Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

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Amskeptic
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Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by Amskeptic » Fri Aug 19, 2016 8:39 pm

. . . freedom to get back to stupid projects.

But first! Had a visit with Lou Mayall, Loufalia in the forum, in San Luis Obispo. To get to San Luis Obispo, I drove down hot old CA-99 through the agricultural heartland of America not to mention California. It was on CA-99 that I began to experiment in earnest with the AFM. This required emptying the rear deck of all that paint and gasoline and water and car parts, and finding a place for it in the middle of the car. 104*, it was hot. Got the engine access opened and the RandyInMaine Commemorative Loaner LM-1 poised on the file folder-bridge-to-the-Diet Coke-floor-stack-held-in-place-with-a-roll-of-paper-towels. Tore out onto CA-46 westbound in frying afternoon heat with a stiff headwind. Posted 13.2 full throttle at 55 mph. Pow! 445* blinkablinkablinka and no way to pull off. Slowed the whole gang down down to 50 mph until a passing lane afforded them a chance accelerate needlessly quickly and to stare furiously at me. Pulled into a vineyard driveway and richened the snot out of the LM-1. Tore out onto CA-46 and posted 11.1 full throttle at 55 mph.432* blinkablinkablinka. So much for rich.

Camped on an overlook overlooking CA 58? in San Margarita? and overlooked all the people as I camped for the very first time on the lower mattress all laid out properly. After an uncomfortable night (one head-bang bang on my way to a late night bladder call) I drove onto the railroad access and basked in the morning sun and shaved in the luxuriant sunshine and guessed an AFM adjustment, then refitted the car back to All Junk Behind The Back Seat again. Descended Hwy-101 into San Luis Obispo and felt the temps drop 20*. I said to God, "the exit I need BETTER happen before that marine layer steals my sunshine, my reason for living, my joy." The marine layer stole the sunshine two exits before mine. Found loufalia's house where his '78 westy sat on two ramps.
"Where's the coffee?"
"Don't have any, I got mine down at the store."
Drove to the store. Bought a cup of coffee that was thankfully quite good and headed back to loufalia's house where we batted back and forth about diagnostics, scenarios, goals, history, and by and by got down to work on the heater cable replacement. I had just done mine, so easy, right? Wrong. The left side came out, the right side absolutely refused. Three dremel-provided "windows" into the heater tube, a program of drill-chucked welding rod reamings, and a couple of hours of compressed air/rust penetrant dousings later, we had the 85 foot long unraveled right cable sheath out with three tattered segments of vinyl and the cable all out on the ground. Greased the new cables but good, and discovered that the Wolfsburg West-provided right cable was too short by at least an inch.

Hit the road back up the 101 so I could head east on CA 46 into the frying pan. Decided to take CA-41 as a shortcut to 46. "Tractor trailers not recommended." No kidding.

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Head temps hung out in the 380*s:

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All the sheep I have been counting recently threw a party out here:

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California Oak Savanna on an August evening is exquisitely gorgeous:

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I do appreciate California's road engineering, the banked turns . . . .

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Drove into Lost Hills with unexpectedly tame CHTs and a welcome 85* warmth and a full red moon that slowly filled out through the smoke of the Blue Cut fire. 17.4 mpg from Lost Hills to San Luis Obispo and back to Lost Hills.Hauled down Interstate 5 to see how annoyed the CHTs might get. 423* not bad. Camped at a huge dirt lot and awoke to five suns reflecting off NaranjaWesty:

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Very smoky out here:

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Had a filthy dirty dusty day driving down to Buttonwillow via almond orchard access roads. It was at one dirt crossroad that I decided to refresh the sliding door panel:

START:
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MIDDLE:

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END:

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This was actually pretty easy. Stirred up some brown Chloe kick panel plastic paint, added a dollop of Naranja's Chrysler Hemi orange, and painted the panel where the plywood was peeking through. Low viscosity was ensured with frequent GumOut sprays to keep the consistency watery. After three minutes of soaking, I cleaned off the surface with WD-40 on a paper towel and wiped vertically to allow a little "grain" where the paint wanted to streak. At the damaged rear corner, the paint just blackened the thirsty plywood. Two coats there, and a slightly more aggressive wipe down allowed the plywood's grain to just start coming through the paint. It actually makes a decent transition from the printed grain to the real grain.

