does anyone know of a good company for diaphragm materials?

while rummaging through my EGR valves to put a car back to emissions standard i can't find a single damn EGR valve that is any good.

they are no longer available for these cars and the existing ones are all turning to piles of dust and no one makes aftermarket ones. sooooo, someone is going to have to rebuild them or you all or SOL, so if anyone knows a company that makes durable sheet material that can take high temps for extended periods of time let me know.

i knew this would be a problem, well now it is going to be a real problem for anyone who needs to pass emissions and owns a 2nd gen.

 

pay for shipping and ill send you mine with 60k on it

 

not really looking for another but thanks for the offer.

this is to potentially rebuild the valves. believe i have found something but not ideal, temp range is only to 250F which i am looking for something in the 400F range for longevity with a thickness range of about 20 to 30 thousandths.

 

Have you tried condoms? But srsly, I wonder if they'd hold up...

 

no and no.

any diaphragm material has to be reinforced so that it doesn't suck in before doing any actual work.

 

I've wondered the same thing... I tried to find a replacement diaphragm for my greddy wastegate, but these things are long gone. The wastegate still goes for $800 because it's stupid and rare. They make it re-buildable, but there are no diaphragms anywhere.

 

Have any pics of this diaphragm you seek?

 

86915K12

$18.70 SqFt

 

McMaster-Carr has some material that may work for you.
I always enjoy strolling though their website.

 

i checked Mcmaster carr but the only reinforced material they have is the one i specified earlier. the others are non reinforced.

basically like belting in a tire they keep the material from expanding more and more with pressure.

if you take a real diapraghm material and push in on it, there is almost no give, if you take a rubber sheet and push on it you will be working against the tensile strength of the material, hence it has give and absorbs work load.

reinforced materials for diaphragms have threading embedded into the material, similar to fiberglass mesh which keeps the material from having any give yet still allow it to be flexible. i know continental makes some materials but those large companies also rarely bother to respond to smaller inquiries.

i haven't opened one up yet to get the dimensions. basically i wanted to find some material first.

thanks for the help so far

 

most states allow a car not to retain ALL its emissions equipment so long as the car passes emissions testing for this very reason- equipment you cannot get anymore

luckily for us if your car does not have a OBDII port you are now emissions exempt, I suspect alot of states will be the same.

I remember my 1982 Jeep so long as it passed emissions testing was not required and I had removed every emissions equipment from it including cat converters

 

well, california has about the largest population of 7's in the world per capita and they have no leniency with emissions. there are some exceptions with NLA parts but you have to jump through hoops to get it past that point.

in all honesty we all know the EGR is not necessary on these vehicles but smog techs generally are required to still test them and will fail you if it fails. here in nevada it simply has to be on the engine, no physical testing but thinking about those who do need it.

just trying to work on ways to rebuild parts that these other companies really don't give a **** about these cars with. we're lucky that they even make reman starters and alternators, that's about the extent of any aftermarket parts support you get at any chain auto parts store.

i did find that SMP makes a reman stock valve but for how long...

 

im not even sure how they test a egr valve but can you just bolt it up and have it not operational?

 

some states do not test it but it must be fitted to the engine, california does physically test them.

 

How? Don't you have to take off the manifold to get to it? Maybe I'm thinking of the wrong valve...

 

nope, i have watched them test them on turbo and non turbo models.

 

i've been trying to think of a suitable material source, and the best i can think of is an inner tube, but i don't think those are reinforced, although they probably make them in the right materials....

oh actually you could cheat and just fill the vacuum nipple with silicon or something, so it holds vacuum.... it'll actually function the same too

 

i suppose that is one way, but even the book specifies a certain RPM drop amount on the series 4. it will not stumble and die on these engines but it is supposed to drop between 100-200 RPMs when the EGR is activated at idle.

problem is i'm just finding all the diaphragms off these motors dried out and rotten with working ones soon following.

i know i had a few good ones but just sitting on the shelf for the last year or 2 killed what life they had left and they all leak now.

 

hm, thats odd, ive never physically tested an egr on a vehicle that runs on the dyno, since the dyno is doing that for me.
if its a tsi, then yes, i physically check the functionality of the egr.....

and rob, i hook up a hand vacuum pump to the egr nipple and give it a tiny amount of vacuum until it starts to kill the engine, if nothing happens, then it fails

Lloyd

 

maybe i just had overly **** smog techs. one actually tested and found it faulty and failed the car for it. non-enhanced area no dyno load smog.

 

Since on the subject of egr leaks I have a question. Why is it almost everytime I smoke test a car to find a vacuum leak a diaphragm style egr emits smoke, but running carb cleaner shows no vacuum leak at valve?

 

because there's a bit of plumbing to the EGR valve, and it isn't pulling vacuum when you would be checking at idle.

 

http://www.contitech.de/index_en.html

http://www2.emersonprocess.com/en-US/Pages/Home.aspx

http://www2.dupont.com/DuPont_Home/en_US/index.html

 

oh ok, i didnt know you were dealing with non-enhanced, thats why. they only do tsi, not asm...

Lloyd

 

Had the same problems last time I had to smog (failed EGR due to cracked/leaking EGR diaphram, part in operating condition....).

So I ended up slavering a layer of silicon sealer on top of the diaphram. Passed smog. Don't know if it would pass this year though!

If the diaphram is still holding together, just slaver on some sealer and go for it. Can't hurt.