Swagelok Fittings

[SpeedyJ]

Is anyone in the club familiar with Swagelok fittings? Some of the vacuum/boost fittings on my 2.25 petrol turbo are made by Swagelok. I need to add a junction to the system and could use someone with knowledge of the product line, or better yet a bin full of odds and ends.

I've had a look through their catalogues and guides, but there's about 1600 pages of information there. All I really want to do is go from the Swagelok to a barbed vacuum hose fitting. Life gets easy after that.

Cheers
Jeff

[Red90]

I might be able to help.  I'm fairly familiar with most fittings.  Maybe start off with some photos.  Swagelok makes a lot of things so it could be anything.

[SpeedyJ]

Thanks John,

There is a threaded male port on my intake manifold that the 'T' fitting threads onto (image1). In it's previous configuration one side went to the carburetor, and the other went to a boost gauge on the dash. I now need to split this three ways - gauge, carburetor and MAP sensor on my electronic ignition. I believe that this 'T' fitting is what Swagelok refers to as 1/8".

The second picture is a 1/4" fitting that I found at work. One possible solution would be to find the same fitting in 1/4", however, it looks like it is meant for fairly thin walled tubing. Standard vacuum line tends to be pretty thick. I'd be up for a bit of trial and error if the Swagelok fittings weren't so expensive.

If a 1/4" barbed fitting will work with vacuum hose then I still need to split it one more time for my third output.

[SpeedyJ]

I forgot to mention that it appears to be SAE straight threads, not metric or NPT. Of course there are other, if less common possibilities (JIS, etc...). A number of components on this truck appear to be from the aerospace industry, so that might be a start. For example, the fresh air intake hose is identical to the hot air duct used in a Bell 205 helicopter.

[Red90]

So it is just a regular 1/8" compression tee?  Compression fittings are for connection to tubing, which is measured on the outside diameter.

If it is threaded into the manifold directly, that is pretty strange and not what should be done.  Normally one port would be NPT or ORB.  I would probably drill and tap the manifold for 1/4" NPT and then just proceed with normal fittings and you can simply shop at the hardware store.

Not sure I understand the connection to the carb.  I assume the carb is not on the pressure side of the turbo?

[SpeedyJ]

The carburetor is before the turbo (i.e. uncompressed), so I believe that this is part of a feed back loop to increase fueling under load. It's hard to see in the intake photo, but the Swagelok port appears to be brazed/silver soldered to to the manifold.

[Red90]

Okay, I understand now.  It is probably ORB or NPT into the manifold.  So there is 1/8" tubing running from that tee to two current locations and you need a third?  A million options.  Depends which way you want to do things.  If you want to stay with tubing, then cut in and tee to the new location.  If you prefer hose, throw it all out and do it in hose.  Brass fittings would be cheap, either route.  A place like Greenline hose would have everything you want.  No point in worrying about matching the Swagelok stuff.  It is only used by people that don't care about budgets.  ;D

[SpeedyJ]

Thanks again John.

Tell me about the pricing! I'm not prone to sticker shock very often, but Swagelok was certainly able to surprise me.

[Red90]

A couple of weeks ago I was at a government research centre. They were saying they only used Swagelok because everything else was crap.   Easy to say when it is not your money.

[headdamage]

I used to use a lot of Swagelok fittings at work, there are alternative manufactures of matching fittings that are cheaper but I don't recall the names.

[Red90]

I used to use a lot of Swagelok fittings at work, there are alternative manufactures of matching fittings that are cheaper but I don't recall the names.

Parker A-lok.  1/4 the price, fully interchangeable.

For our use though, the regular cheap compression fittings from the hardware store will be perfectly fine.