Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

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Amskeptic
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Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by Amskeptic » Mon Aug 08, 2016 9:27 pm

Yes, this I needed. This is the same spot I did Chloe's rear wheel bearings back in 2013. Found a brutal path that clonked the side of the car pretty good as it lurched into a tire rut, so I decided that I best stay here a while. We're on Day Three.

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It is a beautiful shady spot along a crest under the trees, and other than pine needles stabbing in me in the back and sticking to my towel something fierce every time I have to move it, this place has advantages. Low bug count. Beautiful stars. Only a little freeway racket down the hill. A good blast of 2:00PM sunshine followed by a dappled afternoon and another warm-me-up at about 7:00PM. Tonight, we have a crescent moon.

A brake adjustment turned into a Brake Event. See, I have been remiss in my maintenance over the past 17,000 miles, and the adjusters were frozen solid, frozen solid! what is up with that? I used grease and anti-seize, yes, I did. The adjuster plugs were and are all installed. I guess the insane amount of rain in West Virginia and Virginia and Maryland and more in Illinois and Minnesota and South Dakota and that little deal in the Tetons and Yellowstone, all that rain found its way to adjusters that had not seen any attention since November 19th 2015
(remember that overspray? I sure do):

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When I disassembled the brakes to free the adjusters, I found that the shoes were wearing pretty thin at the top. I do not know why, wait yes I do . . . if you don't bother to adjust the shoes in 17,000 miles, your lower ends are further away from the drums. I had gotten used to the lower pedal, blamed it on booster travel or something.

Problem discovered with the new brake shoes (TCM from Wolfsburg West). The holes for the powerful cross spring are drilled incorrectly on the new shoes. They bind the little loop ends against the steel arcs where the linings are bonded on. Plus the holes are too low, so they cause the spring coils to collide with the emergency brake cross bar. Plus, the holes for the lower springs are too small, you can barely get the spring ends to enter from the inside like you are supposed to. Plus, the new lining thickness manages to be quite a bit less than my now 59,100 original shoes, so the ebrake cables, rather than needing to be backed off, required running the adjustment nuts almost to the ends of the adjustment range, and what do we do when these shoes start wearing??

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Well it was a pretty day, any way.


Painted the wiper on the AFM so I can record my adjustments to the 1/4 tooth:

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Will keep you all apprised of future adjustments. Luftvagon! What is your WOT/cruise afr and what head temps?

Tomorrow, I must reassemble the heater valves and pipes that are currently hanging in trees, heave the heater cables that I had to cut (#&^!!@!) to free the valves, and install new I-hope-they-are-the-correct-length heater cables.

Can't see the stars with this computer screen, g'night.
Colin
BobD - 78 Bus . . . 112,730 miles
Chloe - 70 bus . . . 217,593 miles
Naranja - 77 Westy . . . 142,970 miles
Pluck - 1973 Squareback . . . . . . 55,600 miles
Alexus - 91 Lexus LS400 . . . 96,675 miles

kreemoweet
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by kreemoweet » Mon Aug 08, 2016 10:01 pm

Amskeptic wrote: Problem discovered with the new brake shoes . . . from Wolfsburg West.
Sigh. Those would be the same shoes I had to return to WW two years ago: http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=584352

You may be sure I explained to them, in detail, what was wrong with them. One begins to get the idea those guys Just Don't Care.

Those are, in fact, Vanagon rear brake shoes. That is what you will be getting these days from most places purporting to sell "bus" brake shoes.
Nowadays, you must 1) demand that the seller actually LOOK at the merchandise they're selling, and 2) demand to have that looking done
by someone who can actually recognize a bus brake shoe when they see one.

My VW Workshop Manual specs the shoe lining thickness at 6.0 mm (6.5 mm for oversize shoes).

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the miz
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by the miz » Wed Aug 10, 2016 11:18 am

kreemoweet wrote: Those are, in fact, Vanagon rear brake shoes.
I thought those looked awfully familiar... :blackeye:
miz
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airkooledchris
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by airkooledchris » Wed Aug 10, 2016 12:30 pm

That is a really sweet spot to setup shop at while tackling some projects.
1979 California Transporter

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SlowLane
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by SlowLane » Wed Aug 10, 2016 12:50 pm

Amskeptic wrote:the adjusters were frozen solid, frozen solid! what is up with that? I used grease and anti-seize, yes, I did. The adjuster plugs were and are all installed. I guess the insane amount of rain in West Virginia and Virginia and Maryland and more in Illinois and Minnesota and South Dakota and that little deal in the Tetons and Yellowstone, all that rain found its way to adjusters that had not seen any attention since November 19th 2015
Hmm, maybe marine grease is what's needed for those adjusters?

