'71 Australian Super Beetle

[Marco_VESS]

Yeah they've done a great job of repairing it. Colour is called Moss Green, which I think was an Australia-only colour. (The same factory also built certain Volvo and Datsun models at the time, and I have seen Moss Green on a couple of older Datsuns).

[Marco_VESS]

It lives! (But there has been a casualty...)

The more attentive among you will recall that I ordered a new voltage regulator and some carbon brushes. A few weekends ago I replaced the carbon brushes, which were well and truly below spec length. Compare the pair:

There's two in the generator, held in by a small screw. Top one was easy enough, but the bottom one just wouldn't undo. It didn't help that I was doing it left-handed (I'm not) and at an awkward angle as you're both working from below the generator, and there's not much room between the generator and the bottom sheet metal in the engine bay to get a screwdriver in. I tried all sorts of screwdrivers - I even went and bought a sort of Swiss Army knife screwdriver set type of thing in the hope of getting some leverage - but nothing worked. Then I worked out a way to do it right handed...and it undid.

Must work that left arm more at the gym...

Tightening it again was another thing. The screw was not magnetised, and dropped into the engine bay somewhere. Uh-oh. Luckily, there's a hole in the sheet metal under the generator area so it just came out the bottom of the car. Another fourteen times, until I got a lump of blu-tac, stuck the screw to the screwdriver that way, and that worked.

(My three year old calls blu-tac "gloopy glue". I don't know why.)

Two weeks later, the voltage regulator that was allegedly in stock when I ordered it arrived, having been back ordered after all. Thinking I would need to change the connectors, I bought a soldering iron and got my Dad to teach me how to use it. But when I went to do the job today, it was clear that there wasn't really enough give left in the wiring to cut the old connectors off, strip back the wiring, and solder new connectors on. I could see a risk of pulling something too tight and having other electrical issues. So, two choices: solder new connectors to the end of the old connectors, or screw them on if I could. That should be doable, the new regulator had small holes in its connectors, they'd just need to be enlarged slightly. Right, I'll try that first before soldering, off to Bunnings we go for some short, self tapping screws.

I have this air freshener in the Beetle that was a freebie with a T-shirt I bought of the same design. It's a VW ad from the 60s:

It was ironically appropriate today, because:

On the way home, Engine Overheat Warning flashed up on the dashboard and the needle was just short of red. Pulled over ASAP and shut it down, lifted the bonnet and there is coolant everywhere. Some of it is even down the side of the car, so it must have sprayed out the side of the bonnet under some pressure. Something's come off, obviously. While I wait for the NRMA, I have a better look and if emerges that the tube at the top of the radiator where the top hose connects to has broken off.

Impossible, indeed. For a moment there it seems I had a uniquely air-cooled LS engine...

Anyway, the hose was temporarily reattached to what remained of the tube, filled with water, overheated again 100m down the road, filled again, boiled that, etc. Eventually settled down, drove gently home and will need to get that sorted Monday. Hopefully no harm done to my engine from the brief overheat

After that excitement, the rest of the Beetle job was easy. Carefully transferred one cable at a time to the new regulator to avoid mistakes. Being a Mexican made part, the instructions were in Spanish:

But no matter, I'm fluent in Italian which means I can read Spanish (and French) and understand most of it - just don't try and speak it to me.

All in place:

And the moment of truth...I even had my fire extinguisher to hand just in case...and no start.

Bear in mind though that the Beetle had not run for over two months. I'd even siphoned fuel out of it for my mower it had become such an ornament. So, pump the pedal some more, crank some more and...hooray! dak dak dak dak dak dak....

Just in time for the biggest Canberra car show of the year . Generator warning light is still on, so my new carbon brushes didn't fix that after all, but it's running again so that's a problem for another day.

[Hyperspace]

It still looks like the guy put too little yellow in the repaired fender.

PS, I bet there is a second pic somewhere of a beetle with flames pouring out the back, that says Possible!.
_________________
If you can't fix it with a hammer, it is an electrical fault.

Photo's http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/album_search.php?search_author=Hyperspace&show_results=summary

[oldPSUguy]

[Hyperspace]

yes, if it is very light, just rub it with wet tin foil. alternatively use a fine grit sanding paper to lift off the thicker stuff, then use a buff wheel with chrome polish on a bench grinder. Some very crusty looking chrome will come out new looking this way.
_________________
If you can't fix it with a hammer, it is an electrical fault.

Photo's http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/album_search.php?search_author=Hyperspace&show_results=summary

[Marco_VESS]

[Marco_VESS]

As of yesterday I've owned this car for a year - who'd have thought!

Just some fiddling about with the little stuff this weekend. I noticed when I bought the car that a few of the rubber seals were shot, like so:

...and I'd been meaning to get on to it, but when this sort of thing started happening my anti-untidy-car gene cried "enough!":

So I ordered new bonnet and decklid seals ($15 and $11 respectively, I love the price of parts for this car!) and set to work yesterday. The seals themselves are held in by a metal lip that goes around the boot/engine bay, and a how-to video I watched suggested I might need to lever up on the lip itself to release the seal. No problem at all with the engine bay seal - old one came off easily and the new one went in just as easily:

Boot seal wasn't quite as easy, and the screwdriver was needed to pry the lip up a little to release the seal - I must admit I cringed having to do this in such an untidy way:

...and you can see some evidence of the problem I discovered (that I forgot to snap a pic of) when I lifted the seal off, which is that it traps moisture. There's a little bit of rust all the way around the lip which needs a cleanup before I'll be happy to put the new seal on. It's not serious, but there's all these minor spots of rust everywhere you look around this car. Seems a shame to allow a car which has survived 42 years of regular use to slowly succumb to minor rust like this, so I think better to stop it than ignore it.

Anyway, the bonnet seal came off in one tidy piece in the end.

I think I'll order new seals for the front indicators and number plate light, and maybe both doors as well - all of them are either UV damaged or torn, and detract from what is now a far tidier car than the one I drove home a year ago.

[Iaccount]

I've just joined to and have a Moss Green 1971 Superbug. Think yours must be Henry's sister. Hope you enjoy it as much as I do!

[Marco_VESS]

Excellent! I've seen another two around Canberra as well surprisingly.

[Marco_VESS]

And so it came to pass that it was time to move on. When I pulled this car out of the garage last month and realised I hadn't driven it since May, and I felt like I'd done everything to it that I could, or wanted to, do I knew it was time to sell.

Fortunately I've found an enthusiastic buyer who knows Beetles well and I'm confident will give it a good home. He's picking it up tomorrow.

It's been fun. I'm going to miss this car.