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Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2011 3:09 pm
by BellePlaine
After my second visit from Amskeptic, my bus is running better than I ever realized that it could. It is running smoother, cooler, and has more power than before. It takes a guy like Colin to let you know that you’ve been using spark plugs meant for a beetle and not a bus. But I’m getting a head of myself.

Preparing for my itinerary visit began weeks earlier by asking my neighbor, who works for the owner of the building that used to be the old downtown GM dealership, to borrow the old Keup Motors garage. Since I don’t have a useable garage at my home, I thought that it would be a good idea to find some cover from this rainy spring. I made a deal with the building manager and I had use of this old building for a few days. The best part was that the garage came with two lifts!
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Colin was to arrive on Thursday, so I took Wednesday to drop the engine and transmission so we could jump right to work.
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My list had many items to accomplish but the meat of the visit was to rethread the #1 sparkplug port and an intake manifold stud port at the same head. That’s when Colin says, “why do you have beetle plugs”? I don’t know, good question. The good news is that a T1 plug has about ½ as much thread as a T4 plug. My weak threads were only at the top half of my head, the bottom threads were good and strong. We dodged a bullet because we didn’t need to retap those threads. Same situation with the manifold stud, we screwed down the stud until we found strong threads.
Next, we separated the engine from the transmission to learn that my 1974 1800 AW engine and 1976 091 6-rib transmission is using a little 210mm clutch and pressure plate. The opening of an 8 mm box-end wrench won’t quite fit over the edge of the clutch disc which means my disc is middle aged. The limit is if the disc will fit inside of a 7 mm wrench. The disc and pressure plate from my other engine wasn’t bigger or in better condition so we removed the “glaze” from the surfaces using 220 emery cloth and a 45 cross-hatch sanding.

Sorry for the blurry pic.
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We also determined that my endplay was at 0.009” when the limit is 0.003 – 0.006 and there is also a bit of “clunkish” circular movement from the #1 crankshaft bearing. It moves like this.
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Colin said that he hated being the grim reaper but a rebuild is in my future. (But not right now).

If that’s the worst news that I get this year then that is fine with me.

Apparently there is a T4 endplay shim shortage of the thickest ones and the shims that I had were not as thick as they needed to be. You have to set the endplay using only 3 shims no more, no less. Only three shims provide the proper oil shear. Colin was only able to reduce my endplay to 0.0065 but that is better then what it was.
We finished the day installing the engine/transmission into the car and buttoning up some oil leaks. Colin gave the AFM a proper adjustment (I had set it too rich, probably because of the wrong spark plugs) and we went for a test drive. After a couple more AFM adjustments, Colin concluded that the engine was running very well and he couldn’t hear the bearing knock. That’s nice, huh?

Colin left and I caught up with him for a bit at bradgt74’s house on Saturday. Brad, feel free to rap about it here if you like.
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I just took “Spiderman” on a 14 mile hilly lap around a section of the Minnesota River, it’s my usual cruise. Image

I love my bus.

Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2011 4:44 pm
by Ryno
Cool writeup man!!...did you document your spare tire to luggage rack mod?..I dig that!

Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2011 5:14 pm
by whc03grady
I wish I knew enough of the right people around here to secure A HUGE EMPTY GARAGE WITH A FREAKING LIFT for Colin's visit. Beyond awesome.

Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2011 5:55 pm
by BellePlaine
Ryno wrote:Cool writeup man!!...did you document your spare tire to luggage rack mod?..I dig that!
Thanks Ryno. Wasn't it you that told me about a Riviera in Chicago that had it's spare up in the luggage rack? That's where I got the idea. There is a short bit about in on page 7 of my build thread on the samba, here: http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewto ... sc&start=0
whc03grady wrote:I wish I knew enough of the right people around here to secure A HUGE EMPTY GARAGE WITH A FREAKING LIFT for Colin's visit. Beyond awesome.
I agree. I've been day dreaming about launching a retirment business of some sort from this shop. Here's some more photos; the old dealership consisted of two levels. They would winch cars up and down a pretty steep ramp to store or show them on the second level. Totally wild and a representation of an era gone by.

