New Bus- '56 Springframe Westy!

[Stocknazi]

Do you believe the original finish on the nails was brass plated?

I cleaned up a few og nails today and they look like they are possibly zinc plated.

I found some brass plated linoleum nails at the hardware store that look very close. Probably as close as one could hope for when matching up 50 year old hardware. They make a zinc plated version as well.

Would these be the same nails that attach the rack tag?
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WANTED:
58 Westfalia cabinet knobs (3 needed), roof rack, and (7) privy tent poles (silver painted).

"When the people are afraid of the government, that's tyranny. But when the government is afraid of the people, that's liberty."
"Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God."

Thomas Jefferson

[Bendango]

How long is it before someone does a home "how to" brass plate nails for Westies using a home made furnace in the garden!
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I want a real garage.

WANTED - [WTB] 55-62 Bus Thin Lip Package Tray SWR

Getting Used - SWR 60 westy copy built by vw ( apparently )
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=320866

[BarryL]

[campingbox]

Its just a tiny little pin nail, probably 1/16" or 3/32" or so, I can't imagine they would bother with a pilot. I can't remember whether we used brass or brass plated, and can't remember what was in there originally. I know I saved the originals, but I think they are in a box half way across the country.

I'm sure like everything I spent way too much time to try and find the best possible match, and in the end settled for something I thought was less than perfect. I'm sure it bothered me for as long as it took for me to fuss over the next thing I needed to find. And so the pattern repeats.

[oakman]

Rusty original subhatch trim nails from my 65' so-35:


https://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/1584240.jpg

https://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/1584239.jpg

[Stocknazi]

[Stocknazi]

[Clara]

I remember that before straightening the trim it fit together easily. After straightening it it was kinda a pain. They kinda squashed it into place.
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The Obsolete Air-Cooled Documentation Project http://oacdp.org/

[campingbox]

I don't. I think I was able to study the scratches at the ends and determine what order they went in. I hand polished that stuff. Usually I like to make aluminum very shiny but I didn't want to fade the patterns. We also thought about sanding it out nice and redoing the machine turning but at the end of the day it felt right just to leave them with the imperfections and just polish them out by hand.

[Stocknazi]

[Clara]

Due to the tire wear issue, we have barely driven this bus since last summer. But what to do? If we throw new tires on, they will wear out too. The rears were really bad after about 17K miles, while the front had loads of tread left.
Looked for pair of Goodyear High Miler 6.70-15s, but they are not available new anymore. Put up a wanted ad, and found one, in California. That we can pick up at Kelley Park. But we still need to get there.
And we want to get there in this bus.
Leaving Tuesday the 18th.
With a caravan of 7 or 8 VWs. The Northern contingent arrive about 1:30 or 2pm, defined by a ferry schedule.

Actually checked the rear toe, it was 5/16" in, the Cragar Kombi, the Gold Mine, and Cuddy's bus were all 1/8" out.
I had never checked rear toe before.

The tire wear was caused by the tranny being moved back by the adapter for using a tunnel case tranny in a split case tranny bus. This altered the angle of the swing axles and the tires slightly.

The first pic might not look so bad, but it wore to the flat areas between the strips, and the second pic shows the unworn tires. What a difference! Can you tell which two are the rear tires?

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[mandraks]

the front ones look perfect. what air pressure are you running?
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regards

Uli

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'53 3-Fold Oval, L35 Metallic Blue, looking for a narrow hatch panel

[Clara]

Yes, there is lots of tread left on the fronts. Tire pressure was fine. I wish it was that easy a problem to fix.
The rear toe on the bus was 5/16" in, which was well off. I believe this wore the tires out early.
Bentley spec says it should be 0.5mm to 4.0mm toe out.

The gallery auto corrected the image to become sideways, sorry.

So, should we swap to a split case tranny?
Or maybe drill the spring plates to move the RGBs a bit back. If so, how far back do the spring plates need to move?
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The Obsolete Air-Cooled Documentation Project http://oacdp.org/

[wcfvw69]

When I aligned these buses and all aircooled VW's in the early 80's, we set the rear to 0 toe in/out. If we set them to 1/8" out on the rear, we'd get inside tire wear.

I can't recall on 50's bus but are the spring plates not slotted to shift them to set the toe?
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[mandraks]

[Clara]

[BlastMasterMannyFresh]

here's the answer to your problem Clara, just kidding, or maybe not, this came in a torsion housing I bought a while ago, it looks like they were running a late style tranny in and early bus with this home made plate, it looks ghetto as shit, but it's not pushing the tranny back

[Clara]

So with the ovaled holes, the boxes moved back:

It was not enough to get the rear wheel alignment in spec.

EPIC FAIL!


I did not want to oval it anymore; I was concerned about the boxes falling off the end of the plates. SO argghhh!
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[Clara]

Next plan... take the tranny out of the 58.
It was freshly rebuildt and never driven on. It was actually the one out of teh orange Boise Wholesale Dry Goods van. When we got that bus, it had no reverse. We swapped out for another, and took this to Jack at Wolfsburg Motorworks. He rebuildt it, and it got an NOS reverse/first slider, among other bits.

Greg pulled it out and I stripped the 1.40 boxes off

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[Clara]

Oh no! It had no bowden tube bracket!!!


found one on another bus!

_________________
The Obsolete Air-Cooled Documentation Project http://oacdp.org/