A Black & Blue Su-BUS-aroo Build Thread...

fROMOHIO · Posted: Thu Sep 25, 2014 11:29 am Post subject:

[quote="Nepenthe88"]Ok, so I laid that garage mat to cover the floor, and used another piece to cover the shelf. I like the way it looks and probably WON"T cover the shelf in blue plaid as it ties the horiontal surfaces together aesthetically (and practically) They're geared for true abuse now!

Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.

That black floor and shelf does more than just tie it together. That is so eye-pleasing that it should be the design of every bus! nice work, dude!

Where is that garage floor stuff from?
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'72 Bay Window Westy
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Nepenthe88 · Posted: Thu Sep 25, 2014 12:43 pm Post subject:

fROMOHIO · Posted: Thu Sep 25, 2014 12:47 pm Post subject:

Nepenthe88 · Posted: Thu Sep 25, 2014 12:53 pm Post subject:

Ok.
sooooo... I live in NYS and in order to get my little tiny trailer registered I have to jump through all sorts of hoops. Gotta get it weighed, take pictures of it, have receipts, drive back and forth to the DMV three or four times...and it'll cost me like $200. Ridiculous! and way too much rigamarole. So. I'm going to go the low cost, don't leave your couch option and register the bloody thing in Maine Very Happy

All ya gotta do is call the Maine Dept of Motor Vehicles at: 1-207-624-9000, ext. 52151. Tell them you would like to register a trailer as a NON-Resident. Give them your address. They will send a pack of papers which you'll need to fill out and send back with a check for $21. 6 days later you get an owners card and cool Maine plates which are good for 2 years.

In my world, I just saved $179... So I'm gonna buy a cooler and a camp stove... and shoot some mini pumpkins out of a cannon. Really. I'm on my way right now, and only costs $1 a gord Very Happy

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Nepenthe88 · Posted: Thu Sep 25, 2014 1:34 pm Post subject:

THANK YOU MAINE!!
Camp Chef Everest OTW (gets great reviews!)

and an Igloo Marine Ultra 25. I REALLY wanted the YETI Tundra 35... but I just can't justify the $300 price tag. Guess I'll just have to stay away from Bears. Le-sigh...

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a Black & Blue Su-BUS-aroo

Follow my adventures in the GoWAND'RLoST bus on Instagram:
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Stuartzickefoose · Posted: Thu Sep 25, 2014 6:11 pm Post subject:

now your just having to much fun...get your ass over here already before my bus rusts to pieces! Laughing

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Nepenthe88 · Posted: Wed Oct 01, 2014 11:40 am Post subject:

After about a billion hours of figuring out how to mount a spare tire to the rear of the Bus, I think I FINALLY figured out a solution. Originally I was going to make a swing away gate like this one, but I can't find adequate hardware to make one and the one they sell off the shelf for Vanagons is WAY expensive.

The other option was to do a fold away hitch mount spare like you see here on Clyde, the Adventurewagon. This has some advantages and is relatively cheap. The only thing is, I hate that the spare is on an angle and I don't like how far away from the body of the bus it is:

Then I found this:

This is the Thule (pronounced TOOLEEEE, who knew?) Trailway 959 Hitch Mount Bike Rack. It needs to be modified in order to work as a spare carrier, and the spare has to be mounted "Backwards" but, whatever. I like that it's slighly more multidimensional than either of the previous solutions, as it's ALSO a bike rack.

In order to make it function properly I am going to weld a piece of 2" steel tubing to the top inside of the bike rack with a plate and a trio of wheel studs to attach the spare.

This particular model is an upgrade over their budget Parkway hitch mount bike carrier which uses a standard trailer pin that needs to be pulled out to articulate the arm. This is WAY easier as all you need to do is pull up on a lever. The bike rack arms also use the same mechanism to fold down when you're not carrying any bikes, this is also an upgrade over the Parkway model, the arms of which are fixed in place.

And.... I already have a 2" receiver to weld to the back of the little mini-trailer I'm building, soooo when I'm towing the trailer, all I need to do is mount the "bike" rack to the back of the trailer and Voila! One spare for everything. I think It's a damned good solution if I do say so myself Very Happy

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a Black & Blue Su-BUS-aroo

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thebusandus · Posted: Wed Oct 01, 2014 12:46 pm Post subject:

Nepenthe is your throttle still working well? I'm doing something similar but I don't like it as a permanent solution. I was trying to see if anyone had adapted the Vanagon smallcar throttle cable, otherwise the only one I've seen available is the one from fellows in England... Shipping $$$$$$
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Panamerican Highway - 2014-2017

Nepenthe88 · Posted: Wed Oct 01, 2014 4:19 pm Post subject:

Nepenthe88 · Posted: Wed Oct 01, 2014 4:43 pm Post subject:

Ok. Here's the "Spare Tire Bike Carrier" How-to. If you have all the parts and all the tools, it's a 3hr job:

First I cut a 7" circle out of 1/8" steel. I then drilled 3 holes at the appropriate location, inserted three M14x1.5 bolts and then tightened them up with a trio of stock lug nuts to index everything properly. I then welded the bolts to the plate steel like so. FYI, you are looking at the INSIDE of the rim:

Then... I welded together 2 pieces of 1.5"x1.5" angle iron (1/8" thick) cut to 6.5" in length to make a hollow square piece of tubing. I tried to source a length of 1.5"x1.5" tubing, but the steel place had a $35 minimum. Oh well... I gotta welder, might just as well use it:

