Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

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sgkent
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by sgkent » Mon Aug 15, 2016 5:43 am

Colin will post more I am sure. We started about 5 pm after the bus cooled and finished about 8:45 He pulled the tank by lowering the engine. It was my understanding he wanted to adjust the end play. The two tank nuts took considerable time to run a die on and remove. The nuts bound up and would have snapped the studs. Fighting those nuts probably would have justified pulling the engine - I think maybe 10 - 15 minutes more with two mechanics and two jacks - everything except the CV joints, linage grub screw, ECU plug,, starter cable, and throttle cable were already removed. That said the main goal was getting the tank out at a reasonable hours and we were able to do that and get a shower, clean clothes and a night's sleep although it was about 10:45 before we stopped watching the Olympics, and called it a day. I woke up with Cathy at 4:30am but being off I can nap a little later this morning.

We got out about a cup of charcoal flakes from the tank, for lack of a better word. Some were fine, others were the size of a postage stamp.
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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Amskeptic
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by Amskeptic » Mon Aug 15, 2016 10:57 pm

I will post more . . . I gots the pictures too, and it happened.

You all will never never never know the depth of black fury that overtook me in the five hours it took to drive 19 miles. Did I tell you I picked up a screw on one of my shoulder dives, this time the left rear tire, clicking like too-long dog nails on a tile floor? Yeah, that helped my mood. Finally could not trust the car on the freeway. Got lost on surface streets.

I had to get the tank empty enough to have little enough fuel to fit the containers. I envisioned the crud being concentrated in a smaller and smaller quantity of fuel and yes, finally not 1/2 mile from SGKent's house, not a damn drop would come out of the fuel hose RIPPED OFF THE DAMN FILTER IN A FURY WITHOUT A CLAMP. Then I would blow into the hose and hear weird not really bubbles and I would I get a piddle. Finally swore off lowering the tank level any further, and added three gallons within a quarter mile of SGKent's house, because, dammit, I had to get there, I was pleading with that car, screaming under my breath at that car, apologizing to that car that I understood it was not its fault, but "GET ME TO SGKentsHOUSE AND I CAN FIX YOU, FINALLY!!" and it would not go 100 feet without the pump whining like a detestable mosquito, and I would go under the car, loosen the clamps, pull the filter with gas running down my left arm AGAIN, slam the crap out of it into a bucket, blow gasoline out of it in a furious spray all over my legs and back-blasting into my face, wrench the filter back in, try to start the car but it has vapor-locked with no pressure in the rail, hop out of the car, move the wiper, try to get the rail air-free, but some piece of crap would make the mosquito come back before I even got the rail cleared of air, it was hideous, dodging rushing car, trying to get across intersections, afternoon rush coming up, long traffic lights that gave the filter time to clog up again, I was down to barely a block per cleaning.

Yes, we got the tank out by sunset, and holy holy there were mountains of varnish gravel, mountains that represented an easy 100 times the volume I had stored up from the hundreds of filter cleanings to this moment. There was never a chance that I would have been able to drive this gas tank clean even after the 1,000 gallons I have poured into the filler since October 27th.

But too, this was the only place I could have landed to perform this operation. SGKent has pretty much the expertise and standards that allowed us to work together efficiently even if we did butt heads a little because I was so damn testy and exhausted and uptight and discouraged and sick on gas fumes and I don't do well with my engine sitting on jack during an itinerary.

$188.88 got a serviceable tank cleaning, sprayed a little black paint on the outside, and we threw it back in at 4:00PM, started the engine at 8:30, ready to go. Photographs to come. Must crash . . . out.
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 Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by Jivermo » Tue Aug 16, 2016 4:31 am

I am exhausted just reading about this. I guess we'll hear how you had it cleaned.

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vwlover77
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by vwlover77 » Tue Aug 16, 2016 5:09 am

Colin, I hope a clean tank, rest, a hot shower, and coffee will restore your inner peace.
Don

---------------------------
78 Westy
71 Super Beetle Convertible Autostick

"When we let our compassion go, we let go of whatever claim we have to the divine." - Bruce Springsteen

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MountainPrana
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by MountainPrana » Tue Aug 16, 2016 5:54 am

Amskeptic wrote:There was never a chance that I would have been able to drive this gas tank clean even after the 1,000 gallons I have poured into the filler since October 27th.
Well, thanks for putting it to the test. Invaluable to the rest of us stubborn fools out here that thrive on finding the work arounds. You never know till you try, and try, till your blood sweat and tears have you cursing the Gods and begging for mercy in the same breath. I for one am glad that you are able to push the envelope as far as you do, and grateful also that Naranja Westy has a nicely cleaned fuel tank. Well done, man, well done. =D>

Tim got Marvel Mystery Oil in 4 preloaded lifters

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wcfvw69
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by wcfvw69 » Tue Aug 16, 2016 7:50 am

It's great to hear that you have that gas tank drama in the rear view mirror Colin. Let's hope you've gotten some good rest, a thorough washing to remove the petrol from your person and have decompressed.

