'Let's Go! Scotland-Croatia and onwards in our Kombi!'

[mcdonaldneal]

[MorkC68]

[Shonandb]

Really enjoy this thread. Thanks for sharing.

My son has been in the UK on business for the last 2 months and has had to travel a fair bit since arriving (London, Gatwick, Newcastle, Aberdeen, & Dublin). My wife and I are thinking that we may have to ship our Westy over next summer and have him be our tour guide for a two month tour and try to catch a few VW gatherings while there. He can take the train or fly but we'll drive and meet him in each location.

All of my ancestors are from the UK (mostly English but some Scots in the mix too) so we could try to locate some distant family while there.
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76 Westy with a 2.5L Subaru SOHC + Vanagon (010) Automatic Transaxle
Build & Trip Thread: https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=758760
Previous 1973 Panel Bus:
Click to view image

[mcdonaldneal]

[Jalabert]

How have you found the heating with the new exchangers?

I still have originals on mine, seriously ratty now after at least 2 good refreshes...welds on top of welds...

[mcdonaldneal]

[richparker]

Medo always looks super pissed off!

I gotta step my VW game up, your are making us look bad…
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’71 Westy build
Adventure thread
’65 Deluxe Build
’63 Deluxe Build

[mcdonaldneal]

So, there was a long break from this travelling thread as we were in Australia collecting, touring and shipping ‘Olive’ home. She’s currently in Singapore and should arrive in February…
Olive Kombi thread

It’s January in Scotland. The nights are juuuust starting to get a little longer but it’s still hovering around freezing. We don’t often use the Kombi over winter but Shona and a friend were going on a retreat for a week and so I thought I could give them a lift to Stirlingshire and if the weather held up, carry on up to the far North for a few days. Of course, I would have to take the cat as it’s too long to leave her at home.

There was only light frost at home and the weather was clear, so we picked Amelia up by the Forth rail bridge and took them to the retreat. It was getting dark by then, so I found a fishermen’s car park on a very quiet road at Loch Earn that I had stayed at before. Very pretty, with snow on the hills behind. The diesel heater kept me and Medo warm in the evening and I retreated to my sleeping bag overnight. It must have been cold as Medo was a limpet, clamped to her warm spot on top of me!

The next morning, after ‘bed tea’, coffee and breakfast, we headed into the hills to enjoy the beautiful day.

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1978 marino yellow Bay Dormobile camper
1969 signal orange Karmann Ghia convertible
1976 martini olive Bay Dormobile camper

Stop dead photo links! Post photos to The Samba Gallery!

[mcdonaldneal]

The sun was shining nicely, so I thought I could ignore the road conditions warning and headed up the tiny road past Ben Lawers and up into Glen Lyon. I had never been that way before and it was very pretty.
There was rain forecast in the West for the next day but I worked out a route that would miss most of it and loop back to an offer of a driveway camp at Shona’s sisters house in the far West. I headed North and East and was just thinking about where to stop for the night and fill up with fuel before getting into more isolated country when…

After the fill up, the garage owner said I might want to push away from the pumps before starting, as there was fuel raining down onto the ground from the fuel tank!
I pushed to a safer spot, and had a look. It seemed the fuel was coming from the filler connection to the tank, and was soaking the starter motor. Uh oh…

So. I managed to drain enough fuel to stop it actually leaking onto the floor. Made a cup of coffee, checked where the fire extinguishers were located, and waited an hour or so for all the petrol to evaporate, and then crossed my fingers and she started right up. It didn’t seem like a good basis for a remote highland tour, so I reluctantly turned around and picked up the main road for the 2 1/2hr journey back home. It turned out I had replaced the two filler hoses in 2018, so I’ll see what they look like when I have time to take off the bulkhead to see the top of the tank. Maybe the hose has slipped off the metal tube, or maybe it has split? Either way, I’ll be replacing it!

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1978 marino yellow Bay Dormobile camper
1969 signal orange Karmann Ghia convertible
1976 martini olive Bay Dormobile camper

Stop dead photo links! Post photos to The Samba Gallery!

[1970fun]

Great pics again Phil!
I think you are one of the most hardened bus camper guys overhere😉
Shame about the filler hoses and very lucky the gas station guy has seen this!!
Trouble with these rubber parts is that the rubver quality isn’t the same as it used to be anymore put ethanol mixed gas on top of that and boom there goes your lifespan of the rubber!
I would do some realy deep research who does the best rubber before buying some.

[heyskull]

Fantastic thread enjoyed reading.
Do you do the VW show in Scotland (Volksfling) at the end of May?

SC

[RalphWiggam]

Send a nice letter to that gas station guy. He saved your bus and possibly you as well.

[mcdonaldneal]

[mcdonaldneal]

Interesting developments:
I cleared the engine bay of hoses, air filter, carburettors and the blower fan and prised off the metal which hides the fuel tank.

Actually, the large filler hoses look in good condition and tight, so although I have ordered replacements I might not have to do that very awkward job.
In 2018 I must have replaced the vent hosing connections with 8mm fuel injection type hose. It was snug at the time, but the rubber hose is really loose now, and I think could be the source of the leak when the tank is topped off. The extra fuel in the filler tubing would fill up the vent tubing and leak for sure. I think softer braided hose (of the correct size-7mm!) would be better here, as it’s not actually carrying fuel.

I also noticed that someone has cut an access panel for the fuel tank sender, so I took that off in case that was where the leak is, but it looks good to me.

My plan is to replace the vent tubing with 7mm nitrile fuel hose, leave the panel off and fill the tank. I will see then if there is any leak at all at the filler hoses and will have replacements by then if I need to do that. We shall see!

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1978 marino yellow Bay Dormobile camper
1969 signal orange Karmann Ghia convertible
1976 martini olive Bay Dormobile camper

Stop dead photo links! Post photos to The Samba Gallery!

[mcdonaldneal]

Bonus!
While the blower motor was out I managed to disassemble it enough to wipe the bearing surfaces clean and put a little light oil in there. It’s difficult to do in situ.

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1978 marino yellow Bay Dormobile camper
1969 signal orange Karmann Ghia convertible
1976 martini olive Bay Dormobile camper

Stop dead photo links! Post photos to The Samba Gallery!

[Abscate]

Get some oetiker clamps on those emission hoses….


MeeeeeeeeYOW!
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.ssS!

[mcdonaldneal]

The 7mm hose arrived in the post today. I have gone for cotton braided (ethanol resistant) hose, rather than FI smooth hose because it is more pliable to get over the plastic connecting pipe ends which are awkward to access. I had a mixture of ‘eared’ clamps and smooth screw clamps.
Everything went on pretty easily and is clamped and snug. Hopefully I won’t have to expose the tank again for a while! They look wet in the pictures because I soaked them in hot water to make fitting easier!
The large hose from the filler tube looks good, and the vent hoses had become so loose that I am sure they were the culprit.

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1978 marino yellow Bay Dormobile camper
1969 signal orange Karmann Ghia convertible
1976 martini olive Bay Dormobile camper

Stop dead photo links! Post photos to The Samba Gallery!

[wcfvw69]

When I saw your original pictures of the small 7-8mm hoses, my honest thought was "why doesn't he have some clamps on there? When I did those hoses on my bay bus, I used the correct size German Braided hose. Usually I trust a good German braided hose w/out clamps since it does that Chinese finger trap dealio but w/it being such a pain to get to, I installed clamps as a just in case scenario.

Nice work!
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[Manfred58sc]

The road sign said "no gritting" what is that? Salt or sand? great scenery!
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Fat chick owner/operator

[Abscate]