New (to me) 1965 1500 Variant S(!)

[sjbartnik]

[sjbartnik]

OK got the pedal cluster all put back together (and freshly lubed while I was at it!).

Getting the clutch cable hooked back up wasn't bad at all. Getting the brake pedal return spring hooked back up was the most annoying part. That and the tedium of adjusting the clutch freeplay nut with the 1/8 of a turn at a time that you can get on the nut in that space
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1965 Volkswagen 1500 Variant S
2000 Kawasaki W650

[ataraxia]

Here's the 'order' of ignition keys/blanks from the parts book:

111 837 219 A Key blank (for finished keys state key number)

S 83 H profile marked X
S 76 A profile
S 85 FM profile
S 86 DV profile
S 66 K profile
S 92 M profile

I used to have a bookmark that showed the application years per code.

[neena]

[sjbartnik]

[sjbartnik]

Tonight's project: fix the washer system.

Keith had been unable to get the windshield washer to work properly. Once I got the car I took a look and I found that the pressurized hose from the tank to the switch had ruptured at the hose barb on the switch, thus losing pressure (and fluid) to the interior.

Initially I just cut back the ruptured bit and it held for a while but ruptured again in the same spot, even at less than max. pressure for the system.

It appears that the hose Keith used for the system was whatever was available at his local FLAPS, didn't seem to be the proper VW stuff.

I ordered the real deal OEM hose from bughaus. I immediately noticed that the ID of the proper hose was way smaller than the stuff that was on the car. It was quite hard to get on the hose barbs of the tank and switch but I was able to get it done. Holds pressure great and gives a nice powerful jet to the windshield. We'll see how it holds up but I'm more confident that this hose won't rupture.

Now apparently my car was in the transition period between the horn mounted in the spare tire well and the bumper-mounted horn (I have the bumper-mounted horn). But WTF is the deal with the front apron?! (photo is looking down into the spare tire well, spare tire removed)

I have these 3 slots in the front apron that open directly into the spare tire well! Seems a bit odd to have a designed-in opening that lets water into the trunk.
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1965 Volkswagen 1500 Variant S
2000 Kawasaki W650

[ataraxia]

There's a thread in here somewhere that discusses the changes from 64 into 65 and the three slot front apron came up.

IIRC, it's a late 64 / early 65 thing. I've owned three 65's recently and none of them have the slots (all late 65 builds). If you look at a 64 with the full 'Mickey Mouse' horn grill: They don't make much sense - one side and half of the other side are covered by the plastic gasket. What you have is essentially the same thing minus the extra piece and gasket that mount to the inside. The horn at the bumper bracket makes a lot more sense.

VW did lots of weird things with body panels - the cowl indent patterns are another oddity between 64/65 - only with the cowl pattern, there's no consistency.

[sjbartnik]

[ataraxia]

[Tram]

[sjbartnik]

OK so check out this video, it illustrates the post I made earlier about my left side choke:


Link


Just after making the video I took the left choke apart and it seemed to me that the binding was coming from the vacuum piston inside the choke mechanism. I lubed it up a bit and it seemed to make it somewhat better but it still feels like there's a ridge or some other weirdness in the vacuum piston bore that is making it hang up. Any advice on how to go about repairing that? I imagine that it's due to 50 years or so of insufficient lubrication!
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1965 Volkswagen 1500 Variant S
2000 Kawasaki W650

[endresta]

Very nice ride you have there. Take good care of it 😊
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SilverBIGL
Square
Type 1 are nice, Type 2 are cool, BUT Everyone knows, that  Type 3............RULE!\\\\\\\" 

Click to view image

[sjbartnik]

Ok this is driving me crazy. Maybe it's partly the heat and I'm not thinking clearly but:

What is the secret to getting the headlight trim rings back on?

Pulled the rings, pulled the old sealed beams, put in the Cibie H4 lenses, but I just can't get the trim rings to go back on for some reason. Haven't changed anything, the new lenses are seated in the holder and the hold-down rings went on fine. Just can't get the outer trim rings to go on. Can hook them over the lip at the top but they don't seat so I can get the bottom screw in.

the simplest part of the whole job

I should note that these are the Euro spec trim rings with the adjusting screws in the rim (they are dummies now as the buckets have been swapped for the USA type). Not sure if that matters. Keith got them on somehow so I guess it can be done.

