I think Frank Grunthaler installed one years ago in his I4 gas converted diesel westy. It might be mistaken, but I think he had more than one gage in the engine compartment, one of them was a press, gage. A not very clear pic is here on my old website

http://www.members.shaw.ca/albell/notable_vans.html

Drop him a line.

alistair

On 2011-09-10, at 10:41 AM, Jim Felder wrote:

> Resolved, I think.
> 
> It was worse than I knew, upon inspection. The lip of the plastic pipe had
> broken off and was stuck inside the hose, preventing it from going on very
> far. I took a dremel tool and made two annular grooves around the pipe about
> 1/32nd deep each, there is just enough clearance to do that with a dremel.
> Then I shoved the hose way up on the pipe and put two clamps, one over each
> groove. Then I took a known bad coolant cap (how hard are those to find?)
> and attached a pressure gauge to it with a short length of fuel hose and I
> filled and fired it up.
> 
> I did all the usual recommended ritual, except I do not raise either end of
> the car nor park it on an incline, a good way to get hurt working on a car.
> I watched the temp rise to normal and saw the pressure rise to six pounds
> with the upper radiator cool. Then the pressure dropped to four pounds as
> the upper radiator got hot. Temp needle steady during this time. Idled for
> 20 minutes to half an hour, watched the pressure bounce around between 4 and
> 5 PPI depending on the fan cycling on and off.
> 
> Cooled down, replaced the pressure tester with a known good cap, and did two
> cooldowns and test drives.
> 
> 
> Everything AOK, no high pressures from leaking heads.
> 
> I am so happy with the results of my tester that I am seriously thinking
> about a pressure sensor that would display the pressure in the system on my
> dash. That would be a lot better than a temp gauge or coolant level light.
> The driver would be one level closer to knowing about a problem than with
> either of the two more derivative systems that come on the car. As in, you
> would know the moment something was going wrong, not minutes later.
> 
> Has anyone installed such a modification? Or any ideas as to how?
> 
> Jim
> 
> On Fri, Sep 9, 2011 at 6:44 AM, Jim Johnston <inmytree1@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> A few years ago, I had the coolant t/junction piece blowout due to too much
>> pressure in the system.
>> 
>> Turned out to be a bad radiator.
>> 
>> 
>> Jim
>> Wilmington, NC
>> 
>> 
>> On Thu, Sep 8, 2011 at 9:05 PM, Jim Felder <jim.felder@gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>>> I am no stranger to Vanagon 2.1 cooling problems, but I could use some
>>> opinions as how to proceed with my daughter's 1991 GL.
>>> 
>>> She let it get low on coolant a year or so ago (weird leaks, she has
>>> actually taken pretty good care of the car). But in a year and a half or
>>> so,
>>> it is split two primary coolant bottles, popped a hose or two, blew a
>>> chunk
>>> out of the rear heater valve housing, and blown the big bottom hose off
>>> its
>>> plastic pipe. There have always been other explanations as to these
>>> blowouts
>>> and such, but as always those can be rationalizations as much as
>>> explanations.
>>> 
>>> It is the plastic pipe problem that I have been dealing with lately. Some
>>> time ago the metal end pulled out of the pipe. I did what I have always
>>> successfully done which is to epoxy it back in and never think about it
>>> again. But today she was driving and it popped loose and drained all the
>>> coolant. She refilled with water and got to my house and I put in an epoxy
>>> lip around the end of the plastic pipe as I had done many years ago on a
>>> 1990, and never had another issue with it. I actually did a better job on
>>> hers than I did on my Carat, yet the hose blew off with the epoxy lip
>>> minutes after startup.
>>> 
>>> I suspect that I have a leaking head gasket overpressurizing the system,
>>> but
>>> there are no other symptoms suggesting it. I have not kept coolant in it
>>> recently long enough to tell exhaust gases are dirtying the coolant and I
>>> have not done the overnight cooldown test where you start it up and run it
>>> for 30 seconds to see if that puts pressure into the coolant system.
>>> 
>>> I am going to try this weekend making a wire lip that sits in a groove
>>> that
>>> I will dremel into the end of the plastic pipe and see if that holds by
>>> sheer mechanical force.
>>> 
>>> Any other suggestions? I especially want to hear from anyone who has
>>> converted to coolant hose to replace the plastic pipe and has details to
>>> share.
>>> 
>>> Jim
>>> 
>> 
>>