Step 8 ? Mounting the Intercooler Radiator and Hoses:
This is the last of the Pre-Down Time tasks.
Here you will be ?punching? a hole in the Jeeps oil pan above the oil line. This hole will then be taped to fit a ?-inch NPT thread and a fitting screwed in to connect the Super Charger oil return line.
Here are the tools you will need.
The first three (top down) are hand punches used to put a small dimple in the oil pan to mark the stop where you want to make the hole.
On the bottom is a pneumatic air chisel. This is what will actually punch the hole in the pan.
Obviously you will need an air compressor to power the pneumatic chisel.
Very Important! The chisel bit that you use must be the right size to allow a ?-inch NPT pipe tap to put threads in the oil pan. I used a chisel that had an outside diameter of 0.460 ?inches. It was a little on the tight side for my tap.
I believe you could use a chisel bit up to 0.475 ? inches in diameter and still be able to thread this hole. If in doubt I would strongly suggest you punch a hole in a piece of scrap metal and make sure the tap can indeed thread it. If you go too big with this hole the tap will not bite enough to form the threads.
One additional tool not shown is the ?-inch NPT thread Tap.
Comments:
Punching a hole in my oil pan with an air chisel was more then a bit unnerving to me
I had a fall back plan if I didn?t like how this worked, I?d drop the pan and weld a ?bung? on.
Prior to actually doing this I practiced punching holes in some scrap metal around the shop. I found it took two hands to hold and control the air chisel when doing this to the scrap metal. And that it took about 5 seconds to punch the hole through neatly and without having the chisel jump all over the place.
This was not the case on the oil pan. What I found when actually punching the hole in my pan was scary.
The chisel went through the pan like a hot knife through butter. I mean right in, in about one nanosecond! You cannot believe how soft the metal of this oil pan is. (Read that, don?t dream of leaving your driveway without some type of oil pan skid protection!)
The chisel causes the pan metal to mushroom around the edges of the hole. This allows the tap to put threads in about 3/8 of an inch of metal all the way around. More then enough for the hose barb to be screwed in securely.
In hindsight this ?punch a hole in the oil pan with an air chisel? process worked great. (And I?m more then a little picky about these things.)
End of comments
My Apologies
The quality of some of these pictures leave more then a bit to be desired. I don?t know if the problem was with the camera or my being so scared to punch a hole in my oil pan that I couldn?t hold the camera still. At any rate, they are the best I have. Please bare with me and squint.
Here is a picture of the oil pan from the driver side.
See that round block casting? Look down to the pan from there about ?-inch onto the pan, between the two studs that are sticking down.
That is where you need to punch the hole.
Better yet, just take a look at this picture, after the hole has been punched to locate it in your mind.
How do you do that?
Well unless you have monkey arms longer then mine (34-inch sleeve) you are going to need to jack the driver side tire up off the ground, put the frame on a jack stand and remove the front tire.
I also had to remove the driver side shock. I just couldn?t get the air chisel in there to punch the hole any other way.
Now that you have access to the driver side of the oil pan take a hand chisel and mark the stop where you need to punch the hole at with a dimple. This should be between the two studs/bolts as shown above and about ?-inch below the pan gasket lip.
Work the Air Chisel and Bit (You are using the right size bit, Right?) into place and press the chisel point down hard into the marked dimple.
Pull the trigger and hang on cause this is going to happen fast!
Here it is exactly 1.274 nanoseconds later; one perfectly formed, mushroom-lipped hole in my oil pan above the oil line!
Now dig out your ?-inch NPT thread Tap and your grease gun.
What you want to do is cover the tap with lots of grease. This will help catch any thread filings as you run the tap into the hole to thread it.
As you can see in the picture I used a ratchet , extension and socket to turn the tap. All of my tap handles were too big to turn in this space.
Once the threads are cut clean the hole with a shop rag and install the blower oil return hose barb.
While this barb is well above the oil line be sure to use some thread compound or black RTV to seal the threads.
Please Note: The hose barb that comes with the super charger kit is made of brass. I decided to install a replacement made out of steel so that I could weld it in place. Why? I guess it just made me feel better knowing it could never ever back out. (I?m eccentric, what can I say!)
Being I did this work before I was ready to install the rest of the super charger I had to close this hose barb off, or run the risk (likely) of dumping oil all over the place.
I took a 4-inch length of 3/8-inch hose and plugged one end with a bolt, some RTV and a hose clamp.
I then put the other end on the hose barb and held it there with a hose clamp. This worked fine.
You will take this piece of hose off later when you install the super charger and run a hose from the blower to the oil pan to the hose barb you just installed.
Re-install the shock, put the front tire back on and remove the Jeep from the jack stands.
Take it for a test drive and make sure there are no leaks.
Down Time Coming
If you follow my order of installation tasks you will find you are more then half done with the installation in both time and effort.
Yes this was all the boring stuff, but it did enable you to do the work piecemeal and still be able to drive your Jeep after each task was complete.
From here on out, count on your Jeep being down, out of service, until the super charger installation is complete.