EDIT: ok a thought came to me while I was having a cold shower. perhaps the lugs that engage the headlight into the bucket are standing the headlight off more from the bucket than the sealed beams did. After I finish this glass of wine I will go down and investigate the possibility.
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1965 Volkswagen 1500 Variant S
2000 Kawasaki W650

[sjbartnik]

Today's project: finally upgrade to those Cibie H4 halogen headlamps that I purchased from Daniel Stern so long ago.

I wanted to do it properly and retain all the existing functionality including the flash-to-pass feature. This meant retaining the existing headlamp switching relay. So I sourced a couple NOS Karmann Ghia horn relays (6V 30A) to use as headlight relays and bought a bunch of properly colored wire online and used my existing stock of 6.3mm crimp terminals and proper crimper.

Found a spot under the dash to mount the relays. Pulled the wires from 56a and F on the headlight switching relay (low and high beam output from the relay) and attached those to 87 on the new relays. Made new wire in the proper yellow and white to run from 56a and F on the headlight switching relay to run to terminal 86 on the new relays. Ran a new 10 AWG wire direct from battery with inline fuse holder under rear seat to 30 on the new relays. Made a brown wire to ground the two relays under the dash.

New relays looking up under the dash:

Last part was to install the Cibie H4 lenses in place of the sealed beams. All went pretty smoothly except for putting the trim rings back on flush like they're supposed to be. They are on now but there's a gap at the bottom. Since I still have to properly aim the new lights I'll deal with that later.

So the way it's set up now is that the output of the existing headlight switching relay is used to trigger the individual relays for high and low beam. Those relays pass power direct from the battery to the headlights via the normal/original fuse box arrangement.

The lights work great, can't wait to get them properly aimed and try them out on the road.

This is the schematic of what I came up with. Sorry I couldn't get color.

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1965 Volkswagen 1500 Variant S
2000 Kawasaki W650

[Bobnotch]

[sjbartnik]

OK this morning I've been down the Samba rabbit hole of Type 3 headlight trim ring minutiae. I think I've got the basic issue figured out and will take another look at it this evening to confirm.

The basic gist of what I've found out seems to indicate that I need to get ahold of some US-spec trim rings. It appears that the US-spec trim rings have a slightly larger center opening to allow for the sealed beam and retainer assembly to protrude through while allowing for the sealed beam units to pivot for adjustment without being fouled by the trim ring.

The Euro-spec trim ring I have is designed to actually be in contact with the outer edge of the headlight lens all the way around. I think Keith was able to get those to seat on the sealed beams he installed though it would seem that would render the adjusters ineffective. It would also seem the Euro-spec headlight assembly has a little bit less depth to it than the elaborate USA-spec sealed beam supporting and adjusting contraption.

I suspect that these Cibie H4 drop-in sealed beam replacement lenses might stand just a hair more proud of the mount than the sealed beams do, leading to my issue. When attempting to fit the Euro trim rings over the lenses, the inner diameter of the trim ring is contacting the inner chrome ring that holds the lens to the mount. There's a clear interference issue with both the Cibies and the sealed beams but it seems more pronounced with the Cibies.

Rather then bend up a nice set of original Euro trim rings to try to make them fit, I will pick up a set of USA-spec trim rings and hopefully that will do the trick. That should provide the added benefit of actually being able to adjust the headlight aim.
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1965 Volkswagen 1500 Variant S
2000 Kawasaki W650

[sjbartnik]

[Bobnotch]

[sjbartnik]

OK headlight trim ring nonsense figured out. While I wait to find that perfect pair of classic SB12s, I ordered a new set from ISP West, which are Mexican Hella. We'll see how they hold up.