Agree with Chris. Nice looking spot.
'81 Canadian Westfalia (2.0L, manual), now Californiated

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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by hambone » Wed Aug 10, 2016 1:52 pm

Chinese front '69 shoes newly installed on my Bus are woefully thin as well. WTF. Modern materials not needing to be as thick? Cheaping out? It makes the brakes feel not quite right...
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by SlowLane » Wed Aug 10, 2016 3:30 pm

Once upon a time one could take their brake shoes to a shop and have new linings glued onto them. I had this done for the rear drums on my '71 way back in the '80s. Is that no longer a viable option?

Oh, damn, there I go again living in the '80s. :bootyshake:

Huh, and I just realized that my '71 was only a teenager when I had it, yet it was in much worse shape than my 35-year-old is now.
'81 Canadian Westfalia (2.0L, manual), now Californiated

"They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but it is not one half so bad as a lot of ignorance."
- Terry Pratchett

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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by luftvagon » Wed Aug 10, 2016 4:08 pm

Colin, my cruise AFR is 14.0 AFR at the moment. 12.6 AFR for WOT/100% engine load. I would go out on a limb and call that a "OE" setting. In my testing, I believe AFM only provided +/- 0.8 "AFR" (1.6 total) adjustment in original-non-tampered-state, with the idle bypass. Don't know my exact CHT (cable not long enough - story of my life), but TSII probe is reporting a SOLID 200F on the interstate (100F ambient), and 240F around town, 130F intake. This is with a working flap.

With the flexibility of my system, I would not be afraid to do 15.5 AFR with up to and beyond 40 BTDC, up to 79% engine load (partial throttle steady cruise) past 3000 RPM. We could do some testing. I can order a Dakota Digital with a longer cable.
1981 Volkswagen Vanagon Westfalia - air-cooled Type4 1970cc CV (hydraulic lifters, 42x36 valves, stock cam, microSquirt FI with wasted spark ignition)
1993 Ford F-250 XL LWB Extended Cab 7.3L IDI

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zabo
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by zabo » Wed Aug 10, 2016 4:14 pm

there are a lot of places online that will reline them for you
ex: http://industrialbrakeclutch.com/brake- ... -services/

i think napa auto will still send them out for you as well
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78 bus

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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by Amskeptic » Wed Aug 10, 2016 10:49 pm

Fascinating reading there, over on theSamba, kreemoweet. I should visit more often. And German Supply advertises that they have shoes with the correct holes. That means Wolfsburg West should know better.

The last NaranjaWesty frontier for me was to remove the heater valves and pipes and heater cables. Woke up at 6:30AM, took a walk to loosen my aching joints, and prepare for another filthy day of pine pain needles (used two towels at the same time to reduce stabbing injuries, but twice the mess of forest floor junk stuck on them) and Dremel rust dust.

Such a shame to cut the factory smooth cables, but the little 8mm barrel clamp bolts would not give it up for nuthin.
The Very Worst Tin Screw Locations On An Installed Type 4 engine were, as usual, stuck. They are the two tins screws that hold a sandwich of tins together over on the #3 cylinder corner of the engine:
a) upper cylinder tins
b) front tin
c) left heater pipe bracket
d) intermediate tin

I needed (c), so off they needed to come. Michigan road salt had bonded them but good, and provided a rusty deterioration of the #3 phillips slots. Every trick in the book still wasn't good enough. My new Everlast visegrips sheared their teeth off on their very first job trying to bite into the screw heads so I could both phillips bit + 1/4 ratchet and vise grip them loose. A sorry sorry name for those horrendously soft visegrip teeth. Like, where did I even buy them two weeks ago? There is no room to work up there next to the clutch adjusting wing nut and the heater valve. An hour later, they had given up the fight:

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Ground off the welds and tabs that hold the bells on the heater valves, like VW Treasure may have done:

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Little VW/Audi logos in order of assembly:

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Orange RTV'd the asbestos to the metal sleeve remnants on the accordian ducts:

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Checked to see how much new cable stuck out and pulled at front of car to get it to stay in the tube 1/2"
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Installed plastic cable stop
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Installed plastic holder + perfect 39 year-old rubber metal tube seal
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Installed perfect 39 year-old rubber accordian seal on new cable
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Located plastic holder in bracket (outside keyway for Type 4/ inside for Type 1)
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Installed retaining clip
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Installed these with the beautifully re-conditioned bolts and square nuts slathered in anti-seize.

