Hi All,
First time poster, second time TF owner!
I just thought I'd contribute back to the board that had helped me over the last few days fix issues on my recent R9 acquisition.
I notice that Geeves has posted quite a few times that disconnecting the thermo temp sensor (the top wire on the thermo housing) causes knocking and you should only run it disconnected for testing - some people have questioned the wisdom. Well, I can confirm that after finding the wire cut - right to the base - that he's right! I've only had the bus for 3.5 days, driven around 200ish k's, and upon finding the wire was cut, and wondering why on earth the plugs glow for 15 seconds, I have re-soldered some electrical wire to the sensor and reconnected it to the solenoid. I am absolutely shocked at how much nicer it runs, and how much quieter it is. Also, it doesn't glow for forever and a day.
Next on the list (I've done the oil, oil filter, fuel filter, air filter and started cleaning up rust spots) is to replace the sensor completely with a fresh one that's not bodged on with a 2mm drill hole with wire stuck in it, and filled with solder. Following on from that is getting the bottom two bolts on the transfer/gearbox actually installed. God knows why they're missing.
On that note, I'm assuming that there is a reasonable amount of pressure in the coolant system, so I'm not sure weak I've just made this point - any guesses?
I'm dropping it into the mech across the road to give it a once over and grease the slippery bits while he's at it.
All in all, not a bad pickup for $4k though, and really, really happy to be back in an old diesel!