Itinerant Air-Cooled Prep II (upd)
Posted: Tue May 20, 2014 9:59 am
After putting in the new plastic window chrome surround experiment (if the guy comes up with the longer lengths, I will do the left side of the car where the chrome is getting that brown burnt look), I decided to what the heck paint the entire exhaust system again. Straightening and painting the tailpipe had like totally like *imbalanced the visual* under there, fer sure.
As Pensacola was enjoying its annual "Art In The Park" weekend just a half block from the Law Firm, I had the most wonderful music wafting over, New Orleans River Jazz with a horn section at the top of its game. The weather was a perfect 85*, low humidity, abundant sunshine.
I had painted the exhaust system at 52,000 miles in a buggy field back in September of 2010,
( viewtopic.php?f=58&t=8735#p156991 )
and was very happy to discover that the now 93,850 mile system had not deteriorated in any appreciable way in the past four years. It came apart like I was shooting a Bentley Manual video.
The bad news is, the underside of the car now has lost the appearance of all those nice original gold cadmium-plated screws, they are now sporting a lousy silver hi-temp paint:
upd 05/21 . . . forgot to mention that I "ported" all the exhaust flanges. I had noted that the welds seemed to promote a nasty rust inside the pipes. It appeared to be caused by extreme heat in localized areas where the weld metal was a) in the airstream, b) where protrusions could not conduct heat away. I used a dremel grinding stone to smooth all radii and grind down welds just enough for smoothness. I recommend this operation for all late model triangular flange exhaust system bus people:
The good news is, that because I was not on a dirt road dead-end this time, I was able to brush/sand/soapy water brush/hot water rinse all of the parts . . . .
. . . . before painting them again with the VHT 2000* flat aluminum, this time also with a high temp primer:
Whilst executing this operation in the sunshine during the Pensacola Art In The Park weekend, I was being treated to a parade of the curious, a few well-wishers, and three teenage girls whose conversation I got to overhear while under the bus trying to finagle a nut onto a bolt in a tight spot:
"Wow, look at that cute van!"
"I wish I had me one."
"That is soo cute, I love the green."
"Its like a Scooby van."
"Hey, you have a cute van!"
"Gaw-hawd, he's ignoring me."
I had parts draped on the electric meter, dangling off the tailgate, and people commenting as they walked past to the Art In The Park festival.
"Dude, I want that bus."
"It looks like he is fixing it."
"Yeah, you have to work on them all the time."
"Still be fun to drive."
While putting on the right side manifold, I was startled by an enthusiastic elderly couple somehow materializing at the back of the bus:
"THAT IS THE EXACT COLOR OF OUR OLD BUS! HONEY, DON'T YOU REMEMBER?"
"Of course I remember."
"WHAT DID YOU PAY FOR IT IF I MAY ASK?"
"I don't remember."
"NO, THE MAN, MISTER, IF I MAY ASK, WHAT DID YOU PAY FOR IT?"
Used my unusable sheet of buna-nitrile diaphragm material to re-fashion the gaskets that maintain an air-tight seal between the exchanger air inlet and the fan housing. I used weatherstrip adhesive that came exploding out of the tube in the heat, making myself look like a neuron with yellow dendrites attaching themselves to everything I inadvertently touched:
"You look busy!"
"I am."
"What are you doing?
"Gluing myself to my car."
"Ha ha, that's funny, you sure are."
]
The BobD's engine lost its originality in another important way this last weekend, its original dipstick boot had begun to split down the seam. Grabbed my Wolfsburg West replacement out of the glovebox and wrestled it around and around and around until it finally realized where it was supposed to go. Cleaned the nether regions of the engine while the manifolds were out, and noted that even a factory air-cooled engine build will start to leak after endless expansion and contraction cycles. There was oil beginning to ooze out from the cylinder barrels/crankcase mating area, pushrod tubes were getting damp at the crankcase bores, and the oil filter mount gasket is soon going to be the first driveway spotter. "Y'all hang on, we're tearing you down come winter."
A young couple came up. She was, to put it charitably, ditzy. He was stoic and patient. After many minutes of cascading words and stops and starts, it was determined that she liked her Cabriolet Convertible that she unfortunately sold for a Honda Odyssey that is currently in the shop. The cat watched it all:
At 7:00PM or so, the exchanger-to-heat control valve pipe refused to slip over the exchanger. You all (all remaining six of you) have heard me rant and rave about people bending up and bashing their engine tin and smashing their heat pipes. Well, there I was, wrestling the fresh and still delicate painted exchanger which refused to slip inside the pipe. On my back with a toweled knee holding up the exchanger, I loosened six nuts and bolts on the flanges, removed the clamp bolt on the pipe, removed the control valve itself, removed the u-pipe, and finally had to remove the engine tin screws that held together the front tin/upper cylinder cover/heat pipe bracket/intermediate front tin to allow me to twist the stupid pipe down onto the wobbling exchanger. Temper flaring, tools draped all over my stomach, I find that I cannot for the life of me get those *@%! screws to go down through the four competing tins whilst on my back holding up the wobbling exchanger to keep the pipe properly down yet aligned with the tins. I was so ready to go chimpanzee to heck with it strip-drive those screws down. Only because they felt like it, did they finally get started. NOW look what time it is . . .