I hope the rest of this years itinerary is mechanical issue free for you.
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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airkooledchris
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by airkooledchris » Tue Aug 16, 2016 9:07 am

wcfvw69 wrote:It's great to hear that you have that gas tank drama in the rear view mirror Colin. Let's hope you've gotten some good rest, a thorough washing to remove the petrol from your person and have decompressed.

I hope the rest of this years itinerary is mechanical issue free for you.

no kidding, I think he's earned it (x times over). ideally we can resume waxing the front floor and rebuilding the foam around the fresh air intake flaps soon. :cheers:
1979 California Transporter

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SlowLane
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by SlowLane » Tue Aug 16, 2016 9:16 am

Amskeptic wrote: five hours it took to drive 19 miles.
...
I had to get the tank empty enough to have little enough fuel to fit the containers.
Okay, I'm just going to say this once: there are these things called tow-trucks. And there are these other things called jerry cans, of which 5-gallon examples can be had for not a lot of money.

The qualities of perseverance and self-reliance are certainly worthy of admiration. But there is a line where they cross over into self-limiting behavior. Please consider how close you might have been to that line, and on which side of it.

Wishing you safe and stall-free travels from here on.
Lyle
'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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whc03grady
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by whc03grady » Tue Aug 16, 2016 9:17 am

It's a tough call: get a 1/2 mile tow and save a few hundred cerebral capillaries, or get a 1/2 mile tow and spoil a 40 (?) year record.
ETA: simulpost with SlowLane
Ludwig--1974 Westfalia, 2.0L (GD035193), Solex 34PDSIT-2/3 carburetors.
Gertie--1971 Squareback, 1600cc with Bosch D-Jetronic fuel injection from a '72 (E brain).
Read about their adventures:
http://www.ludwigandgertie.blogspot.com

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Amskeptic
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by Amskeptic » Tue Aug 16, 2016 11:02 am

SlowLane wrote: perseverance and self-reliance are certainly worthy of admiration.
But there is a line where they cross over into self-limiting behavior.

If I had to do it all over again, it would play out exactly as it just did.

I made a discretionary call on October 5, 2015. It was based on ignorance of the true extent of contamination in the fuel tank.
Thus, I had to buy the car. ( + nice car )

It nicely reassured me that it was driveable throughout the winter with a few cleanings here and there, and I made another discretionary call that I could easily handle a few filter cleanings each week, so off on the itinerary I went all the way through the southeast and northeast.

It was when the roads got rough in Illinois and Indiana and apparently the varnish was beginning to soften? and flaking off that I realized there was an increasing price to pay. At that point, I was devoted to the principle that the tank was going to have to come out, but I still had more discretion to abuse as to when and where. I decided that the itinerary schedule was way too jammed to even think about taking a few days near an urban area until California.
Only after Portland OR, did I realize this situation was getting a bit dire due to fast-moving traffic and an increasing propensity to sudden death and bigger debris fields in the cleaning bucket.

I settled on SGKent because, if you know him, he has a severe case of Get The Job Done. What is sort of amazing about this time line, is that the tank gave it all up 1/4 mile from his house. For the first time in 18,000 miles of driving, gas would not come out of the open fuel line. I'd say the timing turned out to be flawless. FINALLY shut off the engine in SGKent's driveway of all driveways. I needed a SGKent fellow "deep bench" mechanic to work the gas tank strap nuts, because I was completely psychologically ruined at that point, the rage had been sparked and I was flying off the handle at the merest little thing. I was DONE.

This entire saga had its reasons. Life is not all about the dry practical decision every time, and those who abide by that sort of rationality might step aside a moment and allow the sloppier longer detour-takers to have their chance to present the more irrational but certainly rich experience of dancing along the guardrail of insanity. I made a decision back in October that has informed me of life in ways that absolutely would not have otherwise occurred, and that is a fact. I regret only the loss of time with people I consider friends as I kept "front-loading" my travel schedule.

This morning, I am relieved but not yet trusting. The car has been docile and smooth all morning, the pump has been eerily quiet. I keep scanning shoulders and exits and have nervous feet and hands and look at other cars with panic when they block my escape routes, and I reckon this Post-Traumatic Fool Disorder shall die down in a few days.

