Newbie Questions Love the Van!

[BC Westie]

Hello, Great site here! I have a new 81 Air Cooled Westfalia and a few questions.

1. My Odometer does not work but the needle moves. Are there 2 cables for the Unit?

2. I lowered my spare tire and found a cable broken off of a box with a bent spindle. Is that the ODO cable? Is the spindle suppose to be bent? My guess is this happened by the guy who replaced the tire last.
What is the best way to fix this?

3. Tried the sink and water came spraying out through the drawers. Looks like where the hose attaches to the tap underneath the plastic bit is broken off the tap. Do I need a whole new tap unit or does the bottom screw off?

4. Good place to get this part?

5. Oil Temps. I run about 180-190F around town but creeps up to 210F on hot days. What Oil temp is to hot? The Max?

Cheers and sorry for so many questions

One day I might pop my H6 from my SVX into it if it ever got crunched.

[RevKevin]

[bucko]

Speedo:

More than likely the drive arm that spins the odometer has backed it's way out, a common problem. TENCENTLIFE posted a picture/fix for this. Do a search using speedometer, and you will find it.

Sink parts:

GoWesty! has all the parts you'll need to repair the sink, and most any other Westy related problem.
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Current VW drives: 1984 Westfalia

Past VW drives: 1967 Beetle, 1973 Beetle, 1977 Bus, 1971 Military Type 181

[tencentlife]

The speedo and odo are within the speedo head and both run off one speedo cable from the left front wheel. The odos stop frequently while the sppedo keeps working, due to a couple of little gears inside that get loose on their shaft. Not hard to fix, takes some patience, there are many threads here detailing how.

If your speedo reads then the cable is working, although what you describe near your spare tire sounds like some weirdness at the oxygen sensor service reminder counter box. There are two cables, but they are in series, not parallel. The little square box has the short speedo cable from the front wheel go into it, and a longer cable comes out the other side and goes up to the speedo head. The box has nothing to do with the functioning or malfunctioning of the oxygen sensor and fuel injection; it is just an idependent warning clock that counts off 90000 miles and then turns on the OX warning light in your dash. You can eliminate the useless box if you like by using a single long speedo cable instead of the two separate ones. GoWesty has these in stock and so do some other retailers. If the electrical wires are removed from the box then the light will never come on, and no other systems are affected.

Your oil temp sounds just fine, which is something of a rarity with boxers, especially aircooled. A stable running temp of 190-210F is perfect. It is best if it gets hot enough to boil out any condensation, so you're there. Opinions differ, but I like to keep oil temp below 230F at the very worst.

[BC Westie]

That sounds right. Essentially this long metal bar that looks bent fell out of the OX2 box. I have not driven it since so I guess my speedo is totally disconnected now Can I pop it back in until I get a single long speedo cable? Bent side down? Looks wrong to be bent but I might be wrong.

190-220F is the norm around town for Oil Temp. Have not taken it on a long trip but I will look out for the 230F as a warning Oil Temp.
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1980 Vanagon Cali Import 86,000Miles
1981 Vanagon (Auto) 219,000kms
1981 Westfalia (Auto) Cali Import 169,000Miles
1981 Westfalia 300,000kms
1982 Westfalia Cali Import 193,000Miles
1982 Westfalia (Auto) 205,000Kms
1984 Vanagon 306,000kms
1987 Vanagon GL 300,000Kms

[tencentlife]

Well lotsa folks engines go over 230F all the time and they don't blow up or anything, but that's the temp where oil pressure really starts to drop due to the decrease in viscosity. So it isn't that the oil is damaged by that temp (oil is good to about 250-260F before it starts to degrade rapidly from heat), but the pressure falls off quickly from 230 on up, and with inadequate pressure you start getting rod bearing overheating and damage.

I don't know what bent bar you could be referring to, except maybe the mounting bar that the ox-box is mounted with. The box should have a short cable from the LF wheel spindle, and another on the opposite side that disappears up into the body to connect at the speedo head. The outer end of the short cable is squared and the very tip just sticks out of a square hole in the LF wheel hub dustcap. Make sure the square cable tip can't turn in the square hole, as one or the other can get round with wear. The cables can get disconnected easily at the speedo head, too. You can pull up the plastic shroud that covers the whole instrument cluster and get to the cable at the speedo end. You can pop the cable out of the back of the speedo and drive around a bit to make sure the cable spins. If it does the speedo cable drive is allright. Make sure the cable is well attached to the speedo head and doesn't pop back off after you reattach it. If all that checks out, and your speedo works but odo doesn't, then you need to do a little surgery on the speedo head to fix the odo gears.

[BC Westie]

Ok. Figured out the mystery dual cable thing. Put my son to bed and went out in the dark with a flash light and lowered my spare tire.

I was trying to repair the OX2 box where the bent spindle came out of and then I found the cable went no where as it was tucked up in behind.

The previous owner had replaced it with a single cable. Now I just have to do the surgery to get rid of the squeak and get the ODO going again as my fuel gauge is buggered too and it would be nice to know how much gas I have.

