ABA/inline coolant hose routing using VW hoses

[icolquhoun]

This post will hopefully help those doing the increasingly popular ABA 2.0 inline swap.

The factory ABA hoses used on later 99+ cabrios used a modular design that lets you use off-the shelf VW hoses to route the coolant exactly as it was designed via VW but using a much better route. The upper/large ABA hose really doesn't work in a Vanagon.

Things/parts you will need:

(3) lower coolant hoses 2002 cabrio PN 037 122 058
(1) upper coolant hose 2002 cabrio PN 1HM 122 101 B
various vw spring clamps
(1) roll of 5/8" ID heater hose
(1) AEB lower thermostat housing for waterpump PN 030 121 121 B

You will reassemble the hoses so they fit better using the Vanagon Diesel brackets. Note int he pics I have a set of my carrier bars and mounts used but this coolant line routing works with the 82-83 Vanagon Diesel bars/brackets as well.

Bolt up the AEB/ATW t-stat housing:

Re-configure the coolant lines off the back coolant flange on the head so it looks like this:

the line on the right of the pic faces forward so you can attach the heaterhose line going forward to the heatercore/s

This will take some time, but reconfigure everything else you have left from the 4 coolant hoses to look like this around the waterpump:

MORE TO FOLLOW...

[VWinVT]

THANK YOU!!
_________________
1981 Westfalia with a 2001 Cabrio ABA

Small wheel turns by the firing rod,
Big wheel turns by the grace of God.
Every time that wheel turns 'round,
You're bound to cover just a little more ground.

[VWinVT]

Ian, are those mounts using the aircooled/WBX mustache bar?
_________________
1981 Westfalia with a 2001 Cabrio ABA

Small wheel turns by the firing rod,
Big wheel turns by the grace of God.
Every time that wheel turns 'round,
You're bound to cover just a little more ground.

[icolquhoun]

[VWinVT]

Nice setup...maybe I will upgrade in a year or two!! I have some questions on the cooling lines. The flange of the back of the head...i see I will need a double 90* plastic piece. One line feeds the heater core (whi h I am not installing now), and the other feeds back into the Rad feed from the engine...correct?

Next the upper water pump inlet, did that just get rerouted back towards the flwheel into the rad feed line?
_________________
1981 Westfalia with a 2001 Cabrio ABA

Small wheel turns by the firing rod,
Big wheel turns by the grace of God.
Every time that wheel turns 'round,
You're bound to cover just a little more ground.

[icolquhoun]

the double 90 is the lower cabrio waterpump outlet hose just applied the the hose out of the back of the black plastic flange. In my pic, the outer (right) hose goes fwd to the heatercore. The left hose in the picture is 5/8"ID heaterhose and connects to the upper waterpump 90deg fitting from the other picture showing the mess around the waterpump. This is how vw designed the cooling system on the ABA, so I did it exactly how they did, just using differnt coolant lines that fit better in the vanagon.

[icolquhoun]

super cheesy paint rendition :

[VWinVT]

Thannks for the pics...they help alot. I just recreated the water pump mess you showed...minus the tstat cover(its in the mail). This pic is what I dont know what to do with. It's the thin metal line and the 3 way flange on back of head and the little line on back of head

_________________
1981 Westfalia with a 2001 Cabrio ABA

Small wheel turns by the firing rod,
Big wheel turns by the grace of God.
Every time that wheel turns 'round,
You're bound to cover just a little more ground.

[icolquhoun]

the thin metal "crack pipe" as it's called goes away...repurpose a portion of it the T the bottle in.

Get a coolant flange for the head from a manual trans ABA...the cabrios were autos and the flange has more lines coming off it on the cabby version...

the rightmost line in you pics get taken off and replaced like in the pic I showed above.

the 2nd rightmost line wont be there with a manual trans flange

The large 38mm line gets shieldsflex 1-1/4"

[VWinVT]

[mellowslow]

Nice job.

Great short cut on the VW parts that cross for I4 conversion! And way to sort out the complicated hose routings!

I did my conversion 2 years ago and used locally sourced and made parts!

http://www.foreignautosupply.com/parts-accessories/79-billet-coolant-manifold-jarvik-7/#.VwAhHvkrLIU

http://www.foreignautosupply.com/parts-accessories/82-genv-billet-thermostat-gooseneck/#.VwAiE_krLIU

Made sense for my conversion and cleaned up the install.
_________________
'87 WBWE FAS Gen V

[icolquhoun]

[VWinVT]

[Vanagon Nut]

[VWinVT]

[Vanagon Nut]

[VWinVT]

[Vanagon Nut]

^^

I totally understand.

Of note, use spring clamps or good quality hose clamps NOT the Home Depot type. They will work but over the long term, there's a risk the clamp will damage the hose. This has happened to me. I regret installing all those HD type clamps.


Neil.
_________________
1981 Westy DIY 15º ABA

1988 West DIY 50º ABA

VE7TBN

[VWinVT]

[icolquhoun]

The small line off the head has a t in it with the large hose off the side of the head to the overflow bottle on all obd2 abas that had sai pump. If you look at my diagram and read the desc for that line, I run 6" of shieldsflex off that coolant flange fwd of the "firewall" to the factory t in the large vw coolant line. This 6" allows the line to rise up and the t should be at the highest point above the trans. When the aba was at 15deg the small barbed fitting at the top of the head was the highest pt in the cooling system. Its not in a van layed over at 50deg. The t with that small line and the large 1-1/4 line at its highest pt above the trans allows air to bleed properly back to the bottle