Zebulon Montgomery Pike Trail to the sources of the Mississippi 1805 — 1806

Day 7: August 17th, 2002 Pittsburgh (Transmission Cooler Installation)

Today I buy the remaining parts and utilities which I need. Then I drive on to David’s house to install my transmission cooler. David is not at home but his son. He opens the garage for me and I can start to work. First I start the transmission cooler installation. I didn’t plan to install the cooler like mentioned in the installation guide. They suggest to tie it to the already installed cooler. But I am not able to find anything to screw the cooler on. Therefore I install it according to the guide.

The next fight is with the transmission cooler hoses. There is a lot of pressure in these lines. Therefore everything must be as sealed as possible. According to Carl’s suggestion I double clamp every hose. But to be able to use two clamps the hose must be pushed on completely to the cooler. After two hours of hard work I made it and all 4 connections are securely connected.

But this work also gave some nice blisters on my hand. Then the thrilling moment: The test run for any leaks. Everything looks pretty good. Only at the connections to the regular cooler is a very small leak. I retighten the screw and with my next run everything is sealed.

Next is to conenct my backup battery. I also correct the ground wiring from last year. Unfortuantely I picked the line to my rear window locker last year. But now everything is fine. I hope that this also solved my communication issues from my self made battery charger to my interior computer.

The last job for today is building an adapter for my car pod. I am finished around half past eight. I also planned to install a better sensor for my transmission temperature. But at the output on my transmission is not enough space to install a sensor. Therefore I will keep my “indirect” measurement from last year.

I am back home around half past nine. I make myself a sandwich before I go to bed.