Backstory: We have two P38s. A Black/grey interior Vogue 2000(W) on 125k and an Oslo Blue/cream interior 2001(51)on 67k-ish. We've had mine (the Black one) 6 or 7 years and Sooz for about 2 years. Both cars have replacement OE air springs. During that time, we've seen off 4 EAS compressors. Enough is enough.

We bought the current compressor in the blue car brand new from a reputable vendor with solid feedback and the serial number checked out with Dunlop. First it became very noisy, then the cut-out failed, all within a few months. It currently has a replacement glommed on the outside and spliced into the loom on the compressor cabling. But there's more.

The pump still goes through phases of loud vibration, then quiet. We stripped it and eye-balling it all looks fine. The loud phases reverberate though the whole car - makes a sound like something in the wheel arch, but it has done that in both cars so we know it is the compressor. We leak checked both cars by pulling fuse 29. Mine stayed up. Sooz sagged on one side of the back axle. Valve block and X8R valve block refurb kit are here awaiting her return. That explains, but does not excuse, the catastrophic failure of the pump after such a short time. I neither know nor care what's causing the noise or why the stat failed. It's going in the bin rather than waste the X8R compressor refurb kit in the workshop. As the blue car is completely stock, we'll keep it that way. We'll refurb the valve block and put the working pump from my car in there. Yes, my wife works on the cars with me. No, she's spoken for!

In consultation with the hive mind of the internet and Gilbertd, I've sourced a Viair 380C for the bargain price of £175. This has a 55% duty cycle and flow rate more than three times the stock pump. Vendor seems solid and I've used PayPal for added protection. Photos have disappeared from many of the threads I used to research this. The wiring looks (sounds) to be simple, with the orange wire now redundant and connected to the black ground wire, it's just a two-wire switched supply. However, If anyone has some pics relating to mounting and tidily hacking the existing enclosure, I'd be very grateful. I know I can mount it in parallel and keep the old pump as a bakup but I'm in Somerset, not Western Australia, so I'd prefer to go all in on the new unit. For our part, we'll take detailed pics and post back here for anyone interested in the pros and cons of what I'm about to attempt.

I'd like to finish with a simple question.

Does anyone known exactly what size and gender of NPT reducer I'll need to join the new compressor to the blue pipe?

I've known a number of the currently available Dunlop branded pumps to fail in a pretty short time. Although they look identical to the originals, and parts are interchangeable, they just don't seem to last. Found one where the bearing had broken up completely and sucked bits of it into the compressor and wrecked the lot.

Marty fitted a Viair but I think his was a much bigger one, a 440 or something, and he made up a bracket so it sits beside the box rather than in it. But he also added a hose to the rear with a quick release connector so he could use it for blowing up tyres too. The 380 doesn't look much larger than the original so it might be possible to alter the mountings and fit it inside the box. Usual cause of noise is the washers being fitted the wrong way round. Bottom ones have the concave side downwards while the top ones have the concave face upwards.

Can't help on the size of the connection and could do with finding out myself. I've recently acquired a job lot of valve blocks so will be spending a fortune of X8R rebuild kits and need to make up some sort of test rig for checking them once done. Using a spare pump as a source of pressure will be a lot better than my well knackered tyre pump.

I would be interested in both this and Martys.

Reducer arriving tomorrow. Plumbing is weird. Don't take anything here as gospel yet. Depending on the type of joint you either subtract the thickness of the pipe, or not.

The 380C has a tapered male thread on the hose measuring 1/2" with 18 threads per inch. IF I've understood, this is actually called a 1/4" NPT because you subtract 2 x 1/8th unless it's a compression joint, then you don't.

The car has a very standard 10mmx1mm (10mm diameter with 1mm thread pitch).

Okay. Reducers all sorted.

Cannibalised plug from burnt out pump. Orange to ground, black to black and red to green for the power.

I've decided to mount it outside the EAS box and run the hose and power into it.

Does anyone have pictures of a 350C mounted externally?