ready to roll, when stops the rain

I know its been a few weeks, and if you're a semi-regular reader, I apologize for the absence. I been able to get a few little things done, but between the rains, kids soccer games and the remodel effort in the living room, my time has been limited. The living room work is almost done, though. I've installed a couple of banks of recessed lights, and a fader to control them. Then, there was the dining room light chandelier install, and the corresponding fader. This weekend, I have a bunch of priming to do, and I'll have finish coat painting next weekend. After that, I should be finished with the remodel-ish stuff.

Around the remodel work, I was able to get a Sunday afternoon to focus on the bus. I lost some time to cleaning out the junk that had been piled up around my workspace, but I was able to make some headway. First, I replaced the glowplugs and the glow plug harness. This was pretty easy, though the replacement harness had clips on the wires and the original wires did not. Simple wire work, really. The original glowplugs were pulled as replacements on my other TDI engine, so I knew these were bad. You can test your plugs for resistance, and they should all be within fractional ohms of each other or they will throw a code. 2 of the ones in my old engine had infinite resistance, so they were throwing a code, and caused me to fail my DEQ test a couple of years ago. I also replaced the oil dipstick tube (the bright orange thing in the picture there). Then, I got the engine/transaxle situated on the ATV jack so I can move it under the bus. I need to figure out how to support the transaxle during that move, but a skateboard should do.

Other than the glow plugs, I installed a "Van Gogh" ear onto the block where the engine mount bracket is bolted on. "What's a Van Gogh", you ask. Its this aluminum thing that bolts to the block and supports the bracket joint. Often times, the original ear on the block shears off in an accident. In fact, this ear has been known to fail just from heavy use; though that's very rare. They're available at dieselgeek.com. When I decided to re-use the original mount design, I figured it would be a good idea to add some support. When I started tightening down the bolt, I discovered that the original block ear had a split in it, so it was a good decision. The picture on the left here shows it installed.

I figured out that I need to get the rear end of the bus around 30" off the ground to get the engine underneath it. That is over 6" more than I used to need to get the old engine in and out. I'll have to get creative in how I get it up that high. It is always best to use the stock jack, but the stock jack doesn't go that high. Hmm...
I'll have that resolved by next weekend - that's when I plan to get the engine in. Hopefully, the rains will stop long enough for me to do it... and that I've gotten the fuel filler hose issue resolved. I'll post on that later this week--