Bongo Fury

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https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid ... 733&type=3
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid ... 733&type=3
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Took longer to think about what I was going to do than it did to fit it!

Coolant system self-bleeds by turning the inline valve. All I needed to do was top up the coolant tank

I cannot attach pictures even though I am shrinking them right down!!

Looks fascinating. How does it work, where does bleeding coolant get dumped, and i presume the usual routine of heating the engine etc has to be followed?

Hi there, in place of the usual bleed pipe in have a new pipe exiting underneath the front of the centre console, I have an on/off valve there. The pipe slopes gradually upwards and through a vent near the blower fan and then the pipe goes through a small hole in the plastic and into a T-piece connecting it to the heater pipe just before the header tank.

Basically when the valve is open coolant can run from the header tank to the head and air up to the tank. To fill system with coolant I topped up header tank and refilled running in stages, squeezing pipes as per normal and then I went for a gentle drive stopping and topping up as needed.

I can drive along and bleed the system by turning the valve. I can even drive along for a long way with the valve open with no problems.

Rustyp. Seems interesting but could you post the images somewhere other than facebook as they aren't visible to those with no fb account, and I'm getting a "Sorry, this content isn't available at the moment" message. ImgBB.com is a good (free) image place

rustyp wrote:Hi there, in place of the usual bleed pipe in have a new pipe exiting underneath the front of the centre console, I have an on/off valve there. The pipe slopes gradually upwards and through a vent near the blower fan and then the pipe goes through a small hole in the plastic and into a T-piece connecting it to the heater pipe just before the header tank.

Basically when the valve is open coolant can run from the header tank to the head and air up to the tank. To fill system with coolant I topped up header tank and refilled running in stages, squeezing pipes as per normal and then I went for a gentle drive stopping and topping up as needed.

I can drive along and bleed the system by turning the valve. I can even drive along for a long way with the valve open with no problems.

That seems like a brilliantly simple / elegant solution and i can't think why Mazda didn't design it like that in the first place!

rustyp,looks like some of Mr Takashite Imamoto genius has rubbed off on you.

I have one potential caution on this. If the header cap is on and the system up to temperature and pressurised then opening the bleed pipe valve may not have much effect as the back pressure into the bleed pipe might inhibit flow from it (air bubbles and all) into the header tank. Where it seems most useful is when following the normal/Mazda process, where the tedious/risky business of putting a bucket inside the cab whilst attempting to rush between topping up the header tank and putting the bung in a pipe spurting scalding coolant.....could be eliminated. Shoot me down if i'm wrong on this etc....

Hello there, I have plenty of pics but cannot add them on here. I have shrunk the pics right down using a pc app but it still says on the forum when posting that the pics are too large!

Years ago I used to use photobucket but that is now a pay site. Anyone got any suggestions?

I am more handy with a spanner than a PC

Hi Mike, in my previous Bongo I had rusty water stains in the cab from spurting boiling water!!!

Firstly I can say in practice it works, a couple days after filling and bleeding I was on a drive and thought I would try the valve, the engine was hot, I heard a tiny bubbly "burp" there was a little bit of air still trapped in the system probably worked its way up from the rear heater matrix, without this system it would probably been the case that this little bit of air wouldn't have been purged.

The valve/pipe stays cold but when turned for bleeding the pipe gets hot due to the coolant flow (I will cover in pipe lagging).

Because the header tank is at the highest point, my easy bleed pipe slopes up towards the header tank then that is where the air travels to. Also the air in the engine is hot and expands (high pressure) and migrates to the cooler (low pressure) area being the header tank.

I have considered putting together a kit consisting of a length of 10mm coolant hose, a valve, a T-piece, jubilee clips, grommets and pipe lagging with detailed instructions including where to drill the 2 holes etc. (one in metal, one in plastic). It would be quite low cost.

Years ago I used to use photobucket but that is now a pay site. Anyone got any suggestions?

Try ImgBB.com

Will sort out pics on laptop this eve thanks

rustyp wrote:Hi Mike, in my previous Bongo I had rusty water stains in the cab from spurting boiling water!!!

Firstly I can say in practice it works, a couple days after filling and bleeding I was on a drive and thought I would try the valve, the engine was hot, I heard a tiny bubbly "burp" there was a little bit of air still trapped in the system probably worked its way up from the rear heater matrix, without this system it would probably been the case that this little bit of air wouldn't have been purged.

The valve/pipe stays cold but when turned for bleeding the pipe gets hot due to the coolant flow (I will cover in pipe lagging).

Because the header tank is at the highest point, my easy bleed pipe slopes up towards the header tank then that is where the air travels to. Also the air in the engine is hot and expands (high pressure) and migrates to the cooler (low pressure) area being the header tank.

I have considered putting together a kit consisting of a length of 10mm coolant hose, a valve, a T-piece, jubilee clips, grommets and pipe lagging with detailed instructions including where to drill the 2 holes etc. (one in metal, one in plastic). It would be quite low cost.

Excellent. I'm spiralling earthwards with me tail feathers shot off. A kit could well be worth considering to get rid of this tedious (and costly in time if someone is being paid to do it, and maybe not properly!) chore.

Brilliant...

Brilliant +1
If it works as you describe I'll definitely be interested in a kit or a good instruction sheet (e.g with pics) that can be followed step by step.