MC5 B - again...

[artvonne]

Hard to get to unless under the bus or tires off. But a safe idea.  Tom Y

  I think ill wait until I can air up the Bus to play with the tire, hopefully any air leak is easily corrected/bypassed.

  Anyone know the best place to supply air to the Bus with an aircompressor?

  Powersteering fluid, atf or hydraulic?

[trucktramp]

There should be an access door below the driver's window.  Inside you will find a schrader valve.  That's the little valve that looks like a tire valve.  Attach you air line there.  You will need some sort of locking chuck if you want continuous air supply.

[artvonne]

There should be an access door below the driver's window.  Inside you will find a schrader valve. 

  Hey there, thanks a lot. I found that schrader valve. Must be plugged inside somewhere, wouldnt do anything. There is a valve on the bottom of an air tank in that compartment, I took the end off the air hose and screwed in there. She aired up.

  Got here late, once I got it raising I went to work on the wheel, put in batteries, looked things over. The air seat was down, so sitting there was hard. The rear start button is froze, didnt want to push it any harder in fear it would stick so just tried from up front.

  It does look like someone was trying to remove the alt, the hinge pin apprears to be gone and the alt is sitting a bit offset in the mount. I can look at that more tomorrow.

  Radiators look very solid, virtually no corrosion there, or anywhere really, just grease and dirt (needs a bath). Slight air leak from an actuator in engine compartment, but nothing major. Got the tire changed, compressor ran out of gas so couldnt air it up again (front leveler thought bus was to high when I was jacking it up, so it bled off all the air.

  I looked over the engine, didnt see anything real major except the alt like I mentioned. Decided to spin it over and see what happened. I flipped the highidle switch on, and spun her over, watching lights and for smoke. Never saw smoke, but oil light went out right away. She spun over real good, but wasnt hearing any firing so stopped. Then my daughter asked what the smoke was in back.

  It did appear to be getting fuel, but obviously not enough to make the magic happen. I tried a bit more but the batts were cranking down so I called it a night. after running two chargers for a while, I left a charger on one battery and plugged in the RV and shut the door. Tomorrow I will take another look and try to see if there is something, a fuel leak or whatever, and try it again. But shes telling me she wants to run. I also want to pop a battery in and try the Generator, but I may run out of time, I have to be back home for training tomorrow night.

  So anyway, im nuts. Unless something screams at me tomorrow im going to take it, and will deal with it as it comes. See y'all tomorrow.

[Tom Y]

GOOD LUCK, Haul er Home.   Tom Y

[bevans6]

The front schrader valve is to the emergency air system only, which is protected by one way  check valves from the rest of the air system.  If you put air in there you were airing up the parking brake, basically.  The other valve you found is on the accessory tank.  In a perfect world it should just air up the accessory system and the parking brake system, but not the brake system since the PPV should be closed until the air pressure in the dry/main/service tank gets up to 65 psi.  Mine does bleed air back and will air up the whole bus eventually, which indicates that my PPV is suspect.  I believe that on a 5B the dash pressure gauge may well read the pressure in the accessory tank, not the dry tank.  They did a change in the mid 70's some time, per BusWarrior.

Don't try to start the engine until you have take off the valve covers and checked that the racks can move to the no-fuel position by moving the engine stop lever on top of the governor.  It's the other lever, there is an air cylinder that moves it.  At rest, the racks are in the full fuel position, and they move to the idle position as soon as the bus is started.  With that vintage of engine, one stuck fuel rack in one injector can hold them all full open.  Just move the stop lever and all the little racks should move in and out smoothly, on both sides at the exact same time.

Brian

[artvonne]

  Just move the stop lever and all the little racks should move in and out smoothly, on both sides at the exact same time.

Brian

  There isnt a way to check rack movement without pulling a cover? I'll check it out.

  As far as applying air, its starting to sound like the best place is at the compressor.

  There is a T handle with a red arrow across the handle below the left side of the drivers seat. There is a small placard near it that, if im seeing correctly, says open and closed. Maybe with daylight I can see up around underneath and figure it out, but in the meantime, what is it?

  Hey, It held air all night, hasnt budged a smidge. Cool.

  Glass. The two windows on each side in back slide open, and the front left, all others are fixed. Are these same as MC7? It will need a front drivers windshield. Are they same as a MC7, and are they swappable right to left?

  Lights. The clearance lights lit, I have cargo lights, dash, cockpit, engine etc. But when I flipped headlights I got nothing. And I cant see how you get high/low beam, unless the button on the floor is the dimmer switch and not the air horn???


  Well, looks like another fine day, better get cracking. TTYL.

[Barn Owl]

Give it a sniff of ether and see if it spools up.

[bevans6]

Taking off the passenger side valve cover is five minutes work, and you can then see the rack action.  You'll see the levers that actuate each injector are tightened with pinch bolts to the shaft.  All I have in mind is one injector could be frozen and holding the injectors open.  Probably if the stop lever works easily and the injectors on the passenger side all go to no-fuel, the other side is good too.

that engine has an emergency stop flap on the air intake.  You need to check that it isn't activated.  It's hard to describe, but there is a spring loaded ratchet thing and a lever that needs to be  all the way clockwise and engaging that ratchet.

There is another schrader valve on the ping tank, which is on the passenger side front wall of the engine compartment.  You can usually add air there, unless the purge valve on the air dryer is open.

