TheSamba.com :: View topic - Miami to Alaska Road Trip www.marcandeliana.com

Sat Aug 02, 2008 10:12 am

What a terrific trip! Two young people in love, a sweet bay window bus, North America spread out before them and all the time in the world.

I have to go to my room and cry a bit now for my lost youth. :wink:

Sat Aug 02, 2008 2:19 pm

I just skimmed through your blog a bit. Great trip!

My wife and I did something similar 15 years ago in our bus...15,000 miles around the US and Canada. One important lesson I learned on that trip is to carry a few extra fuel filters, and change them every few thousand miles. You tend to get lots of crappy gas on long road trips, and filters get clogged. That's the first thing that came to mind when I read your blog entry on the 29th. Change out that filter. It only takes about 10 minutes to do, even on the side of the road. :wink:

Sat Aug 09, 2008 4:14 pm

We took Valentina to her first VW show. ;o) You can read more about it here:

http://www.marcandeliana.com/marcandeliana/Blog_Main/Entries/2008/8/3_Entry_1.html

Enjoy!!

Wed Sep 10, 2008 9:14 pm

They have showed up in Seattle now and I got a chance to meet them today.
Tomorrow we'll pull the engine to fix that oil leak. I raided my stash to locate a few missing items on their Westy that should help along the way. We'll figure out the no heat issue too.

Wed Sep 10, 2008 10:48 pm

Awesome post Geoff! We've made it back to the lower 48 after 5 amazing weeks in Alaska. Seattle is great and we are looking forward to learning how to pull the engine and repair some odds and ends on the bus with the big-hearted and benevolent Bleyseng!
We're behind on our blog about 5 or 6 days thanks to a major iWeb glitch that we've just finished ironing out. Cheers from the road, 12,000 miles and counting! The next 2 months will be spent in Washington, Oregon, and California, traveling down the Pacific coast. Woo-hoooo!!!! Check us out online at http://www.marcandeliana.com
Marc & Eliana

Wed Sep 10, 2008 10:59 pm

great thread..hopefully my wife and I will do something similar :D

Thu Sep 11, 2008 7:11 am

What? pull the engine together? :lol:

Thu Sep 11, 2008 8:50 am

If you are coming down through northern cal I live about 1 hour or so from tahoe..you guys are welcome to stop by, use any tools in my garage or if you just need a hot shower and some coffee..your more than welcome to stop in (that is if you don't mind two little ones running around! :)please let me know (pm us) if. wecan be of assistance. This trip sounds like an epic one!!
John

Thu Sep 11, 2008 8:55 pm

Motor is out and drove Marc around to source a rebuilt flywheel and some other parts to complete the repairs. Marc's had a pretty decent grove on the oil sealing surface so time to switch it out.

Sat Sep 13, 2008 5:20 pm

Engine is back in and running but needs the valves adjusted. #1&2 were banging pretty good and we ran it for quite awhile to try to pump up the lifters.
Marc is gonna have to check em, he is learning all about how to do the work himself. \:D/

We did change alot of the fuel hoses and changed the hose at the injectors plus new seals. All this was OEM and pretty crusty..glad it didn't leak on the trip.

We did get the heat working great so no more cold morning drives. :shock:

I ran outta time to help tonight as my other half has the evening planned with no carwork. #-o

Sat Sep 13, 2008 5:26 pm

Where are you planning on going from Seattle? You should really try to check out Leavenworth, WA, my husband and I love it there, we're only about an hour away and go every chance we get. If your planning on being in the area you should pm us and we'll try to work something out. :bus_orange:

Fri Sep 19, 2008 6:28 pm

Good news! Engine is back in, and the road trip continues. 12,000 miles and counting!

