The Golden Gate
Posted on August 20, 2009 by jason8 Comments
The other day we went for a short cruise up into the Marin Headlands. The idea was to give the bus a road-test with some more aggressive climbing and twisting descents. Little did we know that the real eye-opener would be crossing the bridge in some nasty weather with heavy winds.
The bus is a sail. Bridle the thing properly and you could fly it like a kite. Complicating things even more was having a major amount of slop in the steering box. This one moved up to the top of the list and was easy enough to fix. Grab a 19mm socket and flat headed screwdriver, crawl under the front wheel, adjust the set screw on the box – done. Now when i turn the steering wheel something happens! 
We pulled over in front of the Golden Gate to take some beauty shots (in typical S.F. summer weather) and that’s when I noticed the drips coming from one of the valve covers. Oops. I just adjusted those suckers the previous night and didn’t quite get the gasket lined up right. Another easy one to fix. It also gave us a reason to coast down the hill to Sausalito to fill up and grab some oil. Us and a thousand freezing tourists walking around in shorts and recently-acquired “S.F.” sweatshirts – shivering. If you’re visiting from Nebraska (and please do), bring a jacket… even in the summer.
Anyway, the only major issue still on the list after this drive is the frequent stalling whenever we come to a stop or when i put it in neutral. It doesn’t always happen, but when it does its a real pain. The front disc brakes have a booster that is tied into the engine vacuum line. When the engine cuts out, quite a bit of braking power disappears. It can be a good work-out for the right leg. Not exactly a barrel of monkeys descending some of the steeps around here.
In addition to bus projects, we’re already getting behind on the blog posts. Who knew this was so much work? Now i know why people Tweet. Anyway, we’ll get caught up soon…
Tags: Marin, Sausalito, VW bus
Filed Under: California