What did YOU do to your van today?

[Deadvanwalking]

[elizer]

Ohhhh interesting. More info please. Ford 9 inch?

[Deadvanwalking]

[-Derek-]

Put a new sewfine seat cover and backrest foam on my driver side seat. No more wire frame digging into my back! Did the passenger seat a few weeks back, there was a learning curve - fought every aspect of the job. But did the complete driver seat plus headrest in about 2 hrs this evening. Great product from swefine and great customer support!

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'83 Vanagon
'72 914

[4mymalamute]

Put in some OME shocks and struts (huge difference)...stock shocks were completely blown out. I just picked up the syncro about three weeks ago so slowly working on it. Oh and changed front diff oil and hopefully today getting to the transmission. Only negative, I busted the front sway bar link....BUT ordered up some from Burley Motorsports so hopefully get those by the weekend!

[elizer]

[rty1138]

put some new tires one

maxxis ma-715 27x8.5xr14

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1984 Vanagon GL

[4mymalamute]

[NSPeters92]

Finally cup holders!

Washed up, cleaned, and vacuumed (plus daily organization).

[vanis13]

Changed seasons...finally

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83.5 Westy with Subaru 2.5, 4 spd manual, center seat, COLD A/C on 134a!, Winter camp heated with an Espar B4 gasoline furnace

www.SuperVanagon.com - some stuff I make

[rmcd]

[Paulbeard]

Quieted my slider. It has been making an increasingly loud screech as well as being hard to close, just at the end of its travel.

First step is to get the cover off and I found myself taking a more…evolved approach, using leverage instead of force. Do the usual prep (soapy water along the groove, remove the screws, pull on the cover to loosen it).

Then take a couple of lengths of wood and and a brick or stone for a fulcrum, put one end of one piece under the cover while you pull it out away from the body and, using the other piece as a lever, pull up and watch the cover lift up and out of its clips. Took about a minute to have mine out. No hammering, no trying to manage three things (hold the block under the cover while pulling it out and hammering on it) with two hands. John @ GoWesty is welcome to incorporate this technique.

Once I got it out and cleaned it with soapy water and rags, I narrowed down the source of the noise and friction to the lower roller assembly, right where it tucks into the body. And boy howdy was there some junk in there. Lots of soapy water, digging around by hand, and a ScotchBrite™ pad, and things got a little better. Off to the car wash and a serious effort at pressure washing in there: lots of small stones and other road debris came forth. And then it was quiet and smooth, better than it ever has been in my three years.

It's drying now. I'll add some wax to the roller track(s) and put it all back together. A pretty easy job, once you get that cover off and you don't find anything horrible under it. I was lucky: mine is pretty good shape under there.

Added some wax to the black insert behind the cover when I reinstalled to make for a smoother fit and to maybe keep it cleaner. Managed to lose one screw/washer but 28¢ at my local hardware store (8 x 3/8 ) put that right.

Also installed my collector plates…no more tab renewals for this one.
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Currently -> Frida: 87 Tizian Red (mostly) Vanagon GL Westfalia w/ 2.0L ABA conversion
Formerly -> Steward of a 73 Super Beetle (Beater) and 67 Beetle 1300 (Little Max) both names by POs

[elizer]

Put a new van cafe intake coupler on. The old one was splitting.

[oldschool84]

Not today but earlier this week I replaced the alternator, adding a GO Westy bracket. Thanks to everybody here who encouraged me to give the job a shot myself - my wife was ridiculously impressed since I barely do any auto stuff.

[campism]

[Paulbeard]

Ordered an oil pressure gauge, sender and pod yesterday, ran the wire for it today. Found a small hole in the rubber seal for the heat vent lever controls and fed the wire down there. Had to drop the spare and then just followed the frame/radiator hoses the whole way.

Does anyone have a good recommendation for a bottle jack? I could not get the clamshell to close around the spare. It was so hard to close, I had to make a lever out of a brick and a 2x12 get it latched. It's a very tight fit. A bottle jack would have been an easier option.

EDIT: just scored a Toyota bottle jack from the big auction mess. Dave Vickery had good things to say about them in another thread. I'd sooner buy a used Toyo than a new piece of junk which seems to be much of what's on offer.
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Currently -> Frida: 87 Tizian Red (mostly) Vanagon GL Westfalia w/ 2.0L ABA conversion
Formerly -> Steward of a 73 Super Beetle (Beater) and 67 Beetle 1300 (Little Max) both names by POs

[porterbrown]

Install new grey plastic door panels. My old (original) panels had some warping, and my new Rockford Fosgate speakers wouldn't clear the dash so I decided it was time to upgrade.

I didn't know how I'd feel about the "industrial" or "jeep-like" aesthetic, but I'm really digging them.

I was on the fence about grey vs. black, and I'm super glad that I went with the grey.

Easy install, overall. The Molly panel clips are a bit so-so. I like the look, but I see myself buying them in bulk to have around. They install (just) ok, but I had to do the install twice on the driver's side--getting them out was a bit more involved without stripping the heads. In reading about other folks doing this upgrade, the Molly clips seemed to be one of the things that folks weren't 100% happy with.

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'90 Westfalia GL Automatic

[dhaavers]

[Make America Vanagon]

[dhaavers]