Tomorrow? Los Angeles Forest.
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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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by phaedrus76 » Fri Aug 19, 2016 9:03 pm

Nice scenic photos of both the world outside AND world (er door panel) inside that Westy. Really pretty good results ... you have the artist's eye!
76 Sage Green Deluxe Westy w/ manual trans.

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airkooledchris
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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by airkooledchris » Fri Aug 19, 2016 9:13 pm

Love that it's back to these projects. Beautiful pictures along the way and my goodness that door panel is fantastically done!
1979 California Transporter

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MountainPrana
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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by MountainPrana » Fri Aug 19, 2016 10:48 pm

Amskeptic wrote: Stirred up some brown Chloe kick panel plastic paint, added a dollop of Naranja's Chrysler Hemi orange, and painted the panel where the plywood was peeking through. Low viscosity was ensured with frequent GumOut sprays to keep the consistency watery.
Are you applying this with a rag?

Looks great!

Tim

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wcfvw69
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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by wcfvw69 » Fri Aug 19, 2016 11:29 pm

I wonder why it's ALWAYS, always the R/S heater cable that jams or rusts in place in that tube? I read a ton of threads on that other site about the cable replacement and people asking how to get the broken cable out. All of the broken, stuck heater cables were in the R/S conduit. When I changed my R/S cable, YUP, the plastic sheath/cable was frozen but good inside. In fact, it's still stuck in there while the new cable is neatly wire tied along the outside of the tube. I'll get to it again some day. :)
1970 Westfalia bus. Stock 1776 dual port type 1 engine. Restored German Solex 34-3. Restored 205Q distributor, restored to factory appearance engine.

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sgkent
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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by sgkent » Sat Aug 20, 2016 12:15 am

sounds like the gas tank clean out resolved the debris issue and now you have time to enjoy life.

In 2009 we put in new heater cables and they were not that nice to use. I went to replace them last winter and one was stuck. Took quite a bit to get it out. Really want to get the job done right this next time. Maybe we can get to it next time you are here.
TBone208 wrote: "You ppl are such windbags. Go use your crystal ball to get rich & predict something meaningful. Nobody knows what's going to happen. How are we supposed to take ppl who don't know the definition of a recession & "woman" seriously?"

Merlin The Wrench

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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by Amskeptic » Sat Aug 20, 2016 10:59 am

sgkent wrote:sounds like the gas tank clean out resolved the debris issue and now you have time to enjoy life.

In 2009 we put in new heater cables and they were not that nice to use. I went to replace them last winter and one was stuck. Took quite a bit to get it out. Really want to get the job done right this next time. Maybe we can get to it next time you are here.
I think Gemco (?) cables are the correct length and have the clear plastic coating on the wire itself. Loufalia's cables were simple metal inside metal conduit.

As recommended to loufalia, it is critical to never bend these push/pull wires anywhere along their lengths. People bend them all the time at the clamps at the heater levers, and I discover frequently that they have kinks/bends at the lever. They lose their crisp communication if your energy is expended in bending the bends.

