Cooling and electrical grief

OK, I'm having a bad week. I decided to take the van on a long drive to York and it didn't go as planned
I've done a lot to it over the last year or two as it was in need of tlc. It is a 1993 4x4 Hiace with a 3L engine and auto.
Previously I had a lot of overheating issues and it turned out to be head gasket so I did a top end rebuild. As part of this I had the heater matrix and radiator recored. Obviously new water pump, thermostat and cap.
After a couple of hours on the motorway the temperature started to climb and I thought, oh no not again. So I stopped at services and let it cool down. When i went to lock the van the central locking did not work. After adding a few litres of coolant I started it and the alternator light was on, along with most of the other warning lights. With a few revs the light went out and I turned round for the two hour drive home.
The temperature was fine for the next two hours until I was 10 miles from home and it went up to 3/4 on the dial. When I got home it was low on coolant again and the alternator light was still coming on when I let the revs fall.
After much searching I found a leak on the thermostat housing to cylinder head join and it all seems good now but I still have the electrical issue. The alternator has not done 1000 miles since I replaced it but that was a few years ago so no warranty. I can't help thinking that it is likely not the alternator just because the central locking failed at the same time.
I have a day in the workshop tomorrow so will spend a bit of time looking a bit closer but I am getting bored of it now.

Hello. I can only sympathise and commiserate.

On the cooling issues I think you’ve been doing all the right things. As part of a ~30y refresh I’ve been working through the entire cooling system on my 3L 4x4 M/T van. You can see some of the steps here (scroll below the pictures of the rear brake shoes):
https://hiace-super-custom.forumotion.com/t4317-my-lh119

Fingers crossed for your fix. I hope it works.

The only other cooling thing I can think of is the fan clutch but I’d hope that on a run at motorway speeds it shouldn’t really be needed.

As part of my work I’ll be adding an additional gauge, possibly one of these:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/255486969930?hash=item3b7c35c84a:g:0f4AAOSwRLZT0BSV. Do you have any thoughts on these?

Also, recently I’ve been made aware of a 10-blade fan rather than the original 7-blade one. It’s still a Toyota part but as I’ve had a 3-layer core replacing my original two-layer one I think the added thickness might benefit from extra fan pressure. The part number is 16361-54131 (and it's ~£37 on Autodoc) but I think your latest problem might just be a leak that’s led to lack of pressure. I hope so and all is now fine.

Finally I presume you were able to flush all the crud out of the system before adding the shiny new parts. You can see on my post that I’m anxious about this for my van, but will see.

I’m not very knowledgeable on the electrical problem but I think an alternator light means a lack of charging. Do you have the set up with two batteries up front? Might you have a failed battery/cell or a loose battery terminal connector / wire or a bad earth or shorting fault? It seems odd to get an immediate fault when you should have a full charge (after being driven) with the central locking. Also, the central locking might be related to a door ‘module’ rather than low voltage. I have a problematic door module on a VW and it sometimes creates errors or nothing happens when trying to lock.

All these problems could be completely unrelated.

My final question is to ask about your replacement alternator. Does it still incorporate the brake and 4WD vacuum or is that generated elsewhere?

Hope you find simple and cheap solutions!

Cheers

Wife’s new alternator failed during a drive and had the exact same symptoms from the lack of voltage.

Every dash light lit up too. No power locks. Tried to stall if we wanted to roll down the windows.

Got a new, not rebuilt one from rock auto to fix our problem.

It could be anything causing your electrical gremlins gissit, I wouldn’t rule out the alternator just because it’s new.

Good luck.

I am trying to call Rotating Solutions as they supplied the last one but they don't want to answer. I am just a bit suspicious as the central locking seemed to fail at the same time.
If anyone else is looking for an alternator I did notice that Rotating Solutions sell 10% on their own site than what they ask on ebay

LH119V wrote:

Hello. I can only sympathise and commiserate.

The only other cooling thing I can think of is the fan clutch but I’d hope that on a run at motorway speeds it shouldn’t really be needed.

As part of my work I’ll be adding an additional gauge,

Finally I presume you were able to flush all the crud out of the system before adding the shiny new parts. You can see on my post that I’m anxious about this for my van, but will see.

It seems odd to get an immediate fault when you should have a full charge (after being driven) with the central locking. Also, the central locking might be related to a door ‘module’ rather than low voltage..


My final question is to ask about your replacement alternator. Does it still incorporate the brake and 4WD vacuum or is that generated elsewhere?

Hope you find simple and cheap solutions!

Cheers

I have replaced the fan clutch too. I really have done it all, I think. It did need a flush. When I opened the engine block drain nothing came out as it was full of sludge. I cleaned it all out while I had the head off.
I have considered an extra gauge and you can get one with dual input and I thought it might be good to have one in the top and bottom hosses. They even sell nice sensors that fit in line in the hoses on Amazon.
I intend to start looking at it this morning but am half expecting to need an alternator. But my gut feeling is that there is a bad earth somewhere
Yes, my new alternator came with the vacuum pump

Update: Checked the output directly on the alternator this morning. 11.8V so I guess that is a new one needed then.

Hello.

Yes, when I removed both the engine drains and the one on the radiator nothing can out until I poked about a lot. Plus in my long post you can see the huge amount of sludge in the thermostat housing and blockages in the old radiator core.

Useful to know that you also replaced the fan clutch. While I do have a new one ready to go in my van I think I will also research an option to fit an electric fan. I realise this can create a big electrical demand and it might not be possible, plus the more constant cooling provided by the fan clutch might be a much better option; possibly with the 10-bladed fan.

I'm going to start looking more seriously about better temperature monitoring. If you have any options you though warranted a closer look, please do post links!