Engine dropped whilst still fueled by fury:

Image


Only had to drop this far to allow the tank to clear:

Image


This surface here is what I think most of the tank looked like in February, a "baked on" layer of varnish:

Image


After 1,000 gallons of fuel and several bottles of Sea Foam, I think the varnish began to slough off along the lower sides and bottom of the tank, you can see little areas of tank metal through the deep layer of breaking up junk:

Image


1/4 mile from SGKent's house, slabs of this crap were landing in the outlet/inlet well:

Image


On our way to the radiator shop, I banged the tank with the overnight-dried varnish cascading out of the fuel filler hole. This mountain of slag represents another three hundred filter clogs easily, right there, that is 20 hours labor at least represented in that bucket:

Image


Here's the newly cleaned tank . . . some rust spots, but hey, no coal slag piles:

Image


SGKent was hospitable and helpful throughout my despairing furious defeated exhaustion. His every helpful suggestion and offer was met with a series of snappish refusals and stubborn recalcitrance.
"Want dinner?"
"No."
"Want to do laundry?"
"No."
"Want a plastic retainer for the double relay harness?"
"No."

I was horrible in most every way but petting the Scottish Terriers.
Somehow, I was fed, laundry was washed, and the double relay harness is now secured by the plastic retainer.
Here is SGKent Himself, this is what a Savior may very well look like, make a note of it:

Image
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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SlowLane
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by SlowLane » Tue Aug 16, 2016 12:31 pm

:cheers: =D> =D> =D> =D> =D> =D> =D> =D> =D> :cheers:
'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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sgkent
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by sgkent » Tue Aug 16, 2016 1:18 pm

We enjoyed having Colin here - and he is welcome any time. I promise I won't wake the whole house with my snoring again.

FWIW this is the first time Colin and I have worked together. Because he is used to fixing someone else's bus - and in this case we were fixing his I wasn't totally sure how it would go. Basically I am the helper guy on his bus to his standards, but he's in my house and garage trusting me to get him, his tank, and his tire around to be fixed so he can get back on his schedule without being further stressed. You've got two sets of tools being used - and mechanics are possessive with their tools not wanting them to mixed accidentally for example - there are a lot of places two head strong guys working together the first time can get into a conflict. But it went well by my expectations, The only moment of stress for me was when he was using a small bucket of gasoline and a rag wiping down and cleaning his engine bay of dirt, oil, and grease with the garage doors closed - he forgot that there was a water heater 15' from him. Other than that I thought things went quite successful. He arrived about 5pm Sunday and we were done about 9pm Monday - the biggest lost time being sleep and waiting on the tank to get done.

I just wish he had a little more time for himself - I don't think people realize how much of himself he puts into helping others - and how compassionate he is towards others. This time I think was a little harder for him too because he'd been fighting the fuel tank problem so long he just wanted the pain to stop. I told Cathy when he didn't arrive around 4:30 PM but he left early in the morning to make a 45 minute trip either he's passed us by and headed to SLO, he broken down by the side of the road with it, or he's sold the bus to some farmer he found and boarded an airplane to go home.
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 Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by tewa3240 » Tue Aug 16, 2016 4:11 pm

Spectacular.
18k on that tank?-I would of lost it/ lit it on fire after 3k.

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wcfvw69
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by wcfvw69 » Tue Aug 16, 2016 4:41 pm

tewa3240 wrote:Spectacular.
I would of lost it/ lit it on fire after 3k.
No shit.. I'm wired WAAYY too type A and am far too impatient to have dealt with that situation Colin navigated through. Holy smokes, that tank was jacked up with all that crap.

When I bought my 70 bus a few years ago, it smelled like gas inside the bus with the tank full. Within the first week, I had to remove the tank to address that smell. I found it had the original rubber breather hoses on it and the original rubber filler hose. They were the cause of the fuel smell as they were dry rotted and shot. When I yanked the tank out, I went ahead and removed the dead fuel sender and looked inside it. It had just a little bit of dirt and particles in it so I flushed the tank out with water and dried it w/a battery powered leaf blower.

I did notice that it flash rusted rather quickly but I simply don't trust any of the tank sealers. So, I've run it now for around 8k miles w/a clear plastic filter under the tank. It collects the rust dust (not much) and I'm fine with that.

Again, I'm SSOO glad that Colin has that tank issue behind him now. Let's hope the PTSD eases soon and he can enjoy the rest of his 2016 tour.
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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Randy in Maine
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Some Forest

Post by Randy in Maine » Tue Aug 16, 2016 4:56 pm

Any idea on just what the flaky crud was? Was it magnetic?
79 VW Bus

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