The gauge goes to 1/4 at full and then sways all around. I take it a new sender in the tank should fix this.
_________________
1980 Vanagon Cali Import 86,000Miles
1981 Vanagon (Auto) 219,000kms
1981 Westfalia (Auto) Cali Import 169,000Miles
1981 Westfalia 300,000kms
1982 Westfalia Cali Import 193,000Miles
1982 Westfalia (Auto) 205,000Kms
1984 Vanagon 306,000kms
1987 Vanagon GL 300,000Kms

[tencentlife]

Sounds like you're in for the Baptism by Fuel. Many used vans come complete with leaky gas tank seals, so dropping the gas tank to reseal it is a rite of passage. It's the only way to get at the fuel tank sender, too.

You can test the gauge itself first to be sure it's the sender. Pull off the instrument cluster top cover and look down on the lower right front of the cluster itself. You'll see the 14-pin connector for the cluster. First off, make sure the connector is firmly seated in the cluster. Some problems occur due to this getting loose. The fuel level sender input wire there is #8 (counting from the right side, I believe), the violet/black wire. If you track that wire away from the cluster it should reach a 4-pin connector somewhere behind the instrument panel. Disconnect the 4-pin. With the ignition on, the fuel gauge should stay at empty. If you jumper the violet/black pin to chassis ground, the gauge should go all the way to full, at the top of the scale. If that checks out, the gauge and its power supply are allright and the trouble is either in the sender itself, or the sender wire is damaged or grounding somewhere between that 4-pin and the sender (there aren't any other intermediate connectors).

[RevKevin]

So I had my gauges out today while I was replacing my master brake cyl and fixed my odometer, didn't even have to take it apart. There's a gear that works with a spiral gear that's shaft had worked it's way away from the spiral gear, so I just had to push it back agains the spiral gear and viola!

[Lanval]

Per the faucet -

I've had some faucet travails, so I'll comment. The underside of the electric faucet has two connections:

One is threaded - this is for the connection to the city water hook-up.

One is barbed - this is for the water tank line, and it has (or should have) a clamp around it.

My original faucet had only about half the barbed connector, as it had broken off before - it leaked.

I replaced it with another Delta-Six electric faucet, which had a hole where the body joined the flanged (hadn't sealed properly).

Delta-Six kindly replaced that faucet with another - this one has a less severe leak at the faucet arm, but unsatisfactory, nonetheless.

There is, or should be, a seal between your faucet flange and the stainless steel.

The spout disconnects, and underneath there is an O-ring which is all that keeps water from seeping back out (this appears to be the problem with my replacement faucet).

I've ordered a hand-pump faucet from GoWesty - hopefully it won't leak; you can still use a pump with it, by simply hooking up your power lines for the pump to a switch (another Westy owner here at UCI has this same setup); this is nice because you have water with or without power.

Best,

Lanval

[bucko]

[rubbachicken]

here's the afore mentioned link, something i need to do to my bus

[zippyslug31]

[RevKevin]

[bucko]

[BC Westie]

I have ordered the hand water pump from Go Westy. Kind of retro but probably more reliable. Reminds me of the 69 I grew up in.

The fuel gauge somtimes comes on and sometimes only to 1/4. I will look for a loose connector.

Two more silly questions:

How to pop the console off?
What does the L stand for after Vanagon?

I have to say it is cool in my travels how everyone with a Westy waves at me as I drive around Vancouver.
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1980 Vanagon Cali Import 86,000Miles
1981 Vanagon (Auto) 219,000kms
1981 Westfalia (Auto) Cali Import 169,000Miles
1981 Westfalia 300,000kms
1982 Westfalia Cali Import 193,000Miles
1982 Westfalia (Auto) 205,000Kms
1984 Vanagon 306,000kms
1987 Vanagon GL 300,000Kms

[photogdave]

Don't forget to wave at me!
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89 Syncro GL Westfalia 2.1 WBX/WBXaustSS

My Westy Movies:
photogdave On Vimeo
photogdave On YouTube

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

[BC Westie]

I don't think I could miss the Tiger
_________________
1980 Vanagon Cali Import 86,000Miles
1981 Vanagon (Auto) 219,000kms
1981 Westfalia (Auto) Cali Import 169,000Miles
1981 Westfalia 300,000kms
1982 Westfalia Cali Import 193,000Miles
1982 Westfalia (Auto) 205,000Kms
1984 Vanagon 306,000kms
1987 Vanagon GL 300,000Kms

[BC Westie]

Well I did the tencentlife fix on my ODO. It worked till 009.9 on the trip and then it all shut down again. Pulled it out tonight to find the little brown star that connects to the wht worm gear split in 1/2. Guess something in the head jammed up?
_________________
1980 Vanagon Cali Import 86,000Miles
1981 Vanagon (Auto) 219,000kms
1981 Westfalia (Auto) Cali Import 169,000Miles
1981 Westfalia 300,000kms
1982 Westfalia Cali Import 193,000Miles
1982 Westfalia (Auto) 205,000Kms
1984 Vanagon 306,000kms
1987 Vanagon GL 300,000Kms

[tencentlife]

That says that the hangup is between the 1's wheel and the 10's wheel. It'll hang usually somewhere between two number wheels, as the advancing finger comes around to roll the intermediate spider wheel to advance the next digit place by one. So look carefully at that area. Maybe there's some damage to the fingers or some small debris caught in there.

All the number wheels except the tenths one are the same, as are the spider wheels. If there is any damage to one, you can rearrange the wheels so that the bad one is in the last place on the left, where it will only be a problem every hundred-thousand miles.
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Experience is kryptonite to doctrine.