Itinerant Air-Cooled Saint Louis MO
Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2019 7:36 pm
We last left off in hot humid Mountain Home AR, where I thoroughly enjoyed meeting CL Hudson and Rick Steiner. That seems like a tight town, everybody seems to know each other and it is, I am sure, lovely, at about 30% less humidity. After a full ten hour day, I was extra-sticky sweaty, so another scrubdown was executed at my charming "campsite" + Pantene hair treatment at the Blown-Up Toilet Burnt Down Building salon, before I hit US 62 east to Missouri.
Next morning at some Ford Truck dealership driveway, I yanked out the rear window AGAIN (3rd time!) because it kept piddling on the right side curtain. I pushed it out with my palms, lickety split, see, that's the problem, it exerts NO pressure on the perimeter of the opening. Added some butyl caulk to the corners where the seal stretches itself (BECAUSE IT IS NOT FORMED AT THE CORNERS) skinny:
I electrical-taped a single strand 22ga wire to the outside edge of the glass to force the stupid seal to expand just that much more, just like in Spokane with the old seal:
Hey, gas is $2.23 a gallon in Missouri, me? I'm not distracted:
Yay for the new seal + hacktastic tapery - it now does not leak:
Very happily did I find a beautiful campsite only 19 miles from downtown Saint Louis. It was on top of a local "mountain" devoted to a cell tower. Called Kit at dusk to tell her of my find (after the great CampAbout, I have a whole new appetite for being Outside Of Civilization). Did the proximity of the cell tower help the signal quality? No. Popped the top and fell into a deep sleep. Somewhere around first hint of dawn, I awoke to voices. Cops.
"Look at this thing."
"Man, that is cherry."
"I always wanted to get one of these."
"Oh YEAYAH, hit the road! But they break down and then what? That thing is like fifty years old now."
I wanted to rouse myself and pronounce, but my eyelids were glued shut and my mouth was dry and I was literally falling back asleep as I listened. I heard two vehicles and even though I was up where their headlamps and spotlamps had little effect on my eyelids, those clowns hit both of their sirens just to blast them (kop kids).
Awoke at 7:30, and broke camp (sure, pull down the poptop, yer done) and drove to SamW's house to meet his beautiful Great Danes. Once again, a dog makes me feel bad. The bitch had lost her right rear leg to cancer, and she was cheerful and adaptable. Me? I would not likely be. The bus is a twin to McCandmore's '74 orange Westy, this one is a '73, but they have had different lives. This one was saddled with home engineering fixes. I took out about a mile of wire from the engine compartment. Four exposed power supply wires sprouted off the positive battery cable and disappeared into the cabinets and across the engine compartment, all UN-FUSED.
There were other oddities for sure. This was supposed to a nice tune-up tutorial, but it got ransacked by outrages. We just had to patiently plough through the myriad of wrong decisions, fuel hose routing, wire ties binding wires to sharp edged metal, a coil ready to slide out of its bracket, and some time around 6:30PM we got the bus to barely barely start for the first time. Yeah, so the brake booster hose was attached to the central idling circuit pipe that was supposed to lead from the central idling circuit outlet on the left carb, the brake booster nipples on the manifolds were blocked off, the breather hose wandered around and terminated in open air, the vacuum advance hose went to the wrong carburetor, just little details.
At 6:30PM, (I was due for a nice dinner with my friend Marc and his lovely wife at 7:30PM nine miles away) the engine lit my arm hairs and eyebrows on fire with an insane July 4th show spewing from the carburetors. This engine is missing parts all over the place, and the hold down clips for the air horns are two of them. I had to both hold the air horns on and try to adjust the fuel mixtures whilst tickling the throttle crossbar. It was hideous. The backfires were blasting black smoke out the tail pipe, and flames up to the headbanger cabinet. I was about to indict the valves for sticking when I touched the electromagnetic cut-off wire loosely hanging on to the right carb. Yeah, runs smooth now. That was too much misbehavior for one stupid wire connector, but there it is. Sam has some parts to scarf up and I have to grow some new arm hair.
Blasted off "hey good luck, Sam, it'll work out!" and jetted through Saint Louis to dinner:
"You smell like you were on fire."
"I was ... but I'm not now."
Fire victim got to spend the night in a basement of a house under construction with no hot water. I did a basement utility sink cold bath with another Pantene hair spa treatment to get rid of some exhaust soot. Stepped out into a thunderstorm and sheets of sideways rain. Drove to McCandmore's house and greeted that lovely family with the crackerjack whipsmart kids, the eleven year-old of whom provided us breakfast.
McCandmore's '74 is the other twin of the Saint Louis Orange Westy Brigade. Can we ponder for just a second the fact that the last three customers ALL had that amazing rare orange plaid interior?
(CLHudson's photographed here)
Steering was at the top of the list. We replaced the drag link as the rain slowly diminished. Then, because we were there, we decided to replace the front shift rod bushing. Fortunately the orange carpet-with-real-orange-footpad, readily pulled off the floor. Unfortunately, the front shift rod collar would not release the two shift rods so we could telescope them together and get access to the bushing. "Yeah, so we will disassemble the rear coupler to obtain required rearward shift." Yeah, but no. Apparently this lovely orange Westy has advanced rust under the undercoating under the car. It was a couple of hours to eventually get the shift rod rearward enough to barely insert the new bushing. Got it all back together and adjusted the stop plate to eventually give us four forward gears and one reverse.
