1992 Alpha I Gen II failing pressure test....

[Oshkosh1]

Hi all...

I pulled my drive because I'm losing a small amount of oil. I separated it, checked the impeller, cleaned it up and it actually looks very good. For perspective; I can drive roughly 15 miles and when I get back it'll require about 4 pumps from my bottle to bring it back up to "full". I drained it and the oil had no water...still looked very good actually.

I pressure tested it and it won't hold any pressure. I can pump it up to 15psi but it will VERY slowly lose it all. Roughly 1psi per minute.

I used my soapy water spray and hit the usual suspects that I can think of; Shift shaft, prop shaft and the dipstick/vent. Also the seam near the oil passage. All seem to be tight with no bubbles.

So what's left???

 

[tpenfield]

Drive shaft

 

[JoLin]

Did you hit the "dipstick" hole at the top of the case? Found one of mine leaking there, and the gasket/o-ring was shot when I unscrewed it.

Also, since my pressure tester is homemade, the first things I hit with the soapy water are the all the connections I cobbled together.

My .02

 

[Bt Doctur]

probably the seal under the water pump

 

[BF]

buy a cheap kid's kiddie pool and lay it in to see what bubbles...

 

[Benny67]

Drive shaft

MY money's on that as well...

 

[Oshkosh1]

Thanks for all the suggestions...I'm going to split it again today. For some reason I don't think the WP gaskets were installed correctly by the PO now that I see the correct diagram. I think I'll need to run a new bead of Permatex Blue on the water "dam" as well.

 

[Oshkosh1]

Oh here's my pressure tester. I took a HFT radiator tester...which I already had, cut the tube between the quick disconnect and the pump then simply attached an oil adapter...my guess is that the metal version would have easily "clicked" into the original setup with no modification needed. The plastic DID lock in, but didn't have a tight purchase.

In order to return it to it's original use, I'll simply splice it back with a small nylon barb or straight tubing.