Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings San Diego To Las Vegas
Posted: Mon Aug 19, 2019 6:35 pm
Hi! Finally! Phew! Slumming, I am slumming for thirty minutes here in Dalhart TX.
We left off, so very long ago, in a faraway land called "California", way back on August 7th. I can't tell you how unique that visit was with Blauvelt's dad in San Diego. He had no internet. We relayed through his son. I showed up in San Diego at night. It looked glamorous at night, but it had gritty Portland vibe in the neighborhood and smelled like pee where I camped alongside the freeway on a weird one-way frontage road:
San Diego had a charming San Francisco, then a Santa Monica vibe on the way to Blauvelt Dad's house:
I was taken by this dormer window:
Yeah, but then San Diego threw me this, this monstrous "moderne" frou-frou:
Spot the useless "elements" (10 pts)
Blauvelt's dad pretty much lived in the house his grandfather built. The family cars were from 1903, 1906, 1918, and I forget the year of the Jensen Interceptor but it was a Jensen Interceptor. The 1906 had a horizontally-opposed 2 cylinder engine with lubrication pipes to the wrist pins (!) and a radiator that he built up. Just ridiculously fascinating. But we had a Vanagon to recuscitate:
I was treated to a review of many interventions that did not yield results. We plowed through my favorite detail points. Valves, timing-sans-electronic control via the idle stabilizer plugs, mixture sans the O-2 sensor feedback, and yes, the plastic nipple was not seated fully in the s-boot. Neither were this that and the other correctly done. Missing flaps, exposed oil cooler ... and somewhere we did an AFM adjustment and timing tweak and the test drive yielded acceptable behavior. On that test drive, I heckled my poor customer that his obvious automotive sophistication must be able to execute a flawless double-clutch downshift because you HAVE TO with all of those old cars ... and he did with the Vanagon. And It Was Good. And this visit sticks in my mind. James. A man of many talents and experiences, a man of refreshing rectitude:
My Wolfsburg West parts order, I had it all on my computer with a file date of August 2nd and with a tracking number, but no order.
"Why is that?" I asked Wolfsburg West.
"I don't know, man, but it does not exist."
"Well, it does, with a tracking number and a date," I replied.
"Oh no, it does not," said Wolfsburg West.
................................................... ?
"Can I do a will-call?"
"Oh, absolutely! We will have it on the counter! We open at 8:00AM!"
8:00AM the next morning, from San Diego to Corona CA, NaranjaWest saucily sits in the parking lot telling her friends just how fun it is to lock in at 70 mph ... :
"Uh, the parts counter doesn't open until 9:00AM. You sure you called in an order?"
I went down the road, pulled into a parking lot overgrown with weeds and I conducted an unexpected shave and Motel6 bucket wash, then came back at 9:00AM
Look at how subtlely Volkswagen teased the sheet metal to ensconse a Type 4 engine:
This is the "intimate confine" of a splitty's driving environment:
And here I am escaping the smog and the traffic of LA on the 15 north to Barstow with my little Super Beetle friend. I ain't braggin' or nuttin, but we smoked that bug, NaranjaWesty and I:
... then we didn't. We settled in at 43 mph for the long 3rd gear slog to the summit:
Must run! To Amarillo! Much to fill in! Next in this thread, ScottInLasVegas!
Colin
We left off, so very long ago, in a faraway land called "California", way back on August 7th. I can't tell you how unique that visit was with Blauvelt's dad in San Diego. He had no internet. We relayed through his son. I showed up in San Diego at night. It looked glamorous at night, but it had gritty Portland vibe in the neighborhood and smelled like pee where I camped alongside the freeway on a weird one-way frontage road:
San Diego had a charming San Francisco, then a Santa Monica vibe on the way to Blauvelt Dad's house:
I was taken by this dormer window:
Yeah, but then San Diego threw me this, this monstrous "moderne" frou-frou:
Spot the useless "elements" (10 pts)
Blauvelt's dad pretty much lived in the house his grandfather built. The family cars were from 1903, 1906, 1918, and I forget the year of the Jensen Interceptor but it was a Jensen Interceptor. The 1906 had a horizontally-opposed 2 cylinder engine with lubrication pipes to the wrist pins (!) and a radiator that he built up. Just ridiculously fascinating. But we had a Vanagon to recuscitate:
I was treated to a review of many interventions that did not yield results. We plowed through my favorite detail points. Valves, timing-sans-electronic control via the idle stabilizer plugs, mixture sans the O-2 sensor feedback, and yes, the plastic nipple was not seated fully in the s-boot. Neither were this that and the other correctly done. Missing flaps, exposed oil cooler ... and somewhere we did an AFM adjustment and timing tweak and the test drive yielded acceptable behavior. On that test drive, I heckled my poor customer that his obvious automotive sophistication must be able to execute a flawless double-clutch downshift because you HAVE TO with all of those old cars ... and he did with the Vanagon. And It Was Good. And this visit sticks in my mind. James. A man of many talents and experiences, a man of refreshing rectitude:
My Wolfsburg West parts order, I had it all on my computer with a file date of August 2nd and with a tracking number, but no order.
"Why is that?" I asked Wolfsburg West.
"I don't know, man, but it does not exist."
"Well, it does, with a tracking number and a date," I replied.
"Oh no, it does not," said Wolfsburg West.
................................................... ?
"Can I do a will-call?"
"Oh, absolutely! We will have it on the counter! We open at 8:00AM!"
8:00AM the next morning, from San Diego to Corona CA, NaranjaWest saucily sits in the parking lot telling her friends just how fun it is to lock in at 70 mph ... :
"Uh, the parts counter doesn't open until 9:00AM. You sure you called in an order?"
I went down the road, pulled into a parking lot overgrown with weeds and I conducted an unexpected shave and Motel6 bucket wash, then came back at 9:00AM
Look at how subtlely Volkswagen teased the sheet metal to ensconse a Type 4 engine:
This is the "intimate confine" of a splitty's driving environment:
And here I am escaping the smog and the traffic of LA on the 15 north to Barstow with my little Super Beetle friend. I ain't braggin' or nuttin, but we smoked that bug, NaranjaWesty and I:
... then we didn't. We settled in at 43 mph for the long 3rd gear slog to the summit:
Must run! To Amarillo! Much to fill in! Next in this thread, ScottInLasVegas!
Colin