Always Wax Your Konis . . . you never know when someone might shoot a picture of them:
Night Of The BobD
As Pensacola was enjoying its annual "Art In The Park" weekend just a half block from the Law Firm, I had the most wonderful music wafting over, New Orleans River Jazz with a horn section at the top of its game. The weather was a perfect 85*, low humidity, abundant sunshine.
I had painted the exhaust system at 52,000 miles in a buggy field back in September of 2010,
( viewtopic.php?f=58&t=8735#p156991 )
and was very happy to discover that the now 93,850 mile system had not deteriorated in any appreciable way in the past four years. It came apart like I was shooting a Bentley Manual video.
The bad news is, the underside of the car now has lost the appearance of all those nice original gold cadmium-plated screws, they are now sporting a lousy silver hi-temp paint:
upd 05/21 . . . forgot to mention that I "ported" all the exhaust flanges. I had noted that the welds seemed to promote a nasty rust inside the pipes. It appeared to be caused by extreme heat in localized areas where the weld metal was a) in the airstream, b) where protrusions could not conduct heat away. I used a dremel grinding stone to smooth all radii and grind down welds just enough for smoothness. I recommend this operation for all late model triangular flange exhaust system bus people:
The good news is, that because I was not on a dirt road dead-end this time, I was able to brush/sand/soapy water brush/hot water rinse all of the parts . . . .
. . . . before painting them again with the VHT 2000* flat aluminum, this time also with a high temp primer:
Whilst executing this operation in the sunshine during the Pensacola Art In The Park weekend, I was being treated to a parade of the curious, a few well-wishers, and three teenage girls whose conversation I got to overhear while under the bus trying to finagle a nut onto a bolt in a tight spot:
"Wow, look at that cute van!"
"I wish I had me one."
"That is soo cute, I love the green."
"Its like a Scooby van."
"Hey, you have a cute van!"
"Gaw-hawd, he's ignoring me."
I had parts draped on the electric meter, dangling off the tailgate, and people commenting as they walked past to the Art In The Park festival.
"Dude, I want that bus."
"It looks like he is fixing it."
"Yeah, you have to work on them all the time."
"Still be fun to drive."
While putting on the right side manifold, I was startled by an enthusiastic elderly couple somehow materializing at the back of the bus:
"THAT IS THE EXACT COLOR OF OUR OLD BUS! HONEY, DON'T YOU REMEMBER?"
"Of course I remember."
"WHAT DID YOU PAY FOR IT IF I MAY ASK?"
"I don't remember."
"NO, THE MAN, MISTER, IF I MAY ASK, WHAT DID YOU PAY FOR IT?"
Used my unusable sheet of buna-nitrile diaphragm material to re-fashion the gaskets that maintain an air-tight seal between the exchanger air inlet and the fan housing. I used weatherstrip adhesive that came exploding out of the tube in the heat, making myself look like a neuron with yellow dendrites attaching themselves to everything I inadvertently touched:
"You look busy!"
"I am."
"What are you doing?
"Gluing myself to my car."
"Ha ha, that's funny, you sure are."
]
The BobD's engine lost its originality in another important way this last weekend, its original dipstick boot had begun to split down the seam. Grabbed my Wolfsburg West replacement out of the glovebox and wrestled it around and around and around until it finally realized where it was supposed to go. Cleaned the nether regions of the engine while the manifolds were out, and noted that even a factory air-cooled engine build will start to leak after endless expansion and contraction cycles. There was oil beginning to ooze out from the cylinder barrels/crankcase mating area, pushrod tubes were getting damp at the crankcase bores, and the oil filter mount gasket is soon going to be the first driveway spotter. "Y'all hang on, we're tearing you down come winter."
A young couple came up. She was, to put it charitably, ditzy. He was stoic and patient. After many minutes of cascading words and stops and starts, it was determined that she liked her Cabriolet Convertible that she unfortunately sold for a Honda Odyssey that is currently in the shop. The cat watched it all:
At 7:00PM or so, the exchanger-to-heat control valve pipe refused to slip over the exchanger. You all (all remaining six of you) have heard me rant and rave about people bending up and bashing their engine tin and smashing their heat pipes. Well, there I was, wrestling the fresh and still delicate painted exchanger which refused to slip inside the pipe. On my back with a toweled knee holding up the exchanger, I loosened six nuts and bolts on the flanges, removed the clamp bolt on the pipe, removed the control valve itself, removed the u-pipe, and finally had to remove the engine tin screws that held together the front tin/upper cylinder cover/heat pipe bracket/intermediate front tin to allow me to twist the stupid pipe down onto the wobbling exchanger. Temper flaring, tools draped all over my stomach, I find that I cannot for the life of me get those *@%! screws to go down through the four competing tins whilst on my back holding up the wobbling exchanger to keep the pipe properly down yet aligned with the tins. I was so ready to go chimpanzee to heck with it strip-drive those screws down. Only because they felt like it, did they finally get started. NOW look what time it is . . .
Always Wax Your Konis . . . you never know when someone might shoot a picture of them:
Night Of The BobD