Thursday, October 30, 2014

Land Rover accelerator fix

So last week I was driving home over a hill, in front of me was a Prius going under the speed limit and I decided to pass. I gave it some Wellie and it charged up the hill but the Prius went faster too....I passed just at the crest of the hill and all of a sudden my accelerator pedal dropped to the floor!!! Lucky for me I had enough momentum over the top as there were around 5 cars behind me passing the Prius too.
    Coasting down the other side I had time to think, all I knew was I was in gear, the motor running, but no control of the engine speed. I decided to pull over on the first side street towards the base of the hill and not chance that I could make the left turn into the store parking lot.
   After pulling over and shutting down the motor I climbed out and looked at the pedal,,,,,it just lay there forlorn and disconnected from the cable. The piece of all thread I used to attach the clevis to the pedal had snapped above the locknut. It was only 10-32 and using the pedal flexed it too much.
   Out came the tools and the broken bit removed from the pedal, here is where I got lucky, I had left enough of the all thread in the clevis to effect a repair. Still I gingerly drove home.
   Usually I feel like I overbuild things but I had to go with the 10-32 due to the clevis threads.

   I slept on it that night and devised a fix. Using 1/2" steel rod that I had, I fashioned a replacement. Into one end I made a clevis using my angle grinder and a 1/8" cutoff wheel, thru that end I drilled a 3/16" hole for the clevis bolt.

On the other end I drilled and tapped it for a 1/4-28 thread. I had to also enlarge the hole in the pedal itself. Once all done and bolted in when I drove it the pedal was WAY too high even though I used the same measurement as the clevis. I drove it this way for a couple of days trying to figure out what to do.
    Again I do my best thinking prior to falling asleep, I needed to put a bend in the top of the rod to allow it to sit lower at rest.
    So I made another one slightly longer so I could cut it to final length, cut the clevis, drilled for the clevis bolt then heated it up to bend and the clevis bits folded up.......sigh.......
    Cut another piece of rod off and this time I heated it and bent it first! Then cut and drilled to make the end a clevis and the other end drilled and tapped for the 1/4-28 bolt.
    Turns out I didn't have to cut it shorter, fit great!



There was an unexpected plus from this, the throttle response is quicker as there is a more solid connection between the pedal and the pump.

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