I forgot to mention, my absent-minded AFM-guess-adjustment along the railroad tracks seems to be doing the trick. Will provide CHT/MPG info when I pull into LA. The RandyInMaineCommemorativeLoanerLM-1 is back in its case. Yesterday's mild headwind and 101* ambient temps yielded a maximum reading of 423* and a cruise of 410*. Problem is, I do not remember what the rationale of my adjustment was, and I no longer have the a/f readings.
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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Bleyseng
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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by Bleyseng » Sat Aug 20, 2016 6:34 pm

410-423F in 101F is pretty good but at what speed? 55? 60? =D>
Geoff
77 Sage Green Westy- CS 2.0L-160,000 miles
70 Ghia vert, black, stock 1600SP,- 139,000 miles,
76 914 2.1L-Nepal Orange- 160,000+ miles
http://bleysengaway.blogspot.com/

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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by jcbrock » Sun Aug 21, 2016 10:28 am

Amskeptic wrote: I do appreciate California's road engineering, the banked turns . . . .
I like the oleander medians . . . .
Amskeptic wrote: Decided to take CA-41 as a shortcut to 46.
That 41/46 intersection doesn't look that dangerous to me, but I guess with the right traffic it has been.
'76 Type II Station Wagon - in the family since new!
Corvallis, OR

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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by Amskeptic » Sun Aug 21, 2016 9:42 pm

jcbrock wrote: That 41/46 intersection doesn't look that dangerous to me, but I guess with the right traffic it has been.
I don't get this. The intersection was just an intersection. The warning against tractor-trailers was because 41 has hairy turns, camber shifts, poor sight lines, non-existent shoulders, deer!

Robbie! I am ten miles from your Newhall Railroad Avenue scrum here!

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My old spot was terribly taken away from me. I was so looking forward to a day of work there, arrived at dusk, and it was a fricken beehive of activity, including the wretched condemned house! There were pick up trucks and trailers and dogs.
( look at the first photograph of this thread : viewtopic.php?f=67&t=11558#p201741 )

Drove up Agua Dulce Road to a gated-off dirt road whose gating function had been roundly ignored by a little detour around the gate, so I took the little detour around the gate and drove about a mile up. No house, nobody, good enough. Set up camp and had a sleepless night of tuberculosis coughs and mucous smearing sneezing and a full moon and gloried in the isolation just ten miles from Railroad Avenue.

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As I walked up the dirt road in the morning in my tank top and hideously decayed cut-offs, I saw more clearly that the road had really come to an end in a cul-de-sac of dumped trash, oops, damn, there's a pick-up truck, what the? is someone camping in the trash, shouldn't I turn around NOW? But I didn't. I stealthily tip-toed along the dirt to get a better view of what must be the saddest anti-social redneck loser camp, ever. Spied a stoved-in windshield and gunshot holes all through this Chevy (don't get in a gunfight while driving a Chevy pick-up truck). I guess the only loser camping in the trash was standing right there in a t-shirt and hideously decayed cut-offs. No body in the truck, fortunately (that's a gap between the "o" and the "b" for a reason, there were bullet holes, after all).

Pulled the front wheels and cleaned and touched them up.
Pulled my front brake rotors:

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Cross-hatched like I have never cross-hatched to try to get under the rust pocks from the Twenty Year Sit. Must have been four full passes on each of the four friction surfaces:

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This to see if the recent pulsing pedal could be attributed to the front brakes (no). Buttoned up with due diligence:

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Tomorrow might be an engine pull on a Karmann Ghia, ad by dose is still odd cgogged up, I hate codes.
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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asiab3
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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by asiab3 » Mon Aug 22, 2016 7:24 am

Ahhh I miss those mountains. We used to use them for more "adventurous" excursions.

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I hope you enjoyed your, um, day off in Newhall……

I'll never quite have the cajones to go straight from bullet holes to Roadside Refreshments.

Robbie
1969 bus, "Buddy."
145k miles with me.
322k miles on Earth.

