Making your ride Better, or what I try to do.

[mdmc]

[Schlappette]

Mightyart, your prose is inspiring and empowering. I've read some good threads and posts on here, but your writing above is hands-down THE best information I have come across so far, especially for a newbie. Good stuff! Thanks!
_________________
I'm pullin' into town on the interstate, I got a steel train in the rain.
And the wind bites my cheek through the wing, and it's these late nights, this freeway flyin', always makes me sing.
-=-=-
'87 Wolfram Grey Westy -=Ollie=-
2.2L Vanistan :: RMW WBXhaustSS

[VWagabond]

[mightyart]

[Alan Brase]

[montemerrick]

really good work - and very clarifying and calming for a novice such as myself. thanks for taking the time to share your experience
_________________
_______________________________

Money has the smell of dead fish or refuse
but then you get used to it.
- Ananda Surya

[cloudbaseracer]

r39o,

Maybe a dumb question but what are you seeing that shows front A/C? I only see the blower switch and the vent controls. The colors look a little different than mine but I thought that was due to the age difference in vehicles (mine has blue, red and white)

James

[flyingCoyote]

[mjamgb]

Oh, yeah, as a "victim" of stock jack stupidity... twice (wince) I can vouch that the VW jack is for emergencies only or you are taking your life in your hands... or your 4-year old's who wanted a closer look at what daddy is doing (I still shudder).

Drive the car to a better place to jack it up even if it means destroying the rim.

Block ALL three of the tires not being changed.

Still don't go under there!

Mike!

[mjamgb]

I wanted to add a couple of comments (kinda my philosophy).

Mightyart is right-on.

Part I:

Some more things to consider in the purchase of a 10+ year old vehicle or if you plan on owning a new car 10+ years... Best done within a week or two of purchase or on the 10-year anniversary, whichever applies best!

Flush the brake fluid.
Replace the wheel bearings (front, wait for noise before doing the rears).
Replace the shocks.
Replace the tires... probably the last owner cheaped out and you have mush-o-matics on there... get the HD tires.
Expect to replace the windshield.
Clean and repack the CV joints.

Yes, some of those tasks you should have been doing the entire 10 years.

Rust is bad but you may want transportation that is functional, not beautiful for a few years... if so most Vanagon rust is superfluous... it has a very heavy chassis and the most vulnerable places for rust are redundant structural members. If you are considering a ruty Van, jack up each corner in turn and open and close all the doors with each jacking manuver. If any door is recalcitrant (sticky) pass on it as it is too far gone for safety. OTOH, you WILL fall in love with the beast and all that rust will make you heartsick...

Tools... Add a (46mm, I think) rear axle nut socket (3/4-inch drive) and a monster breaker bar for it. Toss in a 6-foot piece of old 1-inch iron pipe and a 6-foot piece of heavy angle iron... you will figure out it's mystical powers quickly!

I second Art's comments on the dead-simplicity of working on these beasts. The ONLY things I can't do are line-bore the mains, R&R the lower ball joint (takes funky adaptor for press I haven't purchased, yet) and bodywork... the latter is because I am too busy to learn the "art."

I do all my work in the driveway. I have a garage but you are likely aware of the nature of garages (junk expands to fill available space regardless of other intended use of said space).

Mike!

[stumpie]

Four (4) Thumbs up Art. Like me you have vw on the brain. (Thats not bad ) Thanks for taking the time to inform us on vw's.

[r39o]

Gee, I just noticedthe rare front mounted A/C in that van. That is one of the things I wish for my van. Someday the Pick-A-Part Gods will smile on me and I too will find a setup like that. Then I can have another cabinet in the back and have A/C where it will do me some good!

[Rick73Super]

Thank you for sharing your wealth of information!

[mightyart]

[DanJReed]

That is a damn quality post!
_________________
-Dan
(87 Westy Vanagon, 98 Jetta GLS 2.0, 95 Golf Sport)

[sbclayton]

Mightyart, thy art is indeed MIGHTY!

But seriously, your posts are thoroughly enjoyable. I re-nominate your posts for a sticky!

I was going to PM you about this, but I figure there just might be some public support, so I am - publicly - going to put my foot in it...

Have you considered writing professionally? Your style is very readable and open, and, having some past experience in the writing business, I think you would find an eager audience.

That said, please allow me to add to your Link-O-Rama:

Ken Wilford of VanAgain has been an invaluable friend to Vanagonheads since forever, and I highly recommend him to all. Great parts and customer service, and a deep knowledge of inner Vanagon workings.

Website is http://www.vanagain.com .

The Vanagon Forum is fortunate in having such a wealth of literate, well-informed contributors; you know who you are and listing all the names would take pages. I have seldom seen such high-caliber advice and support. Well done, all!
_________________
Steve - Tampa Bay Area
Original Owner (12/1990) of
NavDog, a 91 Carat

Enlightenment came when I realized that any time in my life I was having fun, it was somehow connected with owning a Volkswagen.

