Itinerant Air-Cooled Athens, GA Part I

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jimbear
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Location: Athens, GA
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Itinerant Air-Cooled Athens, GA Part I

Post by jimbear » Mon Mar 28, 2016 10:26 am

(The Jimbear Session)

It happened. He came. He saw. We worked...for only a half day. Addressed little bits and pieces.
~Colin consulted with me on my potential windshield removal and I am going to leave it be. Although the seal bleeds some blackness when wet and is slightly cracked on spots on the outer edge Colin's take was that it is not leaking and is likely still protecting the inner metal.
~Replaced the fresh air intake tube (?) for the brake servo. There had not been a tube there since I have owned the bus to my knowledge.
~Colin straightened out my lighting issue; rearranged wires on the headlight switch so that I had parking lights in position one and all lights in postilion two. He also noticed while present on that area of the bus that I had a few 25 amp (blue) fuses. "No, no, no," he said, and graciously pulled them and replaced with correct 8 amps from his stash.
~Checked timing with Colin's light because mine died. Reset to 28 degree before at "fast" rpm.
~Tested the heater fan and put it in place and discussed where and how I will hook it up. Attached tubes. There has not been one since I owned the bus.
~Colin determined that the heating element on the right choke was not working. I had an assembly for the left carb, Colin used his ninja skills to remove the spring from the press fitting and flip it to the correct orientation. He did, it works.
~Tweaked the adjustment of the carbs, leaned the carbs out to help address poor mpg.
~Drove it. I was schooled in shifting into 4th; I was revving the engine way to much. Shifting between 40 and 42 mph now and not 50 mph.

Colin left. The wife and I took it out to breakfast the next morning and...Colin, the windshield wipers that were working previously are now not working at all. Then, as we pulled into the driveway the alternator light came on. Weirdness x 2. I'll keep you posted when I get a chance to look into these issues.

Feel free to add to this Colin...
'74 Hardtop Westy
Pretty much stock engine setup

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energyturtle
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Athens, GA Part I

Post by energyturtle » Mon Mar 28, 2016 12:16 pm

Just for my own entertainment, and possibly the unveiling of new, deeper thought provoking "opportunities", slap those high amperage fuses back in. I've had quite a few visits, and I think Colin does things like that as a teaching tool. Reading your post makes me nostalgic! Good stuff!
Scottie

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Amskeptic
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Athens, GA Part I

Post by Amskeptic » Mon Mar 28, 2016 5:52 pm

So, before I got to jimbear's house, I finally broke down and painted the BobD's beautiful original plastic tailgate covers. They had yellowed just sitting there in the storage unit. It was a slightly painful pleasure to see the beautiful cad II plated screws and clean insides of the tailgate covers, and the perfect everything else on that car at 110,160 miles:

Image

It is newly scaring me yet again to drive it and wear it out.

Image


Got the new wye pipe from Bus Depot with the baffle on this pipe welded no better than the first one, but we shall see if it holds together. This baffle directs the exhaust flow at the end of the cross over pipe (cyl's 1 &2 ) to take a hard left thus allowing the entrance to the catalytic converter to be bisected equally to both banks of the engine. All I could see in this photograph was how beautiful the original paint is on the BobD:

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Meanwhile, on the way to Athens, this here NaranjaWesty is a fine driver with a clean fuel filter:

Image

jimbear wrote:(The Jimbear Session)

It happened. He came. He saw. We worked...for only a half day. Addressed little bits and pieces.
~Colin consulted with me on my potential windshield removal and I am going to leave it be. Although the seal bleeds some blackness when wet and is slightly cracked on spots on the outer edge Colin's take was that it is not leaking and is likely still protecting the inner metal.
~Replaced the fresh air intake tube (?) for the brake servo. There had not been a tube there since I have owned the bus to my knowledge.
~Colin straightened out my lighting issue; rearranged wires on the headlight switch so that I had parking lights in position one and all lights in postilion two. He also noticed while present on that area of the bus that I had a few 28 amp fuses. "No, no, no," he said, and graciously pulled them and replaced with correct 8 amps from his stash.
~Checked timing with Colin's light because mine died. Reset to 28 degree before at "fast" rpm.
~Tested the heater fan and put it in place and discussed where and how I will hook it up. Attached tubes. There has not been one since I owned the bus.
~Colin determined that the heating element on the right choke was not working. I had an assembly for the left carb, Colin used his ninja skills to remove the spring from the press fitting and flip it to the correct orientation. He did, it works.
~Tweaked the adjustment of the carbs, leaned the carbs out to help address poor mpg.
~Drove it. I was schooled in shifting into 4th; I was revving the engine way to much. Shifting between 40 and 42 mph now and not 50 mph.

Colin left. The wife and I took it out to breakfast the next morning and...
. . . that's all, folks! Nothing to read here, BYE!

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jimbear wrote: Colin, the windshield wipers that were working previously are now not working at all. Then, as we pulled into the driveway the alternator light came on. Weirdness x 2. I'll keep you posted when I get a chance to look into these issues.
Feel free to add to this Colin...
Well Jim, Mr. Jimbear,
Please consult your Bentley and see which fuse fuels the wipers. Then disconnect the battery and polish every fuse terminal where the fuse ends actually contact. I used a stubby phillips screwdriver on Naranja because it hit the terminals precisely where the fuse ends do. Then use dielectric grease on each terminal. Then reinstall all fuses checking of course to see that they are all properly seated and that no ends have peeled off the plastic body of the fuse. That should re-enervate the wipers, but if not, check wiper ground at tree on intake plenum.

We had an alternator light anomaly while I was there, remember? and we discovered that the socket was fussy. Then the light worked correctly when ignition was on and engine was off.

