fuel pipe water pipes help needed

[syncro4us]

Hi
On a trip to the Lake district this week end in our 1986 syncro 2.1 DJ LHD fortunately two faults occured and very timely as we are off to Hungary, Bulgaria, Rumania and Turkey in a few weeks in it.
First The fuel cross pipe at the back of the rear rhs wheel arch has corroded and is leaking. Thats the pipe that joins by a 4 inch rubber hose joint to the fuel down pipe behind the rear wheel arch and next to the engine firewall , thats why it collects mud and rots!!
Does anyone do a stainless steel replacement or good steel replacement or good cond second hand and what work is involved.
Second. The end of one of the long plastic water pipes that connect the engine to the radiator, fractured and snapped off leaving the system almost empty. Fortunately we were parked at the time so I rmoved the snapped end with the coller in the engine bay and conncted the pipe bore direct to the rubber hose which got us home but think its time to replace both plastic pipes since when I replaced the rad a few years ago the collars were popping out of the front ends and had to be hammered back in. So does any one do stainless pipes in the UK.
I have seen them advertised for 220 euros in Germany but wondered if anyone has a price for them here. Im sure when we had our travel display at vanfest there was someone selling them and each side came in two parts joined by a rubber connecting tube? Any info on these would be welcome but as an interim I would use replacement plastic ones if they are in good condition if any one has them. I havnt fitted them so is it a straightforward job?

Hope to organise the work this week 14th June if you have any info or can help

PS Thanks all for you replies will get back to you.
NOTE**************As I went through the systems after the rain its not the delivery pipe to the front thats gone its the plastic water distribution manifold that has a sheered end on one pipe just behind the pipe retaining ridge. It is a black plastic cylinder and has two inlets on one side of the plastic cylinder and two outlets on the other VW part 251121442a (no additional pipe as I dont have the auxillary heater). Any one have a new OEM one for sale.
Meanwhile a combination of super glue/ bandage repair/araldite/epoxy/plastic padding/sikaflex as a temp mend, keep fingers crossed***************
Cheers
Kevin

[axeman]

i can answer one of your questions.

http://www.brickwerks.co.uk/shop?page=s ... ory_id=118" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

neil

[Aidan]

I have a used filler pipe in the lock up

[syncropaddy]

If you can get a set of plastic water pipes, do, as plastic is inert. Stainless isnt.

[lhd]

If you can get a set of plastic water pipes, do, as plastic is inert. Stainless isnt.

Surely that means nothing as you have a piece of rubber at either end or am I missing something?
Rob.

[Aidan]

different metal materials in system in prescence of fluid = electrovalent corrosion, there's much discussion of this on the internet on just about every older vehicle forum, cheap stainless steel being readily available has become a choice material for remaking parts, sold on the basis it doesn't corrode, but in the real world things are more complex than that and far cleverer fluid and material engineers would be able to tell you about all sorts of potential corrosion issues - I'll just stick to advising not to use copper in a wbx cooling system, I don't care what you do to diesels

copper being pretty much top of electrovalent scale tends to exascerbate corrosion of lesser metals esp Steel which means head studs, esp in prescence of alloy eg block and heads

ok so the van was built to only last 10 years but ask yourself why VW didn't use S/S on our buses but kept to old school passivating/zinc plating /paint and primer etc of steel parts and even today they still use very little if any s/s material prefering grp as inert material of choice

[lhd]

I knew selling that brand new plastic syncro coolant pipe would come back to haunt me.
Rob.

[Simon Baxter]

Yet to see any evidence that any stainless steel parts has had an effect on any part of a T3 cooling system.

WBX head studs corrode for fun anyway, WBX heads corrode just as quickly, if it finishes a radiator off for you then it's probably needed changing anyway.

Once someone shows me the evidence I'll have another think about what I sell but as I see it you can either have stainless coolant pipes or nothing (off the shelf) and I know that I'de rather have a van on the road than off..
I'm sure if you had them commisioned in ally they they would corrode from the outside in, in our climate.
Plastic really isn't a viable option, and if it was you would probably have to resort to steel inserts again and were back to step one.
So, Tomato Ketchup here ready to eat my own dick (again) and awaiting proof that stainless steel water pipes had a detremental effect on a WBX engine.

[toomanytoys]

^^^^ WHS ^^^

Correct concentration of coolant more important .. by the time any reaction has taken place we wont be driving them...

[silverbullet]

Just to add a splash of 5* to the fire
What are the pushrod tubes made from on a WBX? Stainless steel. They may have polymer seals but they are part of the engines electrolysis circuit thanks to the oil flowing through them en-route to the sump and/or the rain water and salt spray on the outside even if they don't touch the crankcase.
So there's already s/s in the engine, corrosion-inhibited coolant or not.
Now there's a thing...