[Mightyart's Wife]

[mlf]

that does it ,my name is mark, yes i'm addict now i know my wife is going to leave me. i tried the 12 step program . it does not work ,i'm on the websites all day long ordering or checking ,than all night working on my vanagon . she might like it when we retire in it. but only if gas prices go down or a different form of power is found . may be electric ??

[BavarianWrench]

Mightyart you know somebody has to be negative in regards to your post and it might as well be me. You are wrong, wrong, wrong, that post is way over the top. Nobody should ever lay that kind of abundance on this addict or any others for that mater. If your on the Samba, quit your denial, your hooked on VW's and are an addict. I'm freaking overdosing right now. I have other things I need to do, all I can do is check out the links. Mightyart your going to make me hit bottem and then I'll have to quit VW's all together. Join a 12 step group to find some sort of sanity. I can't even pull myself away to eat. I need more insight into the VANAGON and there is days worth of info, in the links. What the hell am I going to do? Mightyart you are the artist type bad influence, should have known you were the one mother warned me about. Shit I can hear her calling me now. I have to go, ahhhhhh save meeeeeee. Oh yeh and thanks.

[mightyart]

How to Make Your Ride Better
Part II
“Actually working on the Van”
Ok, since we are going to work on the van we really need to know what to work on.
My theory has always been to start on the engine and drive train and get them up to spec. before doing any “cosmetic” work. My thinking is you don’t go blow your entire budget on a nice paintjob if the Van isn’t running right and is not reliable.
You’d think this would be common sense but I’ve seen it happen. Now don’t get me wrong if you don’t spend a little bit on some “toys”, it takes all the fun out of the project.
After I got mine running ok, I got rid of the beat up hubcaps that were on it. There were only three of them and they all looked bad. So I spent $20.00 on a can of black spray paint and 4 cheap hubcaps, made the van look ten times better. Who likes driving a junky car?
Here is where your owner’s manual comes into play, if you have one all the better for you. First let’s take our owners manual and do an inspection, and see what works, what doesn’t work right, and what doesn’t work at all. The owners manual will show you the correct way that everything is supposed to work, so if your blinker comes one when you hit the horn you know that’s not the way it was intended , and you can add this to the list of things to correct.
When I first learned to work on cars I was taught to break your car into systems, like we are taught in school to do with the human body. The Bentley manual does a good job of breaking things down in the chapters they have written; so use this as a guide. Braking things down into “systems” allows you to troubleshoot more effectively. It allows you to think about the parts that are relevant to the system your working on, like the van is not stopping right, you know to worry about the brake system, so then you start testing the components of that system, and that system alone.
Let’s start with the most important stuff. Like the 4-way hazard switch, horn, blinkers, lights, break lights, and wipers. The stuff you NEED to work sometimes.
Let’s take the wipers for instance, I first time me and my wife drove the Westy in the rain, it was sprinkling and we had to go to the store. The distance is so short that we usually walk, good time to check the wipers. Worked fine there, on the way back the passenger one just sort of stopped then it fell off! The PO had glued both of them on! The shafts were broken at the threads (from over tightening I’d guess) so the wiper arms were glued to the shafts with nuts on top then painted black so you couldn’t tell. It was good to find this out at home, not a few hundred miles away in a thunderstorm. Another thing to look around for is bad repairs. After 25 years, various owners with differing mechanical ability, old aftermarket junk, and scores of mechanics my poor Westy had all kinds of bad repairs, some I’m still finding.

What is that thing? That is a switch from a cruise control that had long ago stopped working, it came off.

all kinds of wires that don’t do anything anymore The red arrows show A/C wires and aftermarket cruse control wires that are gone now. The blue arrow is a kill switch the PO had wired to the fuel pump. Would have been fun to figure out if I didn’t know the switch was there and It broke down.

The PO thought this was a good place/way to mount the radio and oil temp. gauge, I thought I could improve on it

This is better for now, but I’m still not happy with it.

