Posts Tagged VW bus
Posted on August 5, 2011 by jason
There are probably a thousand nuts, bolts and screws holding our vehicle together. Most of them aren’t all that important. If you have ever taken something apart, put it back together, and had a few bits left over… you know what I’m talking about. The car will probably still run fine.
Screws fall out all the time. That’s what the our ashtray is for – it holds all the little pieces that have fallen off and we haven’t figured out where they go or had the time to put them back in. None of the interior screws are all that necessary. Half of the bolts in my front skid plate have sheared off and I’m not worried a bit. I’m guessing only half of my engine tin screws are still there. No biggie. Heck, I could lose half of my lug-nuts and I’d probably keep driving.
But, there is one screw in this vehicle that is utterly necessary. There’s only one like it in the whole car, and without this screw, it won’t work. Period.
It has a simple, yet critical job. It holds the points in the distributor in exactly the correct position. Without it, there’s no ignition system and you aren’t going anywhere. The spark plugs won’t spark.
Today while I was doing a tune-up, something I feared might eventually happen finally happened. The screw stripped. You might know the feeling. You’re delicately turning the screwdriver until you feel just exactly the correct amount of snugness when all of a sudden the pressure gives way. As if you don’t believe what just happened, you usually turn it in again and the exact same thing happens again. If you’re a glutton, you’ll do it again hoping you can get away leaving it just a little loose. It never works.
I sat a while and contemplated my predicament. We could be stranded because of one damn screw.
The upshot is that there is no wasting time trying to figure out a patch. There is no work-around. No duct tape fix. Bailing wire isn’t going to help. You need that one special screw. The exact size, even. No substitutes.
I pulled out my potato sack of spare parts that rides under the back bench seat and hoped for the best. I have a spare distributor in there, but it wasn’t set up with points or that screw. Fortunately, I’ve got a ziploc bag of random nuts, bolts, washers, screws, etc. Some of them migrated from the ashtray to this bag. Others, I just picked up along the way. Sometimes I even pick up bolts or screws I find on the ground if it looks like something I might need – I’ve got a pretty good eye for thread sizes and where they might fit on the bus. I don’t recall ever picking up this one.
I did find one screw that would thread in, but it was too long. Length matters here. I considered using a sheet metal screw and forcing it in – generally ruining the distributor in the process. Too brutal. Finally, after more digging (it’s a big bag) I eventually found one that seemed about right. I have no idea where it came from – it was black and Phillips-head – but it fit perfectly.
Sometimes, you’re just lucky.
I know everyone has their own list of essential things to carry along on a road trip. If you are planning one in an air-cooled VW… pack an extra screw. This one.
Why can’t I get just one screw?
-Violent Femmes
Posted on July 31, 2011 by jason
We finally got our chance. The stars aligned, the snow melted, and the aduana tells us we can leave the country in the morning – a 6 AM caravan.
We haven’t explored Chile too much – yet – but we can definitely say that we like it. We’ll zig-zag back over later.
San Pedro was a cool place and we met some good people. When we first drove in, we were greeted with peace signs and a few thumbs-up. We haven’t seen that kind of response in a while and it was a good indicator of what type of place it is.
The food here is stellar. Most of the restaurants have a huge outdoor fire pit and they definitely know how to grill. I think I ate melt-in-your-mouth grilled pork chops 4 nights in a row.
We met some other bus travelers here too. Two girls – an Aussie and a Brit – bought a ’88 Brazilian bus (I could swear it’s 5% smaller than it’s German cousin) in Santiago and are headed north. They broke down and have been here a few weeks just waiting around for someone to help. At a party the other night, they found out about us and came over to see if we had any experience working on VWs. Um, a little.
They plan on traveling for a while, and wanted to learn as much as possible. We spent the better part of the afternoon going over the finer points of valve adjustment and the like. Stories were told. Wisdom was dispensed.
They had killed the battery, the valves were too tight, the carb was too lean and the belt was loose. That was it. Now, they’re good to go and might be able to do some of their own troubleshooting next time. After getting their bus all tuned up and going for a test drive, they offered us a sixer of the local brew. There is no fairer trade in the world.
Now, we’ve officially checked out of Chile and handed in our vehicle paperwork, but are camped right behind the immigration office with all the truckers. This is the best place in town to watch the sunset and the stars here are amazing too- the outer arm of the Milky Way is a bright band across the sky. Tomorrow’s wake up call will probably be the sound of diesel engines firing up before sunrise.
Posted on July 22, 2011 by jason
Here’s the post that everyone was waiting for. Photos of me washing the car. Even a close up of the muffler. Hold your excitement.
We wrongly assumed there would be a car wash in San Pedro since there are so many tour operators and many of the trips through the Salar end here. Nope – it’s the desert – there’s no water.
We did it Peruvian style – down by the river. We found the local stream and pretty much emptied the thing out. It was much higher the previous day, and by the time we were done it was a dry river bed.
The salt situation was investigated. We got everything we could find. There was even salt on the roof. I even hand-washed the engine compartment. Then, I lubed every thread of every bolt, hinge, lock, lever, etc. If I’m not the best owner this bus ever had, I’d like to know who had it before me.
The underside didn’t look too bad, but we also had a layer of borax from the drive a few days ago, so it was tough to tell. We’ll have to wait for a power-sprayer somewhere down the road.
I can tell you that where there was major salt under the car, it wasn’t merely stuck on. It had grown on. Crystallized. In some areas, I had to chisel it off with a hammer. Serious stuff.
And, I fixed the timing light. It’s a > $100 USD Craftsman tool and it failed at the connector. Poor strain relief. Another job for the soldering iron – one of my most useful tools. When I need it, I’m really glad I have it. And, I don’t know why, but I love running the soldering iron off solar power.