In the last week (in Seattle), having dropped the engine, we performed the following repairs with the help of Samba's "Bleyseng":

Replaced flywheel
Replaced main oil seal
Replaced clutch disc
Replaced lots of old fuel hose
Replaced fuel injector seals
Sealed up the leaky exhaust
Replaced a missing heater cover panel and got the heater working again!
Siliconed the leaky windshield seal
Replaced front shifter rod bushing
Adjusted the hydraulic valves
Adjusted the fuel:air ratio using a digital exhaust meter

Now that the engine is back in, we are having some sort of new engine stuttering problem that occurs at high RPM's. While cruising at steady speeds the engine runs fine, but when accelerating up into the high RPM range, the engine loses power in short bursts like it's stuttering. To try and remedy that, I freshened up a few things in the ignition system (new points, new distributor cap, new spark plugs, cleaned the rotor), but the problem persists. What can I troubleshoot next?

Thanks for following our road trip thread!

Fri Sep 19, 2008 7:00 pm

I would guess the points gap is incorrect or your fuel/air mixture is wrong. I just went through the exact same symptoms after adjusting both. Check them again.

Mon Sep 22, 2008 7:27 pm

You may also want to check the resistor track inside the AFM unit for wear; had a similar issue myself, and this was the culprit. If this is the case, you can rebend the arm slightly so it makes contact in a different location.

Tue Sep 23, 2008 10:03 pm

I told Marc my guess is the dizzy advance plate is dirty.

Tonight he stopped by for more fixing on the bus and yes, it was a dirty advance plate. His Westy is now pointless! yep, I installed a pertronix in it to get rid of his point problems. Retimed it to a pretty steady 27 degrees at 3500 rpms hoses off and it runs like a champ.

We poked around fixing a few more things and made a list of missing or incorrect parts.

Monique and I said "Good bye" as they are leaving Seattle tomorrow.

Good luck.

Sun Oct 12, 2008 10:06 pm

We are still alive and well and have made it to San Francisco. The adventure continues!

Our distributor is acting up again; it must need another cleaning as we are having a relapse of the same problem we had in Seattle -- where the engine "misses" after exceeding a certain RPM range. Need to work on that one. It's getting kind of annoying not being able to drive above 53 mph!

Mon Oct 13, 2008 12:01 am

exoticdvm wrote: We are still alive and well and have made it to San Francisco. The adventure continues!

Our distributor is acting up again; it must need another cleaning as we are having a relapse of the same problem we had in Seattle -- where the engine "misses" after exceeding a certain RPM range. Need to work on that one. It's getting kind of annoying not being able to drive above 53 mph!

With the Pertronix in there dirt shouldn't be an issue. Could be a bum ignition coil. Locate a VW shop in town and they're likely to let you use a timing light to verify your timing. If you do get a new coil be sure and get the correct one since your using a Pertronix. Just to add, you'd be better off not running your fuel tank down to near empty, you'll start pulling crap off the bottom of the tank and into the fuel system. Since your gauge isn't working you'd be better off topping off whenever you get the opportunity.

Mon Oct 13, 2008 6:41 am

dirt and sand are an issue under the advance plate which doesn't turn freely. :cry: I wasn't able to take the whole dizzy apart for em, so maybe someone in SF can.
On the brighter side, your mpg must have gone up if you can only go 53mph! :roll:

http://www.glenn-ring.com/010/ check this out on dizzy cleaning

Mon Oct 13, 2008 9:58 pm

Quote: you'd be better off not running your fuel tank down to near empty, you'll start pulling crap off the bottom of the tank and into the fuel system.
Yeah, but the fuel line is atttached directly to the bottom of the tank, so , in essence, you are ALWAYS pulling crap off the bottom of the tank! 8)

Mon Oct 13, 2008 10:02 pm

Bleyseng wrote: dirt and sand are an issue under the advance plate which doesn't turn freely. :cry: I wasn't able to take the whole dizzy apart for em, so maybe someone in SF can.
On the brighter side, your mpg must have gone up if you can only go 53mph! :roll:

http://www.glenn-ring.com/010/ check this out on dizzy cleaning

Quote from Marks Site:

"I consulted our fuel log book, and indeed, the last gas-up was 230 miles prior. That’s typically a full tank of cruising for us. Shucks."

Figure he's got a 15 gallon tank or so. That averages out to approximately 15.3 mpg :shock: Something is up. They should be fairing better than that.