At any rate, in this side-by-side picture, you can sort of barely see the difference in the internal diameter of the two different rings. It's just slightly smaller in the Euro-spec ring as the internal rim goes around the edge of the lens. On sealed beam units, the ring is not supposed to touch the lens because the lens needs to be able to pivot up and down and side to side for aiming. In the sealed beam setup, the lens is retained by another inner chrome ring, not by the outer ring.

It appears that Keith had been able to manhandle the Euro-spec outer rings on over the sealed beams he put in but they just would not go over the Cibie H4 drop-in lenses. I suspect this is because the Cibies stand out from the buckets just a bit further than the sealed beams do. At any rate, the Hella sealed beam trim rings fit like a glove, went right on with no hassle.

On another note, a reminder to check your fuses keep your connections clean. Just for kicks I was playing around with the voltmeter doing some voltage drop tests out of curiosity (yes this is fun for me).

Battery to VR, .02v drop. cool.
Battery to main power fuse, .06v drop. Cool.
Battery to bottom (output) side of fuse, .4v drop! Not cool!

Not any visible corrosion anywhere but the fuses were older and they seemed to be some of the cheaper kind and had the silver-colored strips rather than the gold-colored strips. I had a stash of new fuses from Wolfsburg West so I replaced them all with the new ones and kept the old ones for spares. After putting in the new main fuse, voltage drop across the fuse went to .01v.

When I turned ignition on and measured voltage drop at the fuse where 15 from the ignition switch comes in, it was ~.33v (after replacing the fuse, it was more like .6v before that). Weirdly, with ignition on, voltage drop from battery to the input side of the main fuse was also ~.3v instead of .06 which I don't really understand.
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1965 Volkswagen 1500 Variant S
2000 Kawasaki W650

[sjbartnik]

So I think my H4 headlight installation has exposed a weakness in my charging system. Today I drove to my office to use a wall inside the parking garage to set up a headlight aiming station. While aiming the headlights I kept the engine running so as not to kill the battery with 110 watts of H4 fury.

After I was finished aiming the headlights I turned the engine off so I could put everything back together. A few minutes later when I went to start the engine, it cranked very slowly, like weak battery slowly, and did not start. Tried a couple times with same result.

So I began pushing the car into position for a 1-person bump start in the garage. Ran, pushed and jumped in, popped the clutch and it didn't quite catch but then I tried the key and it started. Whew.

Took a 20-min highway drive to Williamsburg (lights off) to make a stop. Went in a shop for maybe 20 min., came back out and car would crank but not start. Cranking was better than in the garage, cranked at roughly normal speed but just would not start - not a hiccup. Seemed to me that it was likely a no-spark issue but I didn't have a meter with me to check cranking voltage.

Went off to have a sandwich and a beer and let the battery rest. Came back maybe 45 min later and tried it, again crank but no start. Luckily I was parked in a relatively open space under the BQE and was able to push the car out of its spot, and push start it by myself (I love that this car is so light!). When I popped the clutch it fired right up.

Made it home without further incident. When I got home, I put the meter on the battery. Showing a surface charge of 6.3V with engine off. When cranking it dipped down to ~5.1V at the battery and with known voltage drop of ~.33V at the 15 wire out of the ignition switch that would put me below the magic number of 4.8V at the coil, therefore no spark. In this experiment it did actually come up a bit while cranking and eventually started so I can only assume the driving I did was slowly recharging the battery from my headlight adjustment low.

With engine running I checked voltage at the battery. At idle it was right around 6.3V and when engine revved until voltmeter reading stopped increasing it got up to around 6.7v. My understanding is this is too low and I want it more like 7.2-7.5V. This was with no electrical load other than the engine and the dome light.

Then I repeated the test with the low beam headlights on in which case it was around 6.2V at idle and only 6.5V at maximum output. Obviously insufficient.

While battery is charging I'll pull voltage regulator and clean all connections thoroughly, make sure it has a good ground, etc.

Anything else I should be checking? Assuming I clean up everything and there is no improvement, is there an adjustment I can make to VR to increase charging voltage?

In the generator the commutator looks very clean and the brushes seem to have plenty of life left.
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1965 Volkswagen 1500 Variant S
2000 Kawasaki W650