| Author | Message | ||
| Robert MC-9 Rating: N/A |
Hi Guys, Ok I have decide it to remove the factory a/c unit from our MC-9. My question is how do I remove the a/c ducts that run all the way down both sides along the floor of the coach and is there anything I really need to pay attention to so that I don't ruin anything? Thanks ahead of time. 1980 MC-9 | ||
| John MC9 Rating: N/A |
The stainless steel ducts are attached to the panels below the windows, comprising the complete ducting action. You can't remove one without removing it all. I used a crowbar and a claw hammer and pried on the S/S until it popped free from the screws that hold it to the floor. You'll have to remove the screws that hold each section together and pry them apart, and pry it from the panels. Find a spot to store the material, since you may decide as many of do, to use the material to complete some other project. The panels are aluminum and can be re-used to cover the toilet area, etc. Whatever aluminum you don't use, can be sold as $crap. Don't worry about the walls, since under those decorative panels, there is the interior aluminum skin. Fred Hobe has pictures of the process, but his method is more complex and work intensive, than mine. I'm more of a yanker/puller. | ||
| ChuckMC9 (Chucks)
Rating: N/A |
Hang on there, Mr. SlashNBurn take-no-prisoners... A Philips #2 will work just fine, by hand or motorized, on those floor screws. Then you just rotate them upwards and they easily slide out of the seat rail. The seat rail is not part of the 'wall', but screwed with some big honkin' screw to the bus structure/framework. You can remove the innermost panels without touching the seat rails. Some folks leave the rails in to attach stuff to. The innermost wall/panel on mine were plastic, not aluminum, which can be slipped out from the seat rail after removing the top vents, which are rivited on, under the window release bars, which need to be removed first. Stop right there, before you touch the next (yellow/orange) wall panels. Much more care and attention must be paid to those, but we'll leave that for another conversation. I think the experts have abdicated the board lately, and they're leaving it up to interns like John and I. Yikes! | ||
| John MC9 Rating: N/A |
Yikes, indeed!!!! | ||
| David Hartley (Drdave)
Rating: N/A |
Mine were attached to the floor with slotted screws not phillips. Slots were already destroyed so the prybar and hammer were necessary. As for the seat rails on the walls.. Whew.. Best way I ended up taking them out was with a smoke wrench burning the heads off the bolts. I spent three days wrestling with them trying to use tools and only took a half hour with a torch. Of course it also took three days for the smell of burning hair,skin,chaff,lint,gum and other unrecognized odors to dissipate. Like a fire in a morgue..... | ||
| David (Davidinwilmnc)
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As to the seat rails (on an MC-8, anyway), I spent a very long time removing the first one. When it came time to take out the second, I spent about 45 minutes. I removed the screws that would come out with my driver/drill. Next, I took out the screws at the top of the walls holding the vents in place. These are under the window release bars. I pulled the vent out, along with the piece that holds the melamine wall panels in place. The wall panels came out mostly intact at this point. Then I slid a reciprocating saw blade behind the seat rail and cut 'em off. Most were corroded to the rail itself and not to the nuts in the wall. I'm sure this isn't the best way, but it was quick and easy. | ||
| John MC9 Rating: N/A |
Ahh... I'll have to add to it... The side panels under the decorative vent panels were aluminum on my MC9. The panels are said to be an integral part of the bus construction. The decorative panels were also aluminum, and worth saving until the conversion is finished. The side seat rails are a pain, since the nuts that the screws go into are not welded to the panel. Some can be removed with an impact screwdriver (Harbour Freight $6.99), and some will have to be ground off. I used a 4-1/2" Dewalt grinder and whacked the heads off with two cuts, one up, one down. Once the rails are removed, you go back and grind the rest off. The best tools you'll need, is a -good- grinder, and impact screwdriver, a small crowbar, a BIG crowbar, and a good claw hammer. Oh yeah... and some band-aids, peroxide, and a cellphone with "*911" pre-programmed. Have fun. | ||
| ChuckMC9 (Chucks)
Rating: N/A |
Thanks for the additional seat rail info, David, David & John. After my initial removal attempt I left them in place to come back and fight that battle another day, moving on to other things. (and trying to make up reasons to leave the rails in place...;)) Now I know what is waiting for me. Can't wait.  | ||
| Stan Rating: N/A |
