The thermostat project.....

7:53 am - Sunday - February 27th - Newell House, AZ - 38° F, 38% humidity, wind 3 mph out of the north by northwest......crystal clear, blue, sunny skies again today with a forecast high of 72° F.  On this date in 2013 we were in St. Augustine, FL dry camping at a local campground......↴

Saturday revolved around removing the 40 year old thermostat on the passenger side of the big Detroit Diesel 6v92, but we did other things.  Before I began to remove the first thermostat TLE and I drove over to pick up 2 more dozen pasture fed chicken eggs from our friend Robert.....

.....upon return I began the task of removing the thermostat housing for the passenger side thermostat, which included removing the large rubber air duct from our large air filter on one end, and from the turbo charger on the other end.....

.....and the coolant hose from the top of the thermostat assembly.....that was as far as I got before we headed into Peoria to keep a 1:30 pm lunch date with Charles and Phyllis (TLE's sister).....

.....we met at The Haymaker Restaurant (4 stars on 903 reviews - Yelp), which serves breakfast all day......

....I was the only one who had breakfast, while TLE, Charles, and Phyllis had lunch type entrees (Fish 'N Chips for Charles and Phyllis, and for TLE BBQ'd chicken).  I had 2 eggs over easy on hash browns, with a biscuit.  Now that Charles and Phyllis are 'seeing' each other again we have taken to calling him the ex 'EX'.....lol.  If it is possible they seem even happier than the last time we met for lunch.  We did not leave the restaurant until after 3 pm.....I think we sat talking for at least 45 minutes after we finished eating.  This will be the last time we see Charles and Phyllis for a while, but we hope to see them sometime this summer at our summer job location.

We were back home around 3:30 pm where I immediately changed clothes, and got back to work on the thermostat project.  It wasn't long until I had removed the top of the thermostat housing, and began to prep it for the insertion of the new thermostat.....

I covered the thermostat housing base with a cloth to keep out dust, and dirt

The 40 year old thermostat

The new thermostat installed

.....I used a wire wheel attached to my Porter Cable angle grinder to polish the mating surface of the thermostat housing top, and will do the same to the base.  

Tom and I decided to dunk the old thermostat in a pot of hot water on the stove in his home to see if it was opening all the way.  At 190° it had barely begun to open.....it should be fully open at 180° F.  We then dunked one of the new thermostats in the now boiling water and it opened fully within seconds.  What is my conclusion?  It appears the old thermostat was not opening at 180° F as it should, but well north of 190° F, and then was not fully opening until 212° F (boiling point for water), which the engine never reaches, or should not reach if you don't want to destroy your 2 stroke engine.  I'm about 90% sure that has been our problem, so I am very encouraged.  This is the inexpensive fix at $77 for the new thermostat kit.  If it is the radiator that is a very expensive fix.....north of $4,000.  Time will tell, but I'm pretty optimistic at this point that we have pin pointed the problem.  By the time we finished the thermostat test it was close to 5 pm, so I put away my tools, and will reinstall the new thermostat Sunday morning.....God willing, and the river don't rise....lol.

TLE and I did take a 1.25 mile walk in the morning, but with the ongoing thermostat project dominating the rest of the day, never got out to walk again.  On a very happy note I can now report that I dropped below 200 lbs. for the first time in 3 years......my Saturday weigh in showed me down to 199 lbs. even.....YAY for me!  I have now lost 13.4 pounds in the last four weeks, and am well on my way to my interim 20 lb. weight loss goal.

Finally, a correction to yesterday's blog.....I said I was using a 3/8" nut driver and open end wrench to remove the hose clamp, but they were both actually 7/16" in size.

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