North GA 1973 Veteran's Addition

[Heiferman]

A couple coats of POR15 on the inside of the modified apron.
Hope it is dry enough to tape it off and paint the outside tomorrow.

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- 1973 Thing, 1970 Ghia, some LandCruisers and an old Ambulance

[Heiferman]

Just placed an order for new seatbelts from seatbeltplanet.com
Chose the tan 48" with an 8" female end to attach to the tunnel. They will be tan to.matxh the desert vibe I hope to get going. The ones in the car are about 7 to 12 feet long and I can't adjust them nearly tight enough.
Anyone use seatbeltplanet? The guy was friendly on the phone but it took 4 calls to get anyone to answer.

Now to get the old ones out since the PO forced 7/16-20 bolts into the tunnel depending on Mothernature's thread locker. Thanks for that.
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- 1973 Thing, 1970 Ghia, some LandCruisers and an old Ambulance

[Olli from NJ]

7/16-20 is correct. VW used SAE seat belt bolts.

[Heiferman]

[Olli from NJ]

Weird isn't it? The story that I have read is that in the '60s VW worked with GM for seatbelts in the Beetle and that is where the SAE bolts originated. I have the THING parts book and looked up the bolts. They are only identified as hex bolts. The Thing Shop sells seat blet bolts, and they are 7/16-20.
https://thethingshop.net/product/bolt-seat-belt-mounting-7-16-x-1/

This isn't just with THINGS. Beetles and Ghias are the same. I think that over the years owners just assumed that they are metric and when replacing, they use a 12M-1.75 because the threads are very close and thread it in. Thinking nothing of the fact that the thread engagement wasn't very smooth.

I just went through this with the '74 THING that I am working on. It still had the OE bolts and they are 7/16-20. What is interesting is the bolt heads don't have the SAE hash markings. I think that is what ads to the confusing. The bolts that I removed have "Repa 8.8" on the head. When I read the 8.8 I thought they were metric. Nope.

[Heiferman]

[Heiferman]

Good enough for this pile. The gap between the donor apron panel and the body is a little more than I had hoped but it is secure.

Of course I scratched the hell.out if it putting it on.
I had to make some mods to the latch/catch and am awaiting the arrival of a countersink so I can attach that.
As I said before, the car must have had a hard life.
The gap between the body and the engine tins on the PS is way bigger than on the DS. It was a bugger getting the engine seal in there in a way it will function.

I have yet to theow the afr on it since I replaced the exhaust. That is probably the next task while I await decent seat belts.
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- 1973 Thing, 1970 Ghia, some LandCruisers and an old Ambulance

[Heiferman]

This is what was in the car for safety belts.
Anyone if you fat boys need a 7 foot seat belt?!

If anyone was using this they were not going to fit behind the wheel of any VW Thing!

And for sure 7/16-20 bolts in there. The DS was cross threaded.... of course
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- 1973 Thing, 1970 Ghia, some LandCruisers and an old Ambulance

[sportin-wood]

[Heiferman]

[Heiferman]

Pics of my latch solution. The countersinks I got from Bezo worked perfect.

Here it is closed and latched.
I did not realize how out of shape the decklid was.
It has been cut up on the inside too when the PO attached the swingout tire carrier.
I may hit Mike up for one since I will be painting it tan eventually.
Still, it latches great. Seems like the latch needs another screw.

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- 1973 Thing, 1970 Ghia, some LandCruisers and an old Ambulance

[Heiferman]

Well finally.
Went for a short drive today and temps were way down. Before all the repairs to the engine bay and new fan I could not eventouch the dipstick. Now oil temp seems to be right around 170F. Easy to touch the dip stick and pass it back and forth between fingers (the old temp test). Head tempnis way down as well. It does not smell super hot either. With a laser thermometer the case temp was about 163F. Dare I say my woes are no more?

The list never seems to get shorter but at least it is changing:
Hook up the AFR and see where I am at
Oil and filter change
Readjust decklid latch
Reinstall the rear bumper
Waiting on new seatbelts to R&R
Send the wiper motor in for rebuild
Continue trying to straight the front bumper
I have new KYB gas shocks I may toss on
Paint the whole car tan <--- that will be a while
Reindex rear torsion bars (yuck)
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- 1973 Thing, 1970 Ghia, some LandCruisers and an old Ambulance

[Heiferman]

AFR test today.

At idle (780rpm) I am consistently at 12.6 -12.8 warmed up
At WOT approaching about 3000 rpm I am at 11.4 - 11.8 (I would have expected these numbers to go up not down so I must be getting a bunch of unburned fuel into the exhaust)

Unfortunately, I am not able to test under load/cruise going down the road as my set up (an Innovate LM2) just has too many wires hanging out the back of the car and they are not long enough to extend into the car. Maybe a project I should attack. What I really need is a longer O2 Sensor wire to the LM2 and that would get me there.

This seems a little rich to me (I feel like I should be in the low 13s at idle) but I think I may run it and then look at the plugs.
If you have been following along, you will know I am running dual 44s on a 2200+ engine so it may be happier richer. Unfortunately I have no idea what cam is in this engine. I also need to find my notes on what jets and E Tube (probably F11) I stuck in the 44s. I dunno. I need to do some more reading and then figure what jet to change if I am going to change anything to dial it in further.. Or maybe just move the mixture screws a tiny bit?

It has been a minute since I played with the LM2 so this was a good exercise.

I did screw around with the LM2 analog pig tail to try to get RPMs from the negative side of the coil but it was giving me some weird intermittent readings. (I usually hook up my timing light for a good tach.) I need t play with that some more. It should be able to show engine rpms right next to the AFR reading in a second window.
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- 1973 Thing, 1970 Ghia, some LandCruisers and an old Ambulance

[Heiferman]

Link
[/youtube]
Just for fun.
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- 1973 Thing, 1970 Ghia, some LandCruisers and an old Ambulance

[doublecanister]

Cool!

Glad you finally got the temps under control!!

What a lot of work though, I'm glad you stuck with it!

Keep on going and enjoy the ride!

T
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2020 - Mustang Eco Boost [High Performance]
1973 - Thing
1966 - Mustang GT- Fastback
1951 - Ford F1 pickup Flathead V8

[Heiferman]

[Heiferman]

Finally got.my seatbelts from Seatbelt Planet.
They are nice. I probably should have added another 12 inches to them but they fit me ao that is all that counts right? If somebody needs to.move the seat up they will be SOL.

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- 1973 Thing, 1970 Ghia, some LandCruisers and an old Ambulance