Chuck MC9: The reason for the lack of expert advice has ben discussed several times in the last couple of years. This is a great board for wannabees and newbees to come for information. The problem comes up when someone publishs a long post on theories that they recomend to the world that are invalid. When the 'expert' points out their errors, they get arguments in more long posts with numerous references to URLs that are just more theories from a different board. The thread then quickly goes off topic and must be very confusing to the person who asked the original question. In the past, there were mechanics with a lifetime of experience with DDs who seldom post now. There were also bus fleet maintenance experts who posted frequently. I expect they just got tired of having their advice disputed or lost in all the non relevant posts. On removing a/c ducts, I guess everyone who has done it is an expert. | ||
| ChuckMC9 (Chucks)
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Yes, Stan, despite cries to the contrary I've definitely noticed that in just the two years I've been paying close attention. But I'll stop because it would be a shame for another thread to head that direction. | ||
| John MC9 Rating: N/A |
David- I found that near all the phill screws into the flooring were so worn and rusted, that the only remedy was to pry the blasted duct free. Some of the bus companies had a habit of hosing out their buses after each trip. The road salt from the NE states always got carried in also, adding to the corrosive effect.. Chuckmc9- It's funny that some models were made using resin products and other models were total aluminum. I don't know if I lucked out with mine... I do know that a guy in the same storage area with a slightly different year model, found rust where I had none, and some aluminum where I had plastic.. go figger.. Robert- If you haven't removed the toilet walls yet, you'll find some screws holding the ductwork at the wall's bottom. You'll have to remove the end cap and search them out. I think there were five, total. Those were the only screws that came out easy, if that's any consolation?? Stan- ?!?! | ||
| Ken_MC8 (Lugnut)
Rating: N/A |
Most of the large phillips head screws in the seat rail on my MC8 came out using a #3 phillips screwdriver with visegrips clamped to it for leverage. Tighten first to help break it lose then loosen. Oh yeh, spray everything down with liquid wrench before getting started. There were a few that the screw heads rounded off so I cut a slot across the center of the screwhead with a cut-off wheel & used a big honkin straightblade screwdriver (w/ visegrips) to unscrew them. Then there was one left that the slot wouldn't work either so I cut a flat notch off the top & the bottom of the round screwhead where an open end wrench would slip onto it & simply wrenched it off. It may sound time consuming but it really didn't take take much time at all compared to some of the other removal projects. Now removing that bathroom... yeh that was fun!! | ||
| John MC9 Rating: N/A |
Stan- There are no experts; no such thing as an "expert". There are only people that have actually accomplished a feat, and those that attempt to use their vast life knowledge to describe how they would do something they've never actually done. Among those that have actually accomplished the feat, there are those that found a simple way, and those that took the long, complicated way. Among those, are the individuals that found through their accomplished feat, that it either was not necessary to take the long route, or it was a mistake to take the shortcut. That, Stan.... is what this is all about. Reading about how each of us has accomplished a task, and the pros and cons of each method. Even a seasoned, well experienced mechanic only shows his intelligence, when he is willing to learn a new way to do an old job. That's why I've been reading here for a few or more years. I want to read all the ways to do something, then decide what plan I'll use. And when my bus is finished, I'll probably be out in it, instead of taking time to post here so regularly. Cheers? | ||
| Bruce Henderson (Oonrahnjay)
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Ken MC8 (Lugnut) said: "Then there was one left that the slot wouldn't work either so I cut a flat notch off the top & the bottom of the round screwhead where an open end wrench would slip onto it & simply wrenched it off. " __. On my bus (**very** different from yours, I'd be willing to bet), I had to remove a lot of countersunk straight-slot screws. These were flat on the floor and full of dirt, water, salt, etc. The only thing that seemed to loosen them was a good soaking in Liquid Wrench and removal with a "hammer impact". Dunno if you've seen one, but they are used to take screws off Japanese motorcycles, etc. They look like a fat screwdriver and when you hit them with a hammer, the cam inside turns the screw -- at the same time, the force of the hammer jams the driver bit into the slot. Works when nothing else but an air impact or smoke wrench will. | ||
| John MC9 Rating: N/A |
Harbor Freight has an impact screwdriver for $6.99. It's one of the handiest tools I have. You can buy a special socket from Sears, that fits a standard ratchet (and this impact tool), with a head that accepts any standard torque (hex) driver bit. They also carry the hex bits that fit this impact screwdriver, but buying the adapter and using regular hex bits is a whole lot cheaper, and it's a whole lot easier to find normal bits! | ||
| Stan Rating: N/A |
