TheSamba.com :: View topic

Sun Feb 07, 2010 11:29 pm

SGKent wrote: I gave up when he suggested creating a balance beam to measure the piston weight. The parts to make that cost more than a cheap postage scale these days. Has anyone seen the price of hardware recently?

Lets not forget the book was written over 40 years ago and a lot has changed in that time. I hardly think Muir was considering the cost of hardware in 2010 when he wrote the book in all those years ago. $10 digital postal scales simply didn't exist back then. There was no internet, no amazon.com, no thesamba.com, etc etc. I'm surre if he wrote the book today, or was still alive to update it the tips and tricks he puts forth in the book would be more up to date. When he died you could still walk into a VW dealership and buy a brand new ACVW right off the showroom floor. I think he did a damn good job with his book and the sales figures seem to lend some validity to that. The Muir book is no Bentley manual for sure, but for someone just starting out in the world of ACVW's, I consider it a must have. The Muir book combined with a Bentley manual is a no lose situation for any home mechanic.

Sun Feb 07, 2010 11:31 pm

old DKP driver wrote: they call it the IDIOT'S guide (Muir) to VW repair.
and not a factory (Bentley) repair manual.And, That's why we all all come here.To share what we have learned and pass it on to those who choose to learn. :shock: Refer to the service manual first and that will eliminate 3/4 of the questions you will ask here. Or ask here first and get every type of opposing advice you could ever dream of. Then the only way to find out which is good advice and which is garbage is to go to the manual to see what VW say's. Save yourself and everyone else a lot of time by checking the book first. If you don't think you need the info in the service manual to do your wrenching, maybe a disposable Honda would be a much better choice than a ACVW. It's not that VW's are that difficult to work on it's that they are too important of a vehicle to willfully or ignorantly destroy. :wink:

Sun Feb 07, 2010 11:40 pm

Quote: And yes, i knew who he was way back in the 70's when in one of his discussions he said,..."(quote") take 2 ball pein hammers and hit them together to drive the rear axle into the housing.....Whoops!!! NO Safety glasses on...a piece of steel thru the young mans eye leaving him with an detached retina.
actually fyi on this - I was splitting some wood one day and using wedges driven by a hammer. Something hit me in high the chest that felt like a huge bee sting. A piece of shrapnel had hit me. If spun around like a low velocity 22 caliber bullet where it had hit and lodged up against my ribs. The doctor extracted it the next day but before he did one of the doctors said - "I'll bet you were splitting wood weren't you? I see these all the time." All I could think was thank God it wasn't my eye that it hit. Banging any two pieces of tempered steel together is really a bad idea.

This really isn't the forum for old cars but an old friend sent me this link tonight and I wanted to share them with someone who appreciates older cars. They are all models. Maybe some of you might enjoy this also.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24796741@N05/sets/72157604247242338/show/with/2346008881/

Mon Feb 08, 2010 8:08 am

That guy is nuts!

Very cool.