The dreaded grounding issues

Took care of the ground points under the dash yesterday.  I was having intermittent functionality of my directionals and wanted it cleared up.  I suspected the grounds as it is a common issue.  Here is how I did it.

First you need to gain access to the ground points.  You do this by dropping the fuse box.  Up behind the fuse box you will find two 'crown' looking pieces screwed to the chassis with a number of brown wires attached.

 I recommend disconnecting the wires and removing the crowns for working on out of the car.  I have never been a fan of working bent backwards under a dashboard, and this is no exception.  The screws in my Vanagon were in great shape and easily taken out.

My tool of choice for cleaning up the contacts was a brass wire wheel installed in my Dremel tool. The brass will not damage the part, is hard enough to clean but soft enough to allow for problem free handling of the parts (or so I thought).

IMPORTANT: when working with a wire brush, wear safety glasses.  I had a piece of the wire brush come out and stick into the skin on the end of my nose, so you can imagine the disaster possible if it got into and eye.

The Dremel brushes are not the best constructed and they are small, so grab a couple to finish the job, also the cone shaped ones will deteriorate quick, so stick to the standard configuration like the picture.

 The photo on the right is my ground crown.  Nasty little thing, no wonder I was having issues.  This was the worst of the two and the second one in, which means the other one was closer to see and access as well as in much nicer condition.  I have no windshield water leaks, so this really amazes me.  The condition of the crown is really bad.

I first set to clean up the van's mount point behind the dash.  Reach up and remove the paint and any rust at the mount point.

Holding the crown in the jaws of a pair of needle nose pliers, I set out to clean them up.  Things were going great as I had finished one, and was working on the other.

Background - this weekend is the Summer Nationals here in Worcester.  There are hot rods of all sorts blasting through the town.  Usually I will attempt to 'get out of Dodge' for most of it as the city does become unbearable.  Every stop light is an opportunity to light up tires or test your speed reflexes.  This year is worse as one of the main roads in the city is being resurfaced, so there is more traffic than usual going through the neighborhoods, including mine.

So as I am doing this cleaning of the crown, a particularly loud one goes by and it distracted me just enough to look up.  Big mistake.  The wire wheel caught onto the inside of the crown, tore it from the jaws of the pliers and sent it into my lower jaw.  Looks like I got bit.  Good thing I am on vacation for a few days as I would not be able to shave on Tuesday.

Bent the wire brush too.

I chose to remove the existing spade connectors and replace with new ones rather than clean those up.  Connect as needed, and enjoy the full functionality of your Vanagon again.

NOTE:  It has been a week of problem free electrics.  Highly recommend this maintenance for your Vanagon.