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jcbrock
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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by jcbrock » Mon Aug 22, 2016 7:47 am

Amskeptic wrote:
jcbrock wrote: That 41/46 intersection doesn't look that dangerous to me, but I guess with the right traffic it has been.
I don't get this. The intersection was just an intersection. The warning against tractor-trailers was because 41 has hairy turns, camber shifts, poor sight lines, non-existent shoulders, deer!
Your uncle Phil woulda, that's the site of the James Dean crash.
'76 Type II Station Wagon - in the family since new!
Corvallis, OR

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Amskeptic
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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by Amskeptic » Mon Aug 22, 2016 9:17 pm

jcbrock wrote:
Amskeptic wrote:
jcbrock wrote: That 41/46 intersection doesn't look that dangerous to me, but I guess with the right traffic it has been.
I don't get this. The intersection was just an intersection. The warning against tractor-trailers was because 41 has hairy turns, camber shifts, poor sight lines, non-existent shoulders, deer!
Your uncle Phil woulda, that's the site of the James Dean crash.
41 runs into 46 at two spots. I came from the south, the Dean accident is up where it branches off at the y intersection.
So, I read the Pelican parts copy/paste:

That was my three older sisters' dad, Donald Parkinson . . . :pale:
As the racing community arrived at the Salinas airport
on Friday, September 30, for the weekend races, they were
greeted by what might have been considered an omen.
Instead of showing “Sports Car Road Races”, the race
program had been misprinted to read “Road Car Sports
Races”.
Then news was received that forced Phil Hill to
withdraw. Hill was scheduled to drive John Von
Neumann’s Porsche 550 Spyder and also his Ferrari 750
Monza in two of the races. However, news from Southern
California reached him about the suicide of his sister’s
husband, well known race driver Don Parkinson, and Hill
returned home immediately. Parkinson and Hill had been
friends for a number of years but were also competitors on
the track as well. Parkinson drove the well known
Parkinson Special which was based on a Jaguar XK-120
that had been rebodied after a crash at Pebble Beach in
1951.
Finally, on Saturday morning October 1, word began to
spread around the pits and through the crowd, that movie
star and aspiring racer, James Dean, had been killed in a
car accident south of Salinas, on his way to the races. The
usual pre-race excitement was replaced with a somber
atmosphere for the balance of the weekend.
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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jcbrock
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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by jcbrock » Mon Aug 22, 2016 9:38 pm

Ah, that makes sense then. I can't follow all your route twists and turns!
'76 Type II Station Wagon - in the family since new!
Corvallis, OR

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Re: Itinerant Days Of Freedom . . .

Post by Amskeptic » Fri Aug 26, 2016 8:49 am

The second camp-out at Agua Dulce involved checking the rear brakes for reasons why the pedal might be pulsing. Seeing as I had just replaced the rear shoes with Vanagon shoes, I looked carefully for signs of heat-induced warpage of the drums, and found it. Apparently, the mis-fitting springs, upper and lower, allowed the cross bar to cock at an angle, thus rendering the ebrake actuation a creaking doinking-sounding affair, with lousy release. Could not do a work-around at this time, but I did remove the nuts from the ebrake cables at the equalizer, and lubricated the heck out of them. Would you believe me if I told you that the cable sheaths were full of Michigan road salt this fine day in California? :

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With the cables free up front, you can pull the cable sheath out of the tube that runs under the car and out of the backing plate and do a little shift it frontwards-shift it backwards baptism of grease:

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Managed to get a fair release of the e-brake, and sanded/readjusted the drums/shoes. In the broiling heat, I thus waded out into the current of cars and took the 210 freeway east. Naranja is running better and better as the varnish gets cleaned off the internals of the fuel system and spark plugs. Belted along at 65-70 and stomped the hills floored for glorious effortless inclinations and truck passing and tasted a little of the old Road Warrior motoring madness at least until Pasadena, when the traffic clogged.

Saw this 1961 Lincoln Continental Convertible with the broken gas cap torsion spring:

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Such nice lines for 1961, what a surprise that car was to the current grotesque excess "stylin":

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With a clean fuel system, I was able to effortlessly draw alongside. Hey kids! Count the number of visible NaranjaWesty reflections in this picture:

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Visited with satchmo, dived down to Corona to visit with Wolfsburg West who lightened my wallet a full Itinerary Appointment income unit, and drove to Interstate Parts to visit with Jim. Jim is still kicking and planning to move to a larger place, "there were too many Volkswagens made, they are not yet drying up."
Colin :cyclopsani:
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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