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Here you can see the service door and the garage door to the ramp which would bring the cars to the upper level.
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Here's the upper level; you can see the ramp in the far end of the room.
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The winch.
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The ramp.
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A view of Our Lady of the Prairie from the second level.
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The service door and Spiderman.
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Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2011 9:26 pm
by airkooledchris
whc03grady wrote:I wish I knew enough of the right people around here to secure A HUGE EMPTY GARAGE WITH A FREAKING LIFT for Colin's visit. Beyond awesome.
what he said. jeeeez that would be nice.

nice writeup, and thanks for sharing. sorry to hear of the bad news, but it's nice to know ahead of time so you can plan for it and do it at your leisure than in a pinch way down the road from now.

Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2011 3:32 am
by poptop tom
Nice writeup, Chris! And good accomplishments on the bus; other than the "bad" news.
But thats nothing you can't handle. I can attest to that.

Having a lift is such a help. That I can also attest to! :pirate: How high were the ceilings where the lifts were? They appear lower in the basement than in the showroom.
And that ramp and winch is wild! That looks pretty steep. Did you hook the BobD up and winch that baby up into the showroom? :joker:

Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2011 3:04 pm
by Sylvester
Someone needs to open up a ACVW shop for stateside service in that shop!

Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2011 5:24 pm
by Lanval
Sylvester wrote:Someone needs to open up a ACVW shop for stateside service in that shop!
Not enough AC to keep it open anywhere but here in SoCal, maybe in the SF area. There are in fact AC devoted businesses here, and that's why. I routinely see show quality air-cooleds just driving around here; it's crazy, but that's SoCal.

Mike

Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Tue Jun 28, 2011 5:51 pm
by BellePlaine
Lanval wrote:
Sylvester wrote:Someone needs to open up a ACVW shop for stateside service in that shop!
Not enough AC to keep it open anywhere but here in SoCal...

Mike
Hey! I'm not done dreaming over here! :rr:

Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Wed Jun 29, 2011 9:55 am
by Sylvester
Hey Colin, since you are in Minnesota what is the weather like, and how is the journey so far from Wisconson?

Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2011 5:24 am
by Amskeptic
Sylvester wrote:Hey Colin, since you are in Minnesota what is the weather like, and how is the journey so far from Wisconson?
I am in Nebraska just about to hit the Wyoming border. Minnesota was beautiful, I have never seen such lush greens under such rich greys. I should have photographed that countryside. Shuddawuddacudda.
YESTERDAY!! was the first time in this itinerary where I had TWO SUCCESSIVE sunny days!!!
ColinComingOutFromUnderCloud

Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2011 11:37 am
by chitwnvw
How do you determine
a bit of “clunkish” circular movement from the #1 crankshaft bearing.
, is it turning over by hand and feeling it?

Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Fri Jul 01, 2011 8:03 am
by Ryno
It was me who mentioned that to you BP. I was in need of a refresher in my minds eye of how you did it...Thanks for the linky.

Re: Colin Visits Minnesota

Posted: Fri Jul 01, 2011 8:13 am
by Sylvester
Amskeptic wrote:
Sylvester wrote:Hey Colin, since you are in Minnesota what is the weather like, and how is the journey so far from Wisconson?
I am in Nebraska just about to hit the Wyoming border. Minnesota was beautiful, I have never seen such lush greens under such rich greys. I should have photographed that countryside. Shuddawuddacudda.
YESTERDAY!! was the first time in this itinerary where I had TWO SUCCESSIVE sunny days!!!
ColinComingOutFromUnderCloud
Well, don't forget going forward to stop and take a few shots and post them. For as Don Williams once said, "The road of life twists and turns and no two directions are ever the same. Yet our lessons come from the journey, not the destination.”