P38A Cycling EAS

Sounds like you got to get underneath with spray bottle of soapy water

Right .......
Both rear air springs have been pumped up with a tyre pump through Shrader valves coupled at the valve block end of the air lines. Both are up an hour later which suggests no major leaks in air bags or air lines. Yesterday both deflated within half an hour when coupled to the valve block and the battery was disconnected. I'm assuming that this suggests no problems with the electronics/control system. So does this isolate the problem to a leak within the valve block?
If so, do you know if you can buy the small rubber discs which insert into the ends of the plungers and close onto the sharpened cylinders? All other rubbers and seals were changed last wek using an x8r service kit which did not include these. Changing these seals, and the diaphragm, did not improve anything - is there anything else I should have done?
DarthDude, sorry I'm not sure what you mean by complete air spring, I changed the air bags but not the air lines. Could I have done more?
Cheers, and thanks again for your help.

Hopefully kurtjohson will be along he’s your man for valve block or compressor woes there’s a right up by wammers in the tec section have a look through that it covers everything

Well cool.... so we know it's not the airpsrings or the air lines and we know the electronics aren't suspect at the moment, eihter.... so it means chances are it's in the valve block. I'd leave it there a few more hours just to be sure, even though they've lasted longer than they used to with the valve block connected.

I'd plan on revisiting the valve block. Since the orings have been recently changed we know that it's not old orings. Hmmmmm.

If the car is still up on it's shrader-valved rear airsprings come say 5pm this evening your time, I think it'll be time to rip out the valve block and take a long hard look at solenoid valves 1 and 2 and their orings- including at the outlet collets.

Almost there mate......

DarthDude said:

Well cool.... so we know it's not the airpsrings or the air lines and we know the electronics aren't suspect at the moment, eihter.... so it means chances are it's in the valve block. I'd leave it there a few more hours just to be sure, even though they've lasted longer than they used to with the valve block connected.

I'd plan on revisiting the valve block. Since the orings have been recently changed we know that it's not old orings. Hmmmmm.

If the car is still up on it's shrader-valved rear airsprings come say 5pm this evening your time, I think it'll be time to rip out the valve block and take a long hard look at solenoid valves 1 and 2 and their orings- including at the outlet collets.

Almost there mate......

Click to expand...

agreed, back to the block you go

Bertie Wooster said:

Right .......
Both rear air springs have been pumped up with a tyre pump through Shrader valves coupled at the valve block end of the air lines. Both are up an hour later which suggests no major leaks in air bags or air lines. Yesterday both deflated within half an hour when coupled to the valve block and the battery was disconnected. I'm assuming that this suggests no problems with the electronics/control system. So does this isolate the problem to a leak within the valve block?
If so, do you know if you can buy the small rubber discs which insert into the ends of the plungers and close onto the sharpened cylinders? All other rubbers and seals were changed last wek using an x8r service kit which did not include these. Changing these seals, and the diaphragm, did not improve anything - is there anything else I should have done?
DarthDude, sorry I'm not sure what you mean by complete air spring, I changed the air bags but not the air lines. Could I have done more?
Cheers, and thanks again for your help.

Click to expand...

Hang on..... a couple points.

1) What do you mean when you say "the small rubber discs which insert into the ends of the plungers and close onto the sharpened cylinders"? Are these the rubberised ends of the plungers? If so then I think it highly unlikely they're a problem because..... well they've never been a problem for me before and I've rebuilt north of 30 valve blocks over the years. I've never had to replace those and I don't think you can buy them separately. You'll need to buy a whole used valve assembly off ebay or something for that. The problem is FAR more likely to be a bit of dirt or grit across one of the orings (do your overhaul in a clean environment and make sure you clean all the surfaces with either silicon spray or windex and a good microfibre cloth before reassembling), an improperly seated oring (use silicon grease or silicon spray to lubricate the oring immediately before reassembling whatever bit it is you're working on to help it seat properly once the system is pressurised), a missing or improperly aligned oring under the collet (I once had a mystery leak much like you do today and it drove me nuts trying to find it until I looked under the collet and found I had just one oring doing the work because the other had folded up like a taco when I pushed the airline in), a cracked valve body, stripped threads on the valve body preventing you from torquing up the screw holding it together properly or a missing oring somewhere in the valve. Just check those possibilities before buying another valve assembly.

