install it in the car and will depend on packaging space.

I bought a Danhard 00405 heat and A/C unit but will not use the included heater core unless there is some later reason to add another heater core in parallel with the Mercedes heater core.  

I used a free 3D design program to design a sheet metal housing to adapt the Danhard evaporator to the Pagoda body sheet metal, replacing the MB fan module and the MB air distribution module.  I made them myself from 1 mm thick aluminum sheet and lots of tiny screws.  Photos show the system beside the MB parts that will be replaced.

It fits the car quite well and leaves enough room to route the ducts, although I’ll probably have to adapt smaller aftermarket defroster ducts to replace the MB ducts.  The photos were taken at different times so they represent the system at different levels of completion.  The latest, except for the fitting access holes, are the two taken in the driveway comparing mine to the MB parts.

I’ve been in contact several times with Joe Alexander for the engine brackets and pulleys.  He’s trying to round up sedan parts for me.  I’ve already bought all the other engine compartment parts – new Sanden compressor, hoses, fittings, condenser, dryer, switches, etc.

I expect the actual console will be relatively easy, since I plan to cover hand cut aluminum panels with left over leather and paint the center panel body color (Dark Blue leather 220 and Dark Blue paint 332G).  As I mentioned previously, I used a red car photo for the sketch so that detail would be easier to see.  Dark blue obscures everything, like black does.

I am still trying to put the car back together slowly, particularly the systems with which I’m less experienced, so I have not started on the interior yet.  Joe has been really busy and I haven’t been delayed so I don’t want to disrupt his other projects.  I’m finishing up the undercarriage, so It’s about time for me to contact Joe again to pull together the engine bracketry and pulleys and to start dressing the rebuilt engine sitting on a pallet.  For me, the pulleys are the big question.  I don’t want to buy a bunch of parts that don’t align and have to be discarded.

Tom Kizer

[66andBlue]

Hi Tom,
that is a lot of progress!
Keep us posted, please.

[114015]

Dear Tom,

Absolutely stunning! This is the way to go. You are an engineer and this will be the way that Daimler Benz forgot to develop for our cars.

Personally, I today live (like many others) in one of the areas throughout the world where aircon weather means top-down driving-only...
...  but I remember very well from my New Jersey and Wisconsin summer days that some weeks were absolutely uncomfortable without AC, and top-down or without AC was/is not an alternative with 90% humidity, traffic jam and using Holland Tunnel , etc.

The original Frigiking etc. system always appeared to me to be the wrong (and only easy bolt-on) solution as a quick response to the market's demand for an AC but without a proper solution for equal and comfortable cold-air supply in our SLs ...

But your system seems now to be the solution that MB had not developed ...

I definitely wish you good luck and please keep us informed.

Achim
(purist but understanding the purist-nonmasochist switch-over)

[Tomnistuff]

I thank you all for your comments and especially your encouragement.  There are days when I say to myself, "Why in hell did you start this restoration project when you could have sold the car as a project car and bought a restored one for less than you will pay to restore this one, not even counting the work you are not being paid for?  In addition, you go and commit to designing an integral AC system into the car."

Posting progress and receiving the kind of complements and encouragement that you all provide make it all worth while.  I hope, when it's finished, I can drive it to PUB to meet some of you.  Unfortunately, I started a couple of years too late to drive it to Williamsburg for the 50th.  I need to get back to Western Kentucky anyway to do some genealogy research and have my grandmother's tombstone restored.  Maybe I can do both on the same trip next July/August, if there is going to be a PUB 2014.

Thanks again.  I'll keep posting progress and questions as I continue.

Tom Kizer

[Tomnistuff]

I realize that in the last (very old) post, I lied.  I said I would post updates as I continued – I didn’t!

I’m 70 now and find that I should never have started this project after having spent 34 years in the automotive industry before retirement and then having restored another car after retirement, and before this one.

I find that the older I get, the faster time passes and the less I can accomplish each day.  I also get tired too easily and make mistakes that wipe out most of my progress.

Anyway, since the car interior AC system and console are finished, here are a few photos of what I hope resembles what Mercedes-Benz would have done, had they decided to integrate the AC system themselves.

I’ll have plenty of photos at PUB, just in case someone is curious.