The Tee handle under the drivers seat is the hot water valve to control heat to the drivers heater and the defroster.  It's a 90 degree ball valve, basically.

I don't think you get headlights until the bus is running.  The button on the floor at the front of the foot rest is the dimmer switch, if  there is one at the back of the foot rest it's air horn.  They don't all have air horns, mine doesn't.

If the suspension held air all night, the air beams are currently good.  Or it has blanking plates.  Either way, bonus!

[artvonne]

  Brian, im just getting on here from this morning, so I made it home before reading anything since this morning. I basically figured all that stuff out by looking and playing with everything. Except the heat knob, without someone telling me or seeing in a book, I would have had to tear it apart to know what it did.

  In the morning light I found the dimmer switch, it does have air horns, just wasnt able to get air in everything so all they did was click when I tapped the button. I also found the schrader in the rear engine compartment, but it wouldnt take air.

  It held air all night and still looked fine when I left. Its not plated. levelers seem to work too. The only rust ive found anywhere is at the very rear most part at the back of the radiators. Compared to the last 10 or so MCI's ive seen, its the least ive seen.

  I know you said to pull the covers, and I looked and saw it would be easy to pull them. But time was rapidly becoming an issue, I really needed to be headed for home before noon. I had charged the batteries all night, this morning I went over the connections, and found one of the cables loose on the BUS bar post. I looked around the engine, everything seemed loose and free, so I decided I would check the coolant before I did anything else.....lower hose on left side leaked. So now what? I have another hour and then its time to fly. Have tools to pick up, etc., I didnt have time to go play around looking for a hose and trying to fix it, not today. So I turned my attention to the generator.

  After a small "issue", about two spins and it was absolutely purring. No smoke, quiet lil bugger. The small issue was a #8 ground wire off the alternator someone had put onto the + battery post (it has its own battery). When I jumped it off a kicker, the wire smoked and filled the cargo bay with smoke. That got everyones attention.

  So I had accomplished everything I set out to do except for seeing it run. I had it aired up, I could work the brakes (though I need to go through them fully before I would try driving), changed out the tire, it has lights, horns, all the big stuff. But will it run? About that time this guy, a buddy of the seller shows up, he seemed pretty interested in seeing if I was gonna get her going. Something about that generator, how fast it popped off just kind of cinched it, that it was gonna be an okay Bus. Yeah, I know the hose could mean it got cooked, and maybe it did, but I just dont think so. About that time the "helper dude" walks out with a can of Ether. God I hate that crap.

  Before I sprayed any ether in it, I tried just cranking. It was smoking a bit, but not a lot, so im thinking its full of air. I checked the tank, looked about half full, was clear and didnt smell funky. I did figure out the primer pump, but it was too late to monkey with that. I noticed in cranking it, the oil light goes out within a crank or two, and cranking, the pressure goes up past 40 psi. So we shot some Ether and I cranked it. It fired instantly, ran a hair rough for a few seconds, smoothed to an idle for maybe 20-30 seconds, and then quit. It would only fire momentarily on ether after that, but id seen enough. I own a Bus. Now I have to figure out how to get the stinker home. If you thought I had a lot of stupid questions before, well, just wait.

 

[bevans6]

CONGRATULATIONS

[lostagain]

Good for you!!! Sounds like a good one. I forgot what is upstairs: is it converted, or still seated?

JC

[artvonne]

  Its converted as an entertainer/band bus. No kitchen, just a sink and toilet, 6 bunks, rear dressing room, front lounge/dinette. My wife noted that the stuff was rather well made, and I started really looking at it for the first time. All the corners are radiused and the surfaces are all formica. It actually looks production made rather than homemade. Everything fits to the cieling and walls with precision. The cieling has plywood with a naugahyde headliner

  When I told the wife I would toss it all out the door, she wondered if we couldnt reuse some of it. I dont know, we'll get it home and look at it then.

  After we made the deal and I was ready to take off, the seller started in again how it used to belong to Mel Tillis. He gave me a file with a hand full of old reciepts he said he found in the Bus, most are dated around the late 90's. Whats interesting is the reciepts bounce back and forth with different names on them through a range of dates, and several within the range of dates have Belden Enterprises Inc., Nashville. All I found online was they looked to be some kind of a promoter.

  What the seller told me was back in the early 80's this women bought the Bus from Tillis, and used the Bus to carry bands around. She died, and her son ended up with it. For a while he carried kids on some soccer team or something back and forth to Ft Smith. He drove the Bus onto the guys car lot last spring, hung around a while trying to fix it or find work, was living in it etc., and then disappeared.

  It appears the Bus has been around the North Little Rock area since at least the late 90's, as well as Nashville. I dont think its right to state names I see on papers, so for now at least I will not do that. But when I googled one of the names I saw a link to Pam Tillis, and found that she had lived in North Little Rock for quite a while. So who knows. I might try poking around and see what I dig up. While I dont really care, it would be neat to own something some character once owned.

[trucktramp]

Congrats.  The adventure continues.  Sounds like you have a present here.  You have had to "unwrap" it before it can be used...and you didn't know what you were getting.  Have fun and enjoy it.

[JohnEd]

It all sounds really good.  My intuition bone says you are fine.   I guess we will see how well that bone is working still.

My best and warmest wishes for a safe and pleasant journey.

John

[artvonne]

  Thanks guys, and I really mean that, to everyone. I think it would have always remained a backburner dream if I hadnt found this place and found so many others doing the same thing.