Carb adjustments did not include big blasts of fire singeing the head banger cabinet or my face. This 1800 engine is smooth. I love the short stroke Type 4 engines. The only photographs we are going to be able to share here will come from McCandmore. Another offer of dinner (!) was rejected as I looked at the darkening sky and bailed out to whatever my next campsite would be. I am now in Paducah with a flawlessly running NaranjaWesty at 110,100 miles. Soon, we will pass the BobD's odometer reading ...
Colin
Next morning at some Ford Truck dealership driveway, I yanked out the rear window AGAIN (3rd time!) because it kept piddling on the right side curtain. I pushed it out with my palms, lickety split, see, that's the problem, it exerts NO pressure on the perimeter of the opening. Added some butyl caulk to the corners where the seal stretches itself (BECAUSE IT IS NOT FORMED AT THE CORNERS) skinny:
I electrical-taped a single strand 22ga wire to the outside edge of the glass to force the stupid seal to expand just that much more, just like in Spokane with the old seal:
Hey, gas is $2.23 a gallon in Missouri, me? I'm not distracted:
Yay for the new seal + hacktastic tapery - it now does not leak:
Very happily did I find a beautiful campsite only 19 miles from downtown Saint Louis. It was on top of a local "mountain" devoted to a cell tower. Called Kit at dusk to tell her of my find (after the great CampAbout, I have a whole new appetite for being Outside Of Civilization). Did the proximity of the cell tower help the signal quality? No. Popped the top and fell into a deep sleep. Somewhere around first hint of dawn, I awoke to voices. Cops.
"Look at this thing."
"Man, that is cherry."
"I always wanted to get one of these."
"Oh YEAYAH, hit the road! But they break down and then what? That thing is like fifty years old now."
I wanted to rouse myself and pronounce, but my eyelids were glued shut and my mouth was dry and I was literally falling back asleep as I listened. I heard two vehicles and even though I was up where their headlamps and spotlamps had little effect on my eyelids, those clowns hit both of their sirens just to blast them (kop kids).
Awoke at 7:30, and broke camp (sure, pull down the poptop, yer done) and drove to SamW's house to meet his beautiful Great Danes. Once again, a dog makes me feel bad. The bitch had lost her right rear leg to cancer, and she was cheerful and adaptable. Me? I would not likely be. The bus is a twin to McCandmore's '74 orange Westy, this one is a '73, but they have had different lives. This one was saddled with home engineering fixes. I took out about a mile of wire from the engine compartment. Four exposed power supply wires sprouted off the positive battery cable and disappeared into the cabinets and across the engine compartment, all UN-FUSED.
There were other oddities for sure. This was supposed to a nice tune-up tutorial, but it got ransacked by outrages. We just had to patiently plough through the myriad of wrong decisions, fuel hose routing, wire ties binding wires to sharp edged metal, a coil ready to slide out of its bracket, and some time around 6:30PM we got the bus to barely barely start for the first time. Yeah, so the brake booster hose was attached to the central idling circuit pipe that was supposed to lead from the central idling circuit outlet on the left carb, the brake booster nipples on the manifolds were blocked off, the breather hose wandered around and terminated in open air, the vacuum advance hose went to the wrong carburetor, just little details.
At 6:30PM, (I was due for a nice dinner with my friend Marc and his lovely wife at 7:30PM nine miles away) the engine lit my arm hairs and eyebrows on fire with an insane July 4th show spewing from the carburetors. This engine is missing parts all over the place, and the hold down clips for the air horns are two of them. I had to both hold the air horns on and try to adjust the fuel mixtures whilst tickling the throttle crossbar. It was hideous. The backfires were blasting black smoke out the tail pipe, and flames up to the headbanger cabinet. I was about to indict the valves for sticking when I touched the electromagnetic cut-off wire loosely hanging on to the right carb. Yeah, runs smooth now. That was too much misbehavior for one stupid wire connector, but there it is. Sam has some parts to scarf up and I have to grow some new arm hair.
Blasted off "hey good luck, Sam, it'll work out!" and jetted through Saint Louis to dinner:
"You smell like you were on fire."
"I was ... but I'm not now."
Fire victim got to spend the night in a basement of a house under construction with no hot water. I did a basement utility sink cold bath with another Pantene hair spa treatment to get rid of some exhaust soot. Stepped out into a thunderstorm and sheets of sideways rain. Drove to McCandmore's house and greeted that lovely family with the crackerjack whipsmart kids, the eleven year-old of whom provided us breakfast.
McCandmore's '74 is the other twin of the Saint Louis Orange Westy Brigade. Can we ponder for just a second the fact that the last three customers ALL had that amazing rare orange plaid interior?
(CLHudson's photographed here)
Steering was at the top of the list. We replaced the drag link as the rain slowly diminished. Then, because we were there, we decided to replace the front shift rod bushing. Fortunately the orange carpet-with-real-orange-footpad, readily pulled off the floor. Unfortunately, the front shift rod collar would not release the two shift rods so we could telescope them together and get access to the bushing. "Yeah, so we will disassemble the rear coupler to obtain required rearward shift." Yeah, but no. Apparently this lovely orange Westy has advanced rust under the undercoating under the car. It was a couple of hours to eventually get the shift rod rearward enough to barely insert the new bushing. Got it all back together and adjusted the stop plate to eventually give us four forward gears and one reverse.
Carb adjustments did not include big blasts of fire singeing the head banger cabinet or my face. This 1800 engine is smooth. I love the short stroke Type 4 engines. The only photographs we are going to be able to share here will come from McCandmore. Another offer of dinner (!) was rejected as I looked at the darkening sky and bailed out to whatever my next campsite would be. I am now in Paducah with a flawlessly running NaranjaWesty at 110,100 miles. Soon, we will pass the BobD's odometer reading ...
Colin