Promise that you will always put the square nuts at the round holes and the bolt ends in the oval holes . . . that ensures that the square nuts will self-lock under the car so you don't have to screw around with two wrenches:

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Diet Coke can accordian tube sleeve fabrication:

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Diet Coke can tabs held securely by the band clamps:

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Ponder the travails that your car subjects you to . . . .

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Said good bye to my beautiful campsite:

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Spent outrageous treasure on painfully cheap 2" preheater hose at O'Reilley's that comes only in 18" lengths for $7.99 and made new dump tubes from the old heater valves to the back of the car:

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Fabricated dump tube hangers out of what else? hangers for E-Z Removal at valve adjustment time:

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The left side was $13.99 black paper/foil preheater hose from NAPA because O'Reilley's only stocked one 18" length per store and I was out of stores to collect preheater hose from, there in Vacaville . . .. :angryfire:

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Then, the beautiful interlude in the forest that had calmed my nerves so beautifully was most surely OVER when I hit I-680 south:

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I could not get more than four miles per filter/tank blow-out cleanings. Car died in fast-moving California freeway traffic over and over again. Died in the slow lane, died on shoulders, ran out of shoulder due to disabled car ahead, had to pull out into oncoming traffic to get around disabled car, but it died dead right when I pulled out into the lane, then it died on the 580 in rush hour traffic, each time EACH TIME looked like this EVERY ONE to FOUR MILES ALL AFTERNOON:

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I do Slow Lane tomorrow, August 11th, then SG Kent is going to host my fuel tank removal.
There is no further itinerary until the gas tank is resolved.
Colin
BobD - 78 Bus . . . 112,730 miles
Chloe - 70 bus . . . 217,593 miles
Naranja - 77 Westy . . . 142,970 miles
Pluck - 1973 Squareback . . . . . . 55,600 miles
Alexus - 91 Lexus LS400 . . . 96,675 miles

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the miz
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by the miz » Thu Aug 11, 2016 8:35 am

...Diet Coke cans...what are they not good for?!
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle! :flower:
...nice post, Colin!
miz
1982 Westy- Vana White

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airkooledchris
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by airkooledchris » Thu Aug 11, 2016 8:45 am

now I know why our attempted gas tank intervention failed. you just didn't want to have to do it in our cold grey climate.

once you hit 90+ sac *now* it's time to tackle the job?


:P

for serious though, nice followthrough on the heater cables and esp with the homebrew dump tubes.
1979 California Transporter

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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by Jivermo » Thu Aug 11, 2016 8:52 am

Man, this is an itinerary of epic maintenance and road hazard. I will be relieved when the caramel production ceases in the gas tank.

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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by tewa3240 » Thu Aug 11, 2016 12:58 pm

Is it the California blend gasoline that's stripping your fuel tank varnish double or triple-quick?
Just curious/suspicious about the situation. They claim they throw something special in there, aromatics or ester(s) or ?. :scratch:

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Amskeptic
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by Amskeptic » Fri Aug 12, 2016 10:19 am

tewa3240 wrote:Is it the California blend gasoline that's stripping your fuel tank varnish double or triple-quick?
Just curious/suspicious about the situation. They claim they throw something special in there, aromatics or ester(s) or ?. :scratch:
It is the perfect tank slosh cadence of the short concrete segments on California freeways :flower:

Or maybe it is the fact that all the varnish has finally delaminated from the walls of the tank after such an active 17,500 miles.

Tank is OUT on Sunday. Period.
Colin
BobD - 78 Bus . . . 112,730 miles
Chloe - 70 bus . . . 217,593 miles
Naranja - 77 Westy . . . 142,970 miles
Pluck - 1973 Squareback . . . . . . 55,600 miles
Alexus - 91 Lexus LS400 . . . 96,675 miles

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