I also need to chase my enquiries I've put out on coolant filtering, too. I want to keep any sludge I cannot flush out of my recored rads.

Finally, thanks for confirming your new alternator still has the vacuum pump. On previous diesel cars I've had, the vacuum was generated either on a directly-driven or a pulley-driven camshaft pump. I've nothing intrinsically against something built into the alternator but I expect it limits parts options. I might see if I can find any data on the size of this pump and see if it can be achieved in another way, though not a priority. Again, if your replacement came with any specs, grateful if you can post these.

Thanks.

The alternator I have arriving tomorrow is:
https://www.startermotor-alternator-store.co.uk/toyota-hi-ace--75-amp-alternator--24-d-b241-2269-p.asp

I spoke to the guy before ordering and he knew his alternators. He is not just a box seller and the price of £150 is the best I have seen. I tried to sell him the old one to refurb but he says he only sells brand new because of warranty.

Also discovered a leaking rocker gasket today so another job to do

Also, my fan clutch died a few years ago and I just drilled it and inserted some steel roll pins to lock it up. I did try refilling it with silicon oil but that did not work. I read somewhere that a solid fan can drain between 10 and 20 bhp so I bought a new one while I was doing everything else.
Also my fan shroud was missing so I cut up a sheet of steel and made a new one with the help of my mig welder.
I did think about going electric and I have a 16 inch fan that would fit. It takes about 10 amps to run it and this is not an issue for a 70 amp alternator. I just preferred the idea of it being mechanical like the rest of the engine.
It looks like you can buy the vacuum pump on its own if you feel the need to change it on its own.

Useful.

I know:

https://www.startermotor-alternator-store.co.uk/

well and they have and continue to be superbly knowledgeable and helpful. Most recently, they gave me great advice that prompted me to replace parts inside my Hiace’s 2.2kW original starter motor rather than buy afresh.

In slow time you might be able to get your defunct alternator rewired / rewound or re-brushed and to keep it as a spare, perhaps?

I also considered re-oiling my fan clutch but think this would have needed two tubes of the gloop which together came to about half the cost of a new AISIN part so I opted to replace. I figured this was the safest option as the old one was very likely to be original.

I think the fan surround is really important to assist with drawing air through the radiator rather than just pulling in air from around the engine bay. There seems also to be various other ‘wind guides’ and ‘shutters’ that seem to have been fitted to my LH119V model. See:

https://toyota.epc-data.com/regius_ace/lh119v/114894/body/5352/53180C/

While I’m not interested in what seems to be a roll up or down shutter I do wonder about the side and top piece in the above link that seems to assist with better ensuring air passes through the radiator rather than around it. Will see.

On this topic the front bumper also has some ducting to allow air to be pulled into the centre of the bumper from its edges and these may assist with cooling. These are visible here:

https://toyota.epc-data.com/regius_ace/lh119v/114894/body/5252/

Thanks for the comment on the vacuum pump. I have enough vacuum for the brakes and 4WD activation / deactivation but it’s useful to know it’s a separately-replaceable item.

Electrical-fan cooling is possibly a step too far for me (I've enough other jobs!) especially if I get the 10-bladed fan, have additional monitoring capability and temps remain stable.

I’ll be updating my long post with my progress

Cheers

Well, the alternator is fitted and working. It was a bit more grief than I expected as I had to remove the casting for the AC pump to get access. Then the new alternator bottom bracket was nearly 1mm longer so would not fit. 5 minites with a die grider sorted that out.
The guy at the supplier was excellent, he knew what he was talking about and was not just someone selling a boxed part. I think I spent half an hour just chatting to him and the part arrived next day.
I have removed all of the AC from my van as I want to fit a water tank in the space in the front and it is not a big deal for me to open a window, I was bought up with cars with no AC.
Making the fan shroud myself allowed me to optimise it to get best airflow.

Gissit wrote:

Well, the alternator is fitted and working. It was a bit more grief than I expected as I had to remove the casting for the AC pump to get access. Then the new alternator bottom bracket was nearly 1mm longer so would not fit. 5 minites with a die grider sorted that out.
The guy at the supplier was excellent, he knew what he was talking about and was not just someone selling a boxed part. I think I spent half an hour just chatting to him and the part arrived next day.
I have removed all of the AC from my van as I want to fit a water tank in the space in the front and it is not a big deal for me to open a window, I was bought up with cars with no AC.
Making the fan shroud myself allowed me to optimise it to get best airflow.

Would love to see some photos of your shroud and the AC pump removal!

AC pump removed. I also removed the condensers and frame from the front. Loads of space there now. You can sort of see the fan shroud.
Did the rocker gasket this morning and gave the engine a good spray of degreaser. I've had it running for 40 minuted and the engine is completely dry. I hope that is the end for now. I need to put some miles on it and make sure it behaves nicely.

Hopefully this is the last post for this thread.
Drove up to York and back with no problems. 200 miles each way at 50 - 55 mph with no stops. Temp gauge never quite got to 1/2 way. I added about 100ml of coolant after the journey up and will check it again when it cools down.

Hi,
Thermostat housing is right next to alternator. You might want to consider the possibility of leaking coolant getting into alternator and thus causing all the electrical troubles you were having it...

imants wrote:

Hi,
Thermostat housing is right next to alternator.  You might want to consider the possibility of leaking coolant getting into alternator and thus causing all the electrical troubles you were having it...

Nope. From the front, the alternator is on the left at the very bottom. The thermostat housing is on the right at the top. As my engine is fully degreased it is relatively easy to see any leaks and where they go.

My bad, I just did the thermostat exercise on my 1kz-te, but you have 3L.