John MC0: There is some truth is what you say about experts but I think everyone would be out driving their bus a lot sooner if they took the advice of people who have spent a lifetime doing what they are advising instead of from people who are trying to re-invent the wheel. The amateur may indeed come up with a better, cheaper, easier way of doing something but the odds are that methods used to repair DDs after 50+ years have most of the bugs worked out. That said, I still see outrageous suggestions (refuting the expert) from people who have never seen the inside of an engine, but read something on the xx bulletin board. If someone came on this thread and said he worked for a bus converter and had removed the duct from several hundred busses and here is the quickest, easiest, best way, I would class him as the expert and use his method. It is quite possible that some first timers on this thread used the expert's method but the newbee asking how to do it cannot separate the one-timer's fact from fiction. | ||
| John MC9 Rating: N/A |
Stan- There's an "expert" bus converter that's well known and well respected. A great guy that'll give you the shirt off his back if you needed it.... His conversions are considered models of perfection, by some... He uses extension cord for wiring the conversions. All extension cords plainly state they are not to be used in enclosed spaces or through holes. "Experts" can make errors of judgement, we're all human... One of the reasons Ma-Bell was so eager to get older employees to retire early, was their reluctance to learn to use new procedures and technology. Being an "old hand" at any vocation isn't necessarily a credit in one's favor. All that aside... This poster wanted to know how others got rid of that ductwork. If he asked a bus air conditioning mechanic over at ABC, he'd be told how to do it the way they do it when they repair and clean the system. It'd be done carefully. All screws carefully removed, and never a crowbar to be used. The ductwork will be re-used and cannot be bent or damaged. But this ductwork is coming out and staying out. It's a whole lot easier to pop the ductwork off those damned screws and get it out of the way so you can get the real work done. The side rails would be in the way for other wall work, so it too should be removed. The easiest and fastest way to accomplish this part of the project, is to remove the screws that unscrew easy, and cut the screws that don't. This isn't rocket surgery, Stan. It doesn't take an expert. What does help, is input from those of us that have managed to do the damned job quickly and painlessly. Theory is objective; work product is definitive. Stay well and happy. We may argue, but I like ya'. | ||
| David Hartley (Drdave)
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The amount of labor required to do a demolition job intensifies as you start overthinking the complexity of the job. If you are trying to save all of the chaff that you will eventually cut up or throw away when stripping a bus then your labor time, expense, aggravation factors and usually injuries either to yourself or others will multiply. It usually takes one to two weeks to properly shell out a used bus in labor alone. Then another week to haul off the junk you took out. Use care with the stuff that you plan to re-use and use force on stuff that is going to the dump. My tools consist of the following items; Torch, Plasma cutter, prybars, 2 pound sledge hammers,socket sets & wrenches, sawzall, Impact wrenches, cordless screwdriver and numerous bits,blades & bandaids. Its always a good idea to pressure wash as much as you can before starting the demolition to get rid of the chaff, dirt, soot and yuckie stuff as best that you can, Then start with the basics. If you can loosen screws and bolts then do so, If they fight you then use the additional tools as needed to get the job done. It is always important to stand back and look at what you want to remove and how much. How far do you want to strip out the shell and think about how much trouble you will cause yourself if you go too far and remove stuff that doesnt need to be removed or is structural. If you are the "strip it to the frame" type of person and you plan or rebuilding everything from the ground up and spare no expense then that is a completely different approach and you will spend years and thousands to get what you want before you can drive your coach again. You will also probably need a $50k building to work in and $10k worth of tools plus the education on how to use the tools. Please keep in mind that whatever you spend for the coach chassis is probably close to what you might get out of it if you need to sell it. So spending $4k for countertops and $5k for cabinets is a waste of time and money. Why not take a realistic approach and get the basics including the comfort factors installed and get on the road. Life is a short and twisty uphill road. A bus conversion is made for those long haul trips no matter the level of actual completion even if it never gets really completed, Enjoy what you have! I like the basics: Bed,Bath,Kitchen,Livingroom, hot and cold water, electricity 12/24 and 120 volts and air conditioning and heat. The wife says she needs a closet or three and a washer-dryer, I am happy with a couple of cardboard boxes, tv and laptop computer. You can build a monument or a usable RV... To each his own.... I don't want to be perfect, It's such a pain in the butt! | ||
| John MC9 Rating: N/A |
Amen, Dave! Very well said! |