The bus came from a man who bought it from an elderly couple that lived in Barrington, Illinoi near Chicago. According to the packet that contains the owners manual, the bus was purchased in New Jersey.
I purchased the bus in 2003 and by 2005 I had replaced the fuel pump, muffler, heater boxes, vacuum lines,, installed a rebuilt transmission, new shocks, Hancook tires, and a front sway bar.
I also installed a Dakota Digital cylinder temp gauge, and that's how I learned that my cylinder head temps can easily go up to 420 degrees on medium grade hills on the highway. in 2005-6 I tracked down some vacuum leaks, set the idle to 28 degrees total advance with the vac hose off of the distributor, got my injectors cleaned by Cruzin Performance, and ... I still had high temps.
Then in 2008 I moved to Vietnam with my family for a job that I thought would keep me there a couple of years, but we didn't return until the summer of 2013. Living in Vietnam was a great adventure - I commuted every day on a 110 cc Honda Wave or a 125 cc Lifan.
When I moved back to Maryland in the summer of 2013, I pushed the bus out of my garage, changed the oil and gas, put in a fresh battery and it fired right up. Of course all of the braided fuel lines started leaking like crazy the same week as it sat in the driveway. The fact that all of the braided hoses failed almost immediately is clear evidence of the changes that occurred in gasoline formulation while I was overseas. I changed all of the hoses except the short ones on the injectors which weren't braided and were installed by Cruzin Performance. Changing those remaining lines is now the top of my to-do list.
Next week I have an appointment with Colin, and I'm hoping he can point me in the right direction on the high head temps. In the past month I've been replacing as many vacuum hoses as I can. I've also set the valves and timing. This week I swapped in 4 new rebuilt injectors that I got on Amazon for what I thought was a good deal (all 4 delivered for $130). But it was too good to be true - after I installed them, the bus ran on only 2 cylinders. I swapped the position of injector 3 and 4 to see if it was the injector or the wires to it, and that confirmed it was the injector. I put 2 old injectors on and the bus now runs on all 4 cylinders. Lesson learned about bargain prices on parts.
It has been a pleasure to get to know my bus again. Being away from the bus so long, I feel like I am my own PO - I see things that I worked on, and I vaguely remember them from 10 years ago. I have a stash of parts and accessories that I had good intentions about but never got around to installing, like the VDO tach my brother bought for his Vanagaon in 2000, but he gave the tach to me after his Vanagon died on the streets of NYC and he donated it.
It is also interesting to drive the bus today vs. 10 years ago. Back then the buses were rare, now they are so unknown that many younger people have never seen one.
Cheers!
