Westies at Watkins

If you are in the range of a Vanagon trip to Watkins Glen, I recommend it.

I had no idea what to expect, and as per usual this summer, it was due to rain all weekend so the wife stayed home.  Was just the boy and I getting ready to have some fun.  Watkins Glen NY is the home of the famous racetrack, but lesser known (at least to me) was the Gorge. 

The event is put together by the folks at the Empire VW camping club, as an event for LiMBO.  It was held at the Watkins Glen State Park the weekend of September 21st.

The state park is well kept, spots are far enough apart and the place was packed despite the rain.

Potluck dinner one night.  Anticipating the cold September rain, I brought a couple gallons of New England style clam chowder.

Was gone in minutes!

Left only with the nasty pot to clean up, and barely a bowl for my son.






The highlight for my son was the VW's racing around the track.  Honestly, it was quite the scene. 

Much fun ad by all.








For $25 you got three laps.  Sure there was a pace car, but YOUR IN A VW BUS!  You are not going to be knocking on triple digits, and if you are, there is an 84 diesel with 49hp at the next corner that will get in your way.


After the second lap, they stop at the finish line for pictures.




High quality (not) video taken with my iPad duct taped to my dashboard can be found here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7TmGEqAkLw

My pedal rivets busted apart on lap three. Quick repair on side of the track and we finished with grins on our faces.

October fish

Fishing in Vermont's Lewis Creek ends on October 31st.  Wanting to squeeze every opportunity out of my 50 something dollar license, I headed up on the 26th for a day of fly fishing with a Chef friend who works out of Burlington, VT.

Nice ride up.  Bit past leaf season, so the colors were faded but the leaf peepers who screw up traffic flow any time they can were not to be seen. Love the Vermont countryside with its mountains, farms and covered bridges.  KEEP VERMONT WEIRD.

As for the fish, it was a bust.  Not anything more than a half assed nibble.  As for the fun and camaraderie; a great day.  Got some casting practice and alot of laughs.

After changing out of our waders, we decided to track down some Switchback Ale.  It was only the second week since the bottled version of this delicious libation became available and the locals were buying it up. 

On our way we stumbled upon this little pizza place that does brick oven style pizza and only on fridays from 4:30 to 7.  These nice folks do it because they love it, not because they need to do it.









Kicked back with our ale while we devoured our pizzas and told fish stories.

Starter and front heater core

So now its December.  The Thingamajigger served me VERY well this year despite the late start.  I am currently using it as a daily driver as the S420 is having 'issues'.  She is still doing well despite the cold.

Only issues as of late have to do with the lack of front heat and my starter went south.

Lets begin with the starter. . .

As I said, I am using it now as the daily driver.  I loaded a Merrychef e4 oven in it and went down to a local distributor to discuss the oven with a client.  All went well until I tried to leave.  One turn of the key, and a nasty grinding noise left me dead in the parking lot.

Warehouse guy leaving for home helped me push start it and I was on my way home. Ordered a hi torque unit from Go Westy.

Next day a friend lent me his 'semi working' spare and I changed them out.

This is what I found.

The unit on the right is obviously the failed unit.  There is absolutely nothing that can be done to avoid this, its just a failed part.  Probably fatigued from years of starts.

Will probably be dropping the new Hi Torque starter in tomorrow after work.  Looking forward to it.


Now for the juicy one.

If you own a Vanagon and do your own work, sooner or later you are going to have to yank the dash out.  Whether it be due to a failed part, mice stench, or just preventative it is a rite of passage for all Vanagon owners.

If you are lucky and can prepare fully for the event, than good for you!  I was indeed one of these lucky souls as mine was due to choice, rather than necessity.

I had prepared for the event, as anyone who has read prior posts will remember.  I rebuilt the heater box last year but have not had the time to install it.  I bought a new wiper motor, which is easier to install with dash off.  Also the windshield washer lines.  They harden and crack, just cheap insurance against leaks.  The last part is the brake booster.  A BMW unit from a early 80's will increase the pressure on the calipers, thereby stopping power and still fit nicely behind the dash.  I bought the part, but chose not to do this right away as I need the car for daily driving now. Maybe over winter I will tackle that project and re-do some of the metal lines.

So as for the dash, I had it out in less than an hour.  There are a variety of helpful hints on the net, follow any ones direction as its fairly straightforward. 

I had access to the heater box quickly and removed the 6 screws holding it in place.  After pinching the hoses with needle nose vice grips covered in fuel line (to not harm the hoses), and placing a collection of old t shirts under the hose connections, I released the worm clamps and slid the heater box out.

The new box was a bit different from the original 84 box, as you can see below.

The 84 box is on the left.  The motor was seized and the core was blocked, but no mice and no turds.  The later style box on the right that had been rebuilt with new core, motor and flap gaskets.  The difference is on the location of the air outlet ports.  The new box has a set of oval shaped ports on the front panel of the box (left in picture) and the round ports towards the back are blocked on the new box and used on the older style box.  Make sense?

I need to come up with a permanent block for the oval ports, using duct tape temporarily is sort of ghetto.

Reinstalling the dash is fairly straightforward.  Trickiest part is supporting the dash in a position where you can access all the things you need to connect, and also have enough light to do so.  I was quickly running out of sunlight, so I suspended a halogen light above the front end.  Worked great, had plenty of light, was out of the way until it dropped on the bottom of my windshield and cracked the 4 month old spiffy windshield.  crap.

Bleeding a Vanagon cooling system is an art unto itself, add in the Zetec and you have the makings for true frustration.  Until you try for yourself, I cannot describe it properly enough.