I contacted ARBUSA and spoke with a tech yesterday. He basically said it failed from installer error. The new O-ring design is being used world wide and is a proven design. He said that either I tightened it too much or not enough. He told me how he installs the bulkhead fitting, I followed his directions and it currently seems to be holding, though I wont know for sure until I hit the trail next month. He said when installing the bulkhead you have to hold pressure behind the copper tube as you tighten down the double male fitting, once it is tight give it about 1/5 of a turn, and when attatching the blue line fitting to hold the double male coupler with a wrench.
The tech said he still had some of the original type of bulkhead fittings and if I wanted one he would dend it to me, I went ahead and had him send me one of each. Neither one of course can be installed w/o pulling the diff out, so neither one is really a trail fix. However messing around with it I found that the blue airline fits tight enough around the copper tube that it held air and the ARB would engage. I am not sure how long this would work, but would be a way to get it working again on the trail w/o pulling the diff.
