Cleaning gunk out of air system of truck

[Sutton]

Hiya All,

 

My first thread and it's seasonal too. But first just a brief intro. I mainly do woodland mangement from planting to felling in the summer and firewood sales in the winter which I've been doing for 11 years now. Great forum and very interesting reading.

 

Anyway, following on from _tc's thread about freezing air tanks, do you know any ways of cleaning all the crud and rusty-coloured condensate out of the air system of an old vehicle (a forwarder) that's been stood for a while? Some of the air switches in the cab are temperamental, that is, it takes them a while to make up their minds whether they're going to work or not...

 

The air operates diff-locks, brakes, loader actuator etc so it's not simple. I've tried ethanol into the reservoir and then emptying the tanks and then re-filling a few times but not had much joy.

 

Is the only way to strip out and dismantle and replace. Any advice or experience is much appreciated.

 

Thanks

 

JamesS

[Stephen Blair]

each of the valves will be gunked up and maybe gone solid with what looks like graphite, the end of a file and will dig that out then soak in fuel, get a big compressor with gun on the end and blast back toward the tank, but obviously taking all the ends off to get the gunk out, you wont believe how quick the air will build up once you have done this.