Tom Kizer

[66andBlue]

Very well done, congrats Tom!
How about bringing all your photos along on a USB stick and showing them to us on a BIG screen together with a narrative? 

How much wider is the tunnel now on the sides, that is, does the handbrake lever still fit?

[George Des]

Tom, I thought I was the only one who operated like this! Seem to get started on a project, get halfway through and have to put it down until I get a shot of motivation to finish it. Drives my wife crazy when she looks around and sees so many partially completed projects.

[TJMart]

Can someone let me know where I can find the aluminum Frigiking placards for the front of the interior unit and the knobs?

Thanks in advance!

Tony

[Tomnistuff]

Thanks, George and Alfred,

The accelerator pedal clearance seemed to work out well, with a sort of tapered foot recess being built into the console driver’s side panel.  I’ve included another, better, photo taken from the position of the dimmer switch.

I, too, had been thinking about the hand brake lever during the construction, BUT, I got too enthusiastic with the progress on the driver side console panel and the success I had with the accelerator pedal console clearance.  I forgot to check the clearance to the hand brake lever before starting the upholstery.  When I read your response, Alfred, I broke into a cold-sweat and went into the garage to trial-install the lever.  Disaster!  See the photo below.

Oh well! when I get back from PUB, I’ll have a nice long project waiting for me.  Also, PUB will provide me an excellent network of experts to offer me suggestions for solutions.
There are some alternatives, but with varying degrees of advantages and disadvantages.  I’ll take my time and choose the right one.

1)   I thought of bending the lever more to provide clearance, but I don’t want to destroy an unobtainable car part (the lever).  The bend in the original lever was obviously put into the lever after initial design, probably to provide more clearance to the tunnel.  Take a look at the underside of the lever and you can see the buckling of the lever wall on the inside of the bend.

2)   I could remove the leather and recess the panel to make clearance, but I might not be able to refit the leather.  I don’t know if I have enough left to recover it with new leather.  Also, the end of the handle reaches the AC register, so creating a recess in the panel won’t be easy, since the register mounting surface has to remain flat.

3)   I will explore the total lever travel required and determine whether it’s possible to adjust the brake cable to use just the upper range of the lever travel, with the desired “brake-off” position of the lever being as shown in the photo.  If that won’t work, then I’m left with the last alternative below.

4)   If 3) above doesn’t work, then I will have to verify my remaining leather and, if I have enough, remake the driver’s side console panel with the objective of providing clearance to the lever.  It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve had to restart a project or part of a project after having made a stupid mistake.  In all my life, I have never learned anything from my successes.

I’ll try, but can’t promise, to have my photos organized in a presentation format.  If I do, it will be short, because I’m uncomfortable taking people’s time for an R&D kind of subject.

Thanks for your praise and comments. 

Tom Kizer

[66andBlue]

Sorry Tom,  I did not want to be the bearer of bad news! 
Among the options you listed I would concentrate on number 3.
If the cable length is enough to move the locked position rearward (clockwise) then perhaps the forward, unlocked position could be reached before the lever hits the side panel.
The other limiting part is the "toothed segment" #4 shown in the BBB page (below). Perhaps it can be re-manufactured to either have a longer toothed radius or a narrower angle between the pivot pin #5 and the hex nut #6 to move the teeth backwards.

Tough pickle, but solvable I hope.

Alfred

[Tomnistuff]

Hello Alfred,

Because I leave for PUB two weeks from tomorrow, I could not leave without having an answer to the hand brake lever clearance problem, so I finished the Number 3 option lever assembly and adjustment this morning.  Fortunately the brakes, cables, springs, and rubber boots under the car were already finished and just hanging there.  I just finished jacking up one rear wheel, adjusting the lever and checking out the parking brakes.

As my mother used to say (in her Southeast Missouri accent), “Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while,”, which translates into English as, “Boy, did you get lucky!!”

The two photos show the brake lever in its completely released position (wheel spins freely) and in its brakes-on position (can’t turn the wheel by hand, at least).

It probably helped to have new brakes and to have adjusted the hand brakes "by the book - BBB that is.)

I’m happy.

Tom Kizer

[66andBlue]

....
As my mother used to say (in her Southeast Missouri accent), “Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while,”, .....

Can’t agree with ya more, ya done good, and mother is always right.

At least no misery  (that is how I pronounce Missouri) for a while.  

See you in two weeks.