After the tubing was made, I centered it on the back of the circle of plate steel and welded it together:

And lastly, welded this contraption to the THULE Trailway 959 Hitch Mount Bike Rack, up near the top. I was worried I might disrupt the mechanism inside the tube of the bike rack, but all works fine:

Then, all that's left is to bolt the mast to the hitch insert mechanism and slide the anti rattle bolt in to secure it. Here is where it would sit if I had left things alone:

As I mentioned in my other post, I wanted the spare to sit closer to the body of the bus, but not so close as to risk hitting the hatch and rubbing on the stellar paint job Rolling Eyes

... soooooo I merely undid the anti rattle bolt in the receiver, slid the rack deeper and drilled a new 1/2" hole thru the hitch part of the bike rack. I used that yellow dewalt plug in drill to make the hole. The thing has a $hit ton of torque and I wound up binding the bit in the solid steel of the bike rack a couple times, bending a pair of drill bits and doing some serious damage to my hands. In an effort to make the holes line up I drilled half way thru each side. I did pretty good, but the hitch pin is really REALLY snug cause they don't index 100% perfectly. Here's where the rack ultimately wound up, It's about 3" closer:

And here she is in the lever down position (at the stock hitch pin location, it doesn't deflect the receiver as much now). There's plenty of clearance to get the rear Bus hatch to open. It's pretty easy to drop the spare. All ya gotta do is lift up on the grey lever at the bottom and ease her down. It's not heavy and doesn't really take any more effort than opening the sliding door with one hand (mine's still a wee bit sticky, but breaking itself back in to tip top operational shape slowly). The only thing I worry about is that the tire's a bit dirty and there's definitely times where my hands need to be clean (like, most of the time).

The only issue I have with the system is that there's a little bit of slop at the lower connection where the mast pivots backwards. I shoved a cedar shim shingle in there for the time being and that eats up all the slop. It's not a real solution (especially since it falls out every time you drop the rack) but as is, it doesn't rattle or shake and seems very very solid.
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Nepenthe88 · Posted: Tue Oct 07, 2014 3:26 pm Post subject:

Today I got around to doing the windshield wiper motor refresh that I was told to do on the first page of this thread. The link to the "HOW-TO" is here:
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=445921

So, I took everything apart and cleaned out all 6 billion splines, See:

And then I put everything back together like so:

Installed it back in the bus and... Ooops.... the wipers now "Park" in the vertical position as opposed to horizontal position. Can anyone clue me in to what I did. I have a guess... I didn't pay any attention to how the "record player" was indexed in the housing and installed it believing that it would re-index itself properly after a sweep or two. It doesn't. Is this my issue, and if so, should the record player be indexed like in this picture with the non-contact area from 3-6 o'clock?

Also... I bought a new wiper switch from Cole Hersee. It's the same one I used in the bug and allows for variable speed windshield wipers, as well as a push to squirt the squirters function (+3 swipes). That is gonna go in conjunction with the electric squirter I have ready to install. Here's a pic of the switch:

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a Black & Blue Su-BUS-aroo

Follow my adventures in the GoWAND'RLoST bus on Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/gowandrlost/

skills@eurocarsplus · Posted: Tue Oct 07, 2014 3:32 pm Post subject:

your motor will park where ever it wants. you need to time the arm that comes off the motor and links your wipers.

the easiest thing at this point is to disconnect the arm on the motor, run the motor till it parks and reattach the arm with your blades in the park position.

just run the whole deal with the arms up first to make sure you have it right, otherwise you may wipe the nose, not the windshield
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Nepenthe88 · Posted: Tue Oct 07, 2014 3:48 pm Post subject:

skills@eurocarsplus · Posted: Tue Oct 07, 2014 4:23 pm Post subject:

that should work. it may take a few times to get it right
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cdennisg · Posted: Tue Oct 07, 2014 5:19 pm Post subject:

Nepenthe88 · Posted: Tue Oct 07, 2014 6:26 pm Post subject:

Nepenthe88 · Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2014 9:14 am Post subject:

The axle finally came, so today I swapped it out. Pushes the trailer base up higher than I imagined. I think I might have to eventually install some sort of storage underneath between the trailer frame and axle (maybe mount some jerry cans for gas and water down there?) Also.. as far as bolt pattern goes, I'm officially NOT worried about having the 5 x 120 BMW rims bolted to the 5 x 4.75 axle. The difference is insignificant and everything fits together smoothly. I doubt the most discriminating, meticulous mechanic would have issue.

I still need to weld the trailer together. Get some marine grade plywood for the base and sides. Cut and epoxy it together. Make a hinged top. Paint and undercoat everything. Install the fenders. A couple weeks of work I imagine. I'm in no hurry to get it finished though. This is a decent cold weather project. On to the bus. Gonna install the electric squirter pump and re-index the arms of the wiper motor.
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a Black & Blue Su-BUS-aroo

Follow my adventures in the GoWAND'RLoST bus on Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/gowandrlost/

fROMOHIO · Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2014 9:29 am Post subject:

I think this is my favorite post on Samba right now.
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'72 Bay Window Westy
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Stuartzickefoose · Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 5:13 pm Post subject:

sweet

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Stuart Zickefoose

2011 Jetta Sportwagen TDi 6 speed manual

206-841-7324
[email protected]

Brian · Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 6:14 pm Post subject:

This looks like you could make a fold out seat, or table

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'69 Bug
'68 Baja Truck
'71 Bug
'68 Camper

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