2) I asked if you'd just changed the bellows because it's possible to buy just the bellows and re-use the airspring top and bottom. See the link for an example. Had you done this, you might have introduced another possible failure to the system by damaging the top or base while trying to get the old bellows off or the new bellows in but since your airspring seems to be holding up with the shrader valve, we can discount that possibility.

I seriously think you're well on your way. Hope it goes smoothly now!

https://airbagman.com.au/collection...rover-p38a-94-02/products/ab0003?lfdnr=178821

.... oh another thing- since you say the problem existed even before your rebuild, look VERY CAREFULLY for physical damage to the valve and it's components- cracking, warping, a chip in the valve body plastic where an oring would sit, stripped threads (as I said above), damage to the rubber end of the plunger or the plastic bit it closes on to, a damaged collet which doesn't do a good job of holding the orings around the airline and so on.

Do you have a second valve block you could cannibalise for the valve body?

.... also a sticking plunger that doesn't move freely up and down vertical the shaft it sits in, dirt in any of the grooves any of the orings sit in... and.... errr.... I can't think of anything else right now so I'll shut up.

Hi everyone, the suspension is still up so done better than it has managed for a long time. So valve block it is. Yes DarthDude, the rubberised end of the plungers. Seems odd to me that neither these ends or the seating is in the kit, but if you say that that is rarely a problem - that will be why. No spare valve block so I'll have a very careful look at this one.
It will be a few days before I have the time to have another look at it but will report back when I do.
Very many thanks for all the helpful ideas and suggestions.

No worries... always happy to help a fellow victim.

Like Alcoholics Anonymous.

Getting a spare valve block (around £55 on ebay.co.uk- I checked a bit earlier) is a good move- I have a couple spares, and not only does it let me cannibalise parts from one to another (never done it so far but it's there if I ever need to) but it also lets me take my time rebuilding one and get it ready whenever the one in the car is failing and then do a quick half hour swap over when the opportunity arises rather than an easily 4 hour job to do start to finish in one go.

Good luck and let us know how it went!

Oh... and post pics of any suspect bits you find. Might help.

The rubber ends can go hard over time. They then wear so they don't quite seal. I sanded one set but got nervous and managed to get some the whole assembly from somewhere, probably @kurtjohnson10 came up trumps.

@kurtjohnson10 is the man you want,

Henry_b said:

@kurtjohnson10 is the man you want,

Click to expand...

I have never been wanted in years mate only by the fashion police
I have a kit available if required

+1

And j may be seeking your advice shortly too @kurtjohnson10 !
Have similar issues but way behind @Bertie Wooster on the diagnostics. Just swapping out a burst air spring and will go from there but have suspicions over the block as the PO said he’d rebuilt it but some of the other things they’d ‘rebuilt’ were a little suspect !

will work through the steps and revisit !

Even more helpful advice. Yes please Kurtjohnson10 - a kit is required. Fashion not an issue
I'll try and send a private message, if I can work out how.
Sanding the ends seems high risk, I prefer low risk.

Oh dear, I shall have to ask advice on this, how do I contact kurtjohnson10 about a kit?

Bertie Wooster said:

Oh dear, I shall have to ask advice on this, how do I contact kurtjohnson10 about a kit?

Click to expand...

Click on his name, and a box will open up,

Among the various options there is a " start a conversation" one, thats what you'll use to contact

Thanks Henry-b, let's hope I do the repair more efficiently than finding those contact details.