04 The Great 2020 Miami Caper w/video!

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Amskeptic
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04 The Great 2020 Miami Caper w/video!

Post by Amskeptic » Wed May 06, 2020 5:11 pm

( prior installment 03: viewtopic.php?f=79&t=14007#p234806 )

Kit just parked Sunshine in the dark, all the questions about the oil leaking and unsettled running had to wait for daylight. Sometimes that is what you have to do, just shut it all down, step away, keep your questions at bay, let it be.

Morning came soon enough. So did asiab3 ( Robbie of Air-Schooled.com ) at the break of day, straight from a red-eye flight from California, showed up at the house courtesy Uber. We had to let Kit awaken when she was ready to awaken after all that distressing unexpected engine difficulty of the night before, so I debriefed exoticdvm on the end of our first phase of his engine overhaul:
a) we disassembled his engine, we discovered that there was oddly excessive crankshaft endplay, a camshaft bearing/gear problem, a leak at the r/s head, and scored cylinder walls.
thus:
b) we are putting in new pistons and cylinders and a used undamaged crankshaft gear (but we are keeping the old razor-repaired camshaft gear) and new engine bearings, we are installing my new Len Hoffman heads and they are going to have all ancilliary parts cleaned and painted by the time I come back to their engine one week hence!
therefore:
c) as we go into the bye week, we are on target to have their engine together as planned, on January 19th, with one subsequent day on stand-by for "contingencies".

This is Kit upon awakening. Her life, her freedom, her chariot, her escape, all have stopped in this moment:

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Within minutes of a cup of coffee, Robbie and I are all over that poor Sunshine engine, a valve adjustment check showed acceptable clearances, cylinder rpm-drop test was pretty much even, mostly, but "what happened? you seem to run OK! why all the oil? where is the oil coming from?" I knew quickly enough that we had a scuffed piston due to oil dripping out between the cylinder head and the #2 cylinder barrel. Well, there was a headwind yesterday, and Kit was cruising for a good couple of hours into the headwind, but dammit, a VW is supposed to handle pretty much all day at full throttle! Yes it is! Hey, look at that air filter! Oh yes, the air filter was as dirty on the filtered side as the non-filtered side. So was the air flow meter. Turns out there were two clips on the "backside" (read: can't see it side) that were dangling loose. We washed the air filter box and the AFM and installed a new air filter, securely clipped and seated. We shall return to this diagnostic gem ... :cyclopsani: )

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Here is Kit, you can feel the churn ... "what happened? what now? how do I avoid these moments where life just throws an unexpected curve ball? when can we dive in and see what happened? How do I maintain a semblance of involvement in the other projects when my heart is in abeyance? Whose that guy looming over me?"
(that guy is Jivermo who reassured her that we will take care of Sunshine, don't worry, this is as good a spot to be as any, we are here already warmed up, we are committed to whatever time it takes, we got this ...)

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... and there goes Jivermo in his Westy, past Naranja and Sunshine, to open a space for her to camp until we indeed do have time to attend to Whatever It Is that ails Sunshine:

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Well that brightens up Kit a bit, and we all wade into the day with two of the pre-eminent traveling mechanics in the country (the only two actually, but who is counting?). Against the above "plan" to release exoticdvm's engine overhaul job for a week, asiab3 (Robbie) and I go in to compare notes on this beautiful Type 4 engine sitting here.

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I am uploading my mental notes to Robbie's mechanical mental processor and we perform a forensics debrief of the chewed camshaft gear and displaced cam bearing and we inspect end play, connecting rod clearances, main bearing clearances, and we need to install the gears onto the crankshaft after the new #3 main bearing is safely stationed (with the dowel hole offset towards the flywheel):

VIDEO
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0XWSEENqJ4

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Our hospitality historian scribe social media hostess kept a close camera on the proceedings with almost hourly updates on Instagram and Facebook. Cranky me is now grateful to have the record to refer to:

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The gears were heated in oil on an old single element GE hotplate, allegedly insulated gloves were donned, the spacer was stationed, and the gears were installed as quickly as possible before the "cold sink" of the crankshaft might shrink them and cause them to stick on the crankshaft too far up from the seated position. This is so not a big deal with any engine but a VW's, the use of a soft brass distributor drive gear means it cannot be hammered into position, it just can't:

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We did a test fit of main bearings and crankshaft with the camshaft and its new bearings, checking for any variations in turning torque. This is a great time to determine end play with a feeler blade between the #1 main bearing and the crankshaft, and we found shims that brought the final end play down to about .003".

https://www.facebook.com/birdingbybus/v ... 029601692/


Through it all, through the confetti of nuts and screws and bolts and micrometers and blasting air compressor cycles and talk, talk of bearing crush and gear mesh and end play and main case bolt dampers and parting line sealant, sandpaper and paint, Kit's heart was heavy with concern for her Sunshine, what happened? what now? when will she be restored to her beloved freedom of movement?

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Meanwhile, my reading "glasses" lose an arm yet again, after a seven year stint of holding together since the last JB-Weld surgery. Ian proffers up a gizmo and I try to glob the arm close enough to the plastic frame/lens to maybe be able to wear them yet again. You can't be too cavalier with $2.99 Walmart readers ... there's books to read, micrometers to read, online posts to write, and I'll tell you what, it is a bit tiring all of this, all of this on January 13th, one week since we descended into this madness of engine overhauling ...

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( next installment 05 : viewtopic.php?f=79&t=14011#p234847 )
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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Amskeptic
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Re: 04 The Great 2020 Miami Caper w/video!

Post by Amskeptic » Tue May 26, 2020 1:35 pm

(place holder post)
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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