Clean the socket and the fuel gauge hole clean! Shiny! Perfect! Then seat the thing nicely!
Does the alternator light stay on even when you rev the engine? Do let us know.

Hey everybody, jimbear actually has a very very nice 1974 tintop Westy (L90D white with the blue plaid) and I think it might be a low mileage example. It still has the 1974 tune up decal and looks very un-tormented. We all must endeavor to heckle jimbear to maintain this car very very well and to wax the engine compartment then the rest of the car. Later we will eradicate that perky butt.

Image

Then I went to kriskleine's house and we painted his windshield channel and went to the Blind Pig with jimbear and Kleine family. I was driven there in the NaranjaWesty by kriskleine spouse, the first woman to drive Naranja in its life.
The rainy forecast precluded our finishing the kriskleine appointment. It has been rescheduled for April 3rd.

Today was sunny, so I drove to a nasty truck parking lot with trash and blowing wind and removed the rear bumper.
Why did I remove the rear bumper? Because the foul paint smeared over the original paint was foul. I color-sanded it down, and it departed the bumper with no more fight than any kindergarteners' finger paint. Three truck drivers came up and asked me what I was doing.
To Driver #1 "I am color-sanding my bumper."

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To Driver #2 "I am trying to balance this bumper on the saw horse."

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To Driver #3 "Good thing those vans on your trailer are already white" (the wind had of course picked up briskly when I got the paint out):

Image


To the two giggling young women, "why yes, the back bumper is inside the car so it doesn't get damaged."

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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dingo
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Athens, GA Part I

Post by dingo » Tue Mar 29, 2016 9:37 pm

Those tintop westies are an exotic species, and my personal favourite of all the variations I have owned. Were they all white ? looks like they might have started out as Kombis...?
'71 Kombi, 1600 dp

';78 Tranzporter 2L

" Fill what's empty, empty what's full, and scratch where it itches."

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Amskeptic
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Athens, GA Part I

Post by Amskeptic » Wed Mar 30, 2016 5:22 am

dingo wrote:Those tintop westies are an exotic species, and my personal favourite of all the variations I have owned. Were they all white ? looks like they might have started out as Kombis...?
They all started out as stripped out Kombis. The Westfalia Company merely uses the non-sunroof models as the starting point for the tin-tops.
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 Air-Cooled Athens, GA Part I

Post by asiab3 » Wed Mar 30, 2016 2:24 pm

Amskeptic wrote:
dingo wrote:Those tintop westies are an exotic species, and my personal favourite of all the variations I have owned. Were they all white ? looks like they might have started out as Kombis...?
They all started out as stripped out Kombis. The Westfalia Company merely uses the non-sunroof models as the starting point for the tin-tops.
Colin
Brian (new member here!) and I were musing about this last month. We came to the conclusion, that with the pop rivets holding so much rattle-trap sheet metal in place for the headliner and interior panels, the Westfalia workers were really just factory-blessed hacks. :drunken:

I'll go take cover from the impending flames now,
Robbie
1969 bus, "Buddy."
145k miles with me.
322k miles on Earth.

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Amskeptic
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Athens, GA Part I

Post by Amskeptic » Wed Mar 30, 2016 5:41 pm

asiab3 wrote:
Amskeptic wrote:
dingo wrote:Those tintop westies are an exotic species, and my personal favourite of all the variations I have owned. Were they all white ? looks like they might have started out as Kombis...?
They all started out as stripped out Kombis. The Westfalia Company merely uses the non-sunroof models as the starting point for the tin-tops.
Colin
Brian (new member here!) and I were musing about this last month. We came to the conclusion, that with the pop rivets holding so much rattle-trap sheet metal in place for the headliner and interior panels, the Westfalia workers were really just factory-blessed hacks. :drunken:

I'll go take cover from the impending flames now,
Robbie
No flames from here. VW contracted out to mere mortals. Even the pretty Karmann Ghia looks like it was put together by people free from the VW quality control supervisors.
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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jimbear
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Location: Athens, GA
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Athens, GA Part I

Post by jimbear » Mon Apr 11, 2016 8:57 pm

jimbear wrote:(The Jimbear Session)
[...]the windshield wipers that were working previously are now not working at all. Then, as we pulled into the driveway the alternator light came on. Weirdness x 2. I'll keep you posted when I get a chance to look into these issues.
Colin returned a week later and I visited him at kleinevw's. Colin took a brief moment between paint mixing sessions with Kris and hooked me up with a courtesy check. He readily determined that the wiper issue was much simpler than expected...it was a fuse connection issue, something I checked, but not closely enough. Lesson: start small and focus before you go big. The alternator light issue could likely be a loose/crusty connection as well; I pulled the connector off behind the dash and the light has not come on since.
'74 Hardtop Westy
Pretty much stock engine setup

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Amskeptic
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Re: Itinerant Air-Cooled Athens, GA Part I

Post by Amskeptic » Tue Apr 12, 2016 2:09 pm

jimbear wrote:
jimbear wrote:(The Jimbear Session)
[...]the windshield wipers that were working previously are now not working at all. Then, as we pulled into the driveway the alternator light came on. Weirdness x 2. I'll keep you posted when I get a chance to look into these issues.
Colin returned a week later and I visited him at kleinevw's. Colin took a brief moment between paint mixing sessions with Kris and hooked me up with a courtesy check. He readily determined that the wiper issue was much simpler than expected...it was a fuse connection issue, something I checked, but not closely enough. Lesson: start small and focus before you go big. The alternator light issue could likely be a loose/crusty connection as well; I pulled the connector off behind the dash and the light has not come on since.
Good. As of now, every wiper switch person on the eastern seaboard is now ready for rain.
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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