Of course when we got our Westy the wife and I did the dumbest thing you can do with an older used car that doesn’t seem to run right. That is decide to go on a short trip without checking it out thoroughly. Of course we paid the price by having to have it towed home. I knew better than to trust it without checking it out, but we wanted to play with our new toy. It was a beautiful spring day and we wanted to go picnic by the lake, and check out our new camper. We were leaving The Target Superstore (temple of consumption) with all our goodies, we went over a speed bump and it stalled and would not start again. I messed around with it for about 3 hours got it to limp around the block, then gave up and called a tow truck.
Well I figured the VW gods were sending me signs, so that’s when I really started doing things correctly. I found so many things wrong after taking all the Fuel Injection apart I’m surprised it ran at all.
The thing that what finally killed it was a very loose injector, It was an aftermarket injector, and It looked like the person who installed it used an old rubber o-gasket, it was so dry rotted, and had cracks in it so deep, that it wouldn’t hold the injector in place. The injector was just flopping around in the hole letting air in. When we hit the speed bump it came out for good.
You need a Bentley Manual!
My Westy came with a big green manual called “Vanagon Official Factory Repair Manual”. To my surprise I found out this was the fabled “Bentley Manual”. In small print at the bottom is the author’s name, “Robert Bentley”. Without this you are just guessing about how things are supposed to be. The Bentley is expensive, and it has its shortcomings, but what it will save you in time it is well worth the cost. I’ve also found a cheap digital camera is very handy. I take a bunch of pictures, than I have a reference if I forget where something goes, I can see the progress I have made over the months to.
After the Tow truck brought us home I went to work taking all the fuel injection components off the van. I had given them a halfhearted “visual” inspection, because I wanted to drive it. I was at least armed with a good understanding of how FI worked.
I took the air hoses off, and went to the auto parts place and got a few feet of each size, and a bunch of new hose clamps.
I cleaned all the parts, checked that the moving parts worked, checked the parts with a voltmeter per the Bentley Manual and then put it all back together with the new rubber hoses and clamps. I also removed the A/C unit that didn’t look like it had functioned in a while. And looked for any anomalies or missing parts, and of course I found a few.
One thing I have learned over the years if you are fixing up a car to keep, use good quality parts. I have replaced worn out parts after a few years because of how cheaply they were made, sure they had a warrantee but only the lord knows where the receipt for it went. Doing the same job twice sucks to.
Here are a few of my criteria for buying parts. Don’t buy anything important like starters, alternators, and the like from AutoZone, or other cheap retail chain stores. As a rule of thumb I try to only put German OEM parts in my Vanagon. I will pay extra for good quality parts like Bosch. I also try to stay away from any South American VW Parts. I will by parts from NAPA in a pinch, and also universal stuff like hoses and bulbs.
The Internet is a great place to get New parts. Here are a few of the places I have ordered from:
www.busdepot.com Bus Depot has started to slip a little bit in the quality of part that I have gotten. The service is allot quicker if you place your order by phone.
www.bus-boys.com Bus Boys has a good website but no online ordering, but if you write all your part numbers down beforehand the service is quick. On a side note: if you are going to go to their website don’t forget the “-“ in the URL. If you do you’ll go to the bands website and have to listen to the song “the boys are back in town” at a high volume. It starts getting annoying after about the third time you forget.
www.aircooled.net I only ordered a few things thought their website and the transactions went very smooth and the parts arrived quickly. They get an A+ so far.
www.jcwhitney.com Let me just say a few words about a rather strange place to order parts from. I’ve been ordering parts from JC Whitney since the late 80’s with varied results. Because they deal in volume it is hard to pass up some of their prices.
Here are a few rules I’ve got when ordering from JC Whitney:
Only order named brand parts, They carry so much stuff good and just plan crap that you have to be careful.
Of course if you order a “cool” pair of mirrors for $9.95, expect a set of mirrors worth about ten bucks. Don’t expect or take any advice given on your Van from their customer service, know what you are ordering and verify that it is correct for your van. Don’t order anything you may need quickly or can’t wait for, they can be slow sometimes.
Get their catalog in the mail and always take advantage of any “free shipping” or 20% off specials they are running. This is one way you save big from them. Here is an example of what I have ordered: I bought my electronic ignition from them 95.00 + free shipping at JC Whitney, 139.00 at Bus Depot. I did have to wait a month for it to be shipped from the factory, but it was worth the savings because I didn’t need it.
Used parts can be an alterative when some new parts are no longer available, or if you need something that doesn’t wear very much. If you are lucky enough to find a Van like yours in your local junkyard, then get all the usable stuff you can off it. I haven’t been able to find one to cannibalize in a junkyard so I’ve relied on the Internet for all the used parts I have acquired. I’ve ordered a few things and have had good luck with the few sellers I’ve delt with in The Samba Classifieds. I ordered things from the “parting out” ads in the Classifieds I’ve also had good luck ordering things off Ebay. www.ebay.com
I’ve gotten a few manuals and some parts off Ebay. I stay away from buying parts on Ebay, but will snatch up a good deal if I see one, and will pay a bit more for say a hard to find thing like a manual.
So where are we so far?
We need to check the Van over (with manual in hand) to see what needs to be replaced or fixed. While checking we will get a feel for how everything is supposed to work, and where certain things are located. We will be on the lookout for any “bad” repairs to undo or nonfunctioning aftermarket junk to remove. When starting your repairs give yourself plenty of time to do the job correctly, and allow for the inevitable mistake here and there, like getting something almost together and discovering a part you forgot to put in. Should you take another extra hour and take it apart, or just forget about this part?
Take the extra time and do it right, you’re trying to make it better not add to the problems. I would be a good idea to make a list of the items that need attention, and take lots of pictures if you have a digital camera and a little hard drive space.
The other morning with the smell of brewing coffee and the sun just rising above our campsite, the wife and I were discussing how our hard work and money spent were quite worth it. We then had a wonderful breakfast cooked on the Westy’s stove, explored awile, packed up camp and drove back 300 trouble free miles. I’ve still got some cosmetic work to do, it may never be “finished”, but the payback from the labor is worth it.
_________________
My Art:
http://www.instagram.com/flynn8552/