Posted on June 30, 2011 by jason
We’re out the door to pick up our new upholstery (hopefully) and hit the road. Adios, Sucre.
We already mentioned the weirdness with all the used Japanese (Chinese?)… uh, Asian buses rumbling through town. Well, a few other vehicles were notable as well.
First, Angela spotted a VW Notchback on her way to class. I don’t think I’ve seen one of these in person in over a decade, so she definitely gets full credit for the Über-rare VW spotting.
I will take credit for spotting the giant VW LT-35 that pulled up beside us at the camp site, though. A cool Austrian couple hopped out and immediately exclaimed “Vee have your big brother!” I didn’t know these existed, and it’s an impressive machine. Kinda like a Syncro on steroids.
And, if you are a Toyota Landcruiser fan, this is your city. It’s crawling with them. Without a doubt, I’ve seen more Landcruisers in Bolivia than anywhere else, and I can say with absolutely certainty that Sucre is the Landcruiser capitol.
That other thing… I have no idea.
Posted on June 26, 2011 by jason
One of the reasons we intended to stay in Sucre a while was to “get some things done.” Sometimes we feel like we have all this stuff to do – and we do – but it’s usually a revolving non-specific list of things that we can never remember. We need to get something accomplished, but don’t know what it is*.
Anyway, after lingering and only getting a few things accomplished here, we decided to hit the road and head over the the highest city in the world – Potosi. But, within a few minutes of pulling out of our camp site, we drove by a tapaceria. That’s an upholstery shop – and hey, that was on our list!
Every seat in the bus is torn (except mine) and this would be a huge thing to cross off our bus project list. Angela had seen this place earlier and we decided to pull over and talk to the guy. He took a quick look at the inside of the bus and said 4oo B for the whole thing. That’s about 60 bucks.
I double checked the price and he assured me it was correct. I showed him the giant cushion in the back for the bed and he nodded that it was included. I explained to him the rear bench seat construction and he nodded that he got it. The rear-facing jump seat… si, si.
This seemed a little too good to be true – the material should cost more than $60 USD. Before we agreed to go ahead, we figured we’d throw in the custom upper bed for Bode. I guarantee he’s never seen one of those before. He didn’t skip and beat and said no problem he’ll include that too for the same price.
Just to be sure, I went over to his shop and inspected some of his work and materials. He showed me what he was working on and there was a guy in the back measuring fabrica and putting it on a machine. Granted, I saw some loose seams, but we just can’t go wrong here if the price sticks. I went back to the bus and grabbed my tools to start pulling out seats. An entire Westfalia custom re-upholstered for 60 bucks. We’ll see how well this works out in a few days.
After that, we had to figure out what to do while we wait a few more days in Sucre. Camping is out, since we now don’t have beds. We found a hostal near downtown – $15 USD a night that includes wifi and secure parking. All of our stuff is now sloshing around the inside of the bus, so it was an interesting ride around town.
After we parked, I could smell the distinct odor of what is probably my clutch, so there is potentially one more major project that could force us to stick around Sucre. I know I smoked it up pretty good climbing a few of the hills on our long trip here. Maybe it will fix itself, maybe it’s trashed. No clue. I’ll take it for a test drive manana and try to figure it out.
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*One of those things is answering email. We do try to answer all of them. This week, Justin at The Great Family Escape asked us about traveling through Peru.
Posted on June 16, 2011 by jason
It took two full days of cleaning and tinkering to get everything back to ‘normal’ after our choice of roads to Sucre the other day.
There was filth – lots of it. We were refused service at a car wash. They even had a power sprayer and wouldn’t take the job. We went back to our campsite and scrubbed and scrubbed. Pulled everything out and scrubbed the inside too. How does road dust get in the closet? The engine compartment had to be cleaned just so I could work on it.
Windshield – 2 cracks – both on passenger side. They will stay for now.
Tires – 1 flat. We discovered the next day. It was a slow leak that turned out to be a blown out patch from the last time. $2 to have it repaired again.
Oil leaks – 2. One from the distributor and one from alternator stand. Maybe it was just time. I found the local VW parts store (Formula Uno) and they had a very cheap looking gasket kit even though they didn’t have a distributor cap. One benefit of the dual carbs is that I can replace the alternator stand gasket fairly easily.
Carburetors – 2 unhappy ones – they were filthy inside and out and I just couldn’t tune them. Finding carb cleaner in this town was a challenge and took hours. I spent half a day disassembling and cleaning them up. Now, they tune up. Good thing I have a sync tool. There was also a new broken choke part – a lever that connects to the throttle control. Another thing for the list.
Oil – how did that get so dirty? How much blacker could it be? “None more black.”
Interior bits – we found all the screws that rattled out and have screwed just about everything back in.
Underside – the front panel that protects the brake master and steering got the puddin’ beaten out of it. The steering linkage now scrapes against it when I turn. I’ll take it off and try to bang it back into shape when I get a chance.
Now, we’re (almost) ready for the next trip.
Posted on May 24, 2011 by jason
The bus has been running terribly when it first starts up – barely going at all, actually. For the most part, we haven’t been under 3500 meters in a month. It’s the cold, it’s the altitude. Well, today I decided to actually do something about it. I would either try to fix that broken choke or just open them up all the way.
Well, first of all, I found out that BOTH the chokes were broken. Same part, but different places. It took a while, but I figured out a way to essentially make a new part with some baling wire and RTV. It now starts right up on the first try. While I was at it, I fixed that damn throttle lever that was coming off all the time. It was too the point where I was stopping every 30 minutes to re-attach it.
Problem is, my carbs are now literally held together with baling wire. Note to the Solex/Kadron people: make components that don’t fall apart when you use them.
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