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I'm helping a new friend here in the park with his Wonderlodge it had few air leaks and a bad PPV valve he is a gear head so he's doing all the work I'm finding with my Biddle leak detector and handing him tools. After removing the PPV valve and the manifolds that tie all the brakes and supply together we dissected the PPV valve we found a bad diaphragm, found a new one in a truck parts place for $25 and changed out the diaphragm and not the whole valve. My point of this whole thing is we could have saved many hours of removing the manifold when all we had to do is remove 4 screws clean the body and put in the new diaphragm and be done with it saving 3 hours of labor. Having never been under a Wonderlodge I found a large portion of there air plumbing is soft copper which is pretty nice.
1999 45' with tag axle, #504 "Magnolia"
Gravette, Arkansas
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(02-02-2024, 06:59 AM)Jack Houpe Wrote: I'm helping a new friend here in the park with his Wonderlodge it had few air leaks and a bad PPV valve he is a gear head so he's doing all the work I'm finding with my Biddle leak detector and handing him tools. After removing the PPV valve and the manifolds that tie all the brakes and supply together we dissected the PPV valve we found a bad diaphragm, found a new one in a truck parts place for $25 and changed out the diaphragm and not the whole valve. My point of this whole thing is we could have saved many hours of removing the manifold when all we had to do is remove 4 screws clean the body and put in the new diaphragm and be done with it saving 3 hours of labor. Having never been under a Wonderlodge I found a large portion of there air plumbing is soft copper which is pretty nice.
My 84 Wanderlodge air system is almost all copper tubing. The water system is all copper, they used a bunch of copper tubing. They used a little bit of plastic tubing for some of the gauges on the dash and that is about the extent of any plastic tubing. I have worked on several coaches that were taken to truck shops and they could not find the air leaks to fix the air system, I had them fixed in hour, you just have to know where to look.
I would check all the bendix air switches, they tend to leak. There are some around each of the axles and there are some around the air tanks, sometimes they are hidden up above the holding tanks.
Jeff LoGiudice
Temple Terrace, Fl
1984 Bluebird Wanderlodge PT40
1998 Newell 2000 #490
1986 MCI/TMC 102A3 (sold)
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Jeff when you say air switches are you talking a solenoid valve?
This is the first Wanderlodge (sorry about miss spelling) I've been in and will say I'm very impressed it's an older unit 40 ft no slides which is perfect in my mind.
1999 45' with tag axle, #504 "Magnolia"
Gravette, Arkansas
Posts: 248
Threads: 17
Joined: Jun 2023
(02-02-2024, 02:45 PM)Jack Houpe Wrote: Jeff when you say air switches are you talking a solenoid valve?
This is the first Wanderlodge (sorry about miss spelling) I've been in and will say I'm very impressed it's an older unit 40 ft no slides which is perfect in my mind.
Talking about these:
They are for the low air lights and suspension dump lights.
Jeff LoGiudice
Temple Terrace, Fl
1984 Bluebird Wanderlodge PT40
1998 Newell 2000 #490
1986 MCI/TMC 102A3 (sold)
Posts: 992
Threads: 63
Joined: Sep 2022
Ok thanks pressure switches. I will look at those this morning, thank you!
1999 45' with tag axle, #504 "Magnolia"
Gravette, Arkansas
Posts: 1,004
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I recently replaced mine. It's a Bendix part 228750
--Simon
1993 8v92TA #312
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I highly recommend that when you replace pressure switches that you verify that they actually work before installation.
I replaced my original low pressure indicator switch because it was leaking.
After dropping the lighter than air hydraulic cooler, removing and reconnecting a new switch, and bolting the hydraulic cooler back in I found out that the switch although not leaking did not turn off the "low air" light on the dash any more.
So now I get to look at that until I get back in Simons pit to replace the switch again. However this time I will verify that the switch actually works......
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That's a bummer! What pressure is it, 60 psi?
1999 45' with tag axle, #504 "Magnolia"
Gravette, Arkansas
Posts: 1,004
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I believe so Jack
--Simon
1993 8v92TA #312
Posts: 248
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Joined: Jun 2023
(02-05-2024, 01:46 PM)Gnawrocki1 Wrote: I highly recommend that when you replace pressure switches that you verify that they actually work before installation.
I replaced my original low pressure indicator switch because it was leaking.
After dropping the lighter than air hydraulic cooler, removing and reconnecting a new switch, and bolting the hydraulic cooler back in I found out that the switch although not leaking did not turn off the "low air" light on the dash any more.
So now I get to look at that until I get back in Simons pit to replace the switch again. However this time I will verify that the switch actually works......
Often times there could be multiple switches in parallel, any one switch can turn on the light. You may need to make sure that there is not another switch on the circuit.
Jeff LoGiudice
Temple Terrace, Fl
1984 Bluebird Wanderlodge PT40
1998 Newell 2000 #490
1986 MCI/TMC 102A3 (sold)
