Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Atlanta
Posted: Thu May 16, 2019 8:33 am
It was hectic, folks, hectic.
First, I had to recondition the new control arms bought off eBay for Alexus1 up in Atlanta, new grease, smooth the damaged looking arc, then paint them:
Cleaned out then cleaned the 2019 Rodney The Pilot Hosted Art Studio.
Cleaned the Law Firm Volkswagen Project Garage
Loaded Alexus2 with all of the computer and art inventory.
Said good-bye to the finest 1970 Bug in the land:
Changed all of the station presets in the entire house (and the bug) to the local NPR station (that's right, Rodney, I did that). Was heckled out the door by those Lionel Train punks:
Thanked jackstar at the Law Firm for hosting the portable Computer & Art Studio Alexus Storage Unit:
... and plopped me and the control arms into the loaded NaranjaWesty sending it right over the GVWR rating:
Drove to Atlanta. Naranja decided to drive flawlessly at 65 mph head temps at 410* and 19.2 mpg. Richened the mixture in Opelika AL and dropped the fuel economy down to 17.2.
Found my brother at an abandoned gas station in Alpharetta and tore into the Alexus1's front suspension with looming clouds and wind:
Got it done, and took off to the storage unit:
Chloe started right up with a new battery. Yes, the eleven year-old Les Schwab battery finally expired:
We'll see how AutoZone's middling mid-grade battery does. Chloe felt "vibrate-y" after a winter with NaranjaWesty, but what a sweetheart still, light, willing, weak, and always at the first stop "where's the brakes in this thing?":
Cleaned the heck out of the storage unit. Drove to Decatur to the zabo appointment:
This bus has tried the patience of men, but now rewards past perseverance with a solid road-going demeanor. We re-positioned the condensor on the distributor, zabo-kid modified a condensor plug retainer and we stuck that distributor in and statically timed the engine. You know, I was only dimly recognizing that this zabo progeny was pretty effortlessly executing, and he called out my lousy ground choice for the test light long before I triumphantly announced, "this ground choice is not good."
We piled into the spring plate bushing replacement job. Sanded and painted the torsion bar with rust-catalyzing primer:
Ignored steps D, E, F, G, H, I, J, in the Bentley, and did very very basic math to determine the angle we needed and socked that spring plate back in with no index marks, "index marks, we don't need no stinkin' index marks,"
to precisely the angle we wanted plus a half degree. Sure does help to have a 17 year-old's eyes to read the protractor scale marks ...
Drove the beautiful 1960 Beetle to check out its steering (it's fine, just need to break in the new tie rod ends and add a little toe in? out? Ask the tire treads):
Then we drove the bus. No seventeen year-old I have ever driven with has been this relaxed and skillful. Seriously. Flawless hill start, damn close to correct shift points. A true treasure for the future of air-cooled VWs. Kudos to zabo and the kid.
Time does march on. let this be a warning ...
Zabo Colin May 2015
Zabo Colin May 2019
First, I had to recondition the new control arms bought off eBay for Alexus1 up in Atlanta, new grease, smooth the damaged looking arc, then paint them:
Cleaned out then cleaned the 2019 Rodney The Pilot Hosted Art Studio.
Cleaned the Law Firm Volkswagen Project Garage
Loaded Alexus2 with all of the computer and art inventory.
Said good-bye to the finest 1970 Bug in the land:
Changed all of the station presets in the entire house (and the bug) to the local NPR station (that's right, Rodney, I did that). Was heckled out the door by those Lionel Train punks:
Thanked jackstar at the Law Firm for hosting the portable Computer & Art Studio Alexus Storage Unit:
... and plopped me and the control arms into the loaded NaranjaWesty sending it right over the GVWR rating:
Drove to Atlanta. Naranja decided to drive flawlessly at 65 mph head temps at 410* and 19.2 mpg. Richened the mixture in Opelika AL and dropped the fuel economy down to 17.2.
Found my brother at an abandoned gas station in Alpharetta and tore into the Alexus1's front suspension with looming clouds and wind:
Got it done, and took off to the storage unit:
Chloe started right up with a new battery. Yes, the eleven year-old Les Schwab battery finally expired:
We'll see how AutoZone's middling mid-grade battery does. Chloe felt "vibrate-y" after a winter with NaranjaWesty, but what a sweetheart still, light, willing, weak, and always at the first stop "where's the brakes in this thing?":
Cleaned the heck out of the storage unit. Drove to Decatur to the zabo appointment:
This bus has tried the patience of men, but now rewards past perseverance with a solid road-going demeanor. We re-positioned the condensor on the distributor, zabo-kid modified a condensor plug retainer and we stuck that distributor in and statically timed the engine. You know, I was only dimly recognizing that this zabo progeny was pretty effortlessly executing, and he called out my lousy ground choice for the test light long before I triumphantly announced, "this ground choice is not good."
We piled into the spring plate bushing replacement job. Sanded and painted the torsion bar with rust-catalyzing primer:
Ignored steps D, E, F, G, H, I, J, in the Bentley, and did very very basic math to determine the angle we needed and socked that spring plate back in with no index marks, "index marks, we don't need no stinkin' index marks,"
to precisely the angle we wanted plus a half degree. Sure does help to have a 17 year-old's eyes to read the protractor scale marks ...
Drove the beautiful 1960 Beetle to check out its steering (it's fine, just need to break in the new tie rod ends and add a little toe in? out? Ask the tire treads):
Then we drove the bus. No seventeen year-old I have ever driven with has been this relaxed and skillful. Seriously. Flawless hill start, damn close to correct shift points. A true treasure for the future of air-cooled VWs. Kudos to zabo and the kid.
Time does march on. let this be a warning ...
Zabo Colin May 2015
Zabo Colin May 2019