There are some things that need to be done

Organization is at the heart of a Chef.  Mise en place, or 'everything in its place' prior to starting a project is key to a happy outcome.

Alas, this was not making me happy:

This is a clusterf*ck of a homemade shelf I inherited when I bought my house.  I kept it as the other half of the garage is lined with wire racks that have served my organization needs - until now.

I could not get something off the shelf without knocking something else down.  That pisses me off.

There was 4 feet of these half ass shelves full of all sorts of stuff.

And this is in addition to the wire racks on the opposite side.

Time to consider options.


SO when you mention that your organization needs a fix to a friend who is a contractor, you expect a certain amount of professionalism and an idea or two.  What I got was a maniacal laugh, some comments about my anal retentiveness in my work areas (especially my kitchen), and a room full of laughter at my expense (wife included).



The corner to receive the shelves



When the laughs subsided, and we all caught out breath, grabbed another round of beverages and all of a sudden Mick the contractor yells "I GOT IT!" with such vigor I thought he would wake up my sleeping 4 year old.

From the explanation I got, it seems that Mick had signed a new contract that day and the new T Mobile site had some demolition that needed to be done before becoming the latest bastion of cellular technology in this city of 500 phone vendors.

The demo?  Multiple shelf units of a 6 inch depth.  Each one measuring 2 feet wide by 8 feet high.  I scored 4 of them, and some 4ftx8ft retail slat wall panels.

I cleared out the back corner to get ready to install the first of the shelves.  Broke out the ramset, some pressure treated 1x6 and got them shelves up.

This is what three of them look like installed.  Perfect depth for most of my needs.  May need a larger shelf to support the various Harley manuals and other books.  But everything has a spot, I have room to grow (a fourth shelf yet to be installed) and its ORGANIZED.

The added benefit is that the space taken from the wall is minimal, providing more work space in an already cramped garage.

This makes me happy.

Now if I could only sell the 5 foot wide commercial refrigeration unit that is taking up so much space.

Just thought this was cool

Tim from Maine had this in his Inspector Gadget Vanagon.  I had to duplicate it because of its multiple uses and placements.

Its a simple paper towel holder I had in the basement, with two spring clips usually used in closets to hold brooms on the wall.  Some small screws with loc nuts and you have a papertowel holder that can clip nearly anywhere.

I like to keep mine here

Tail lights

Aside from the high quality bumper, and a rotting hatch that is soon to be replaced, I made some modifications to the taillights utilizing the vacant holes in the US taillights.

The method is quite easy actually.  A donor taillight backing (the part that holds the bulbs, and snaps into the lens) is required for almost all of the parts you will need.  From the donor, you need to peel back the contact strips that bring electricity to each socket on the backing plate.  Located within the socket is an 'L' shaped spring-steel piece that provides the contact and spring resistance to the bulb.  Remove these contacts.

Now that you have seen how easy the piece comes out, now you must insert two of them in the vacant holes in your existing taillights.  I was able to do this most successfully by carefully cutting away one side of plastic melted tabs over the necessary metal lead into the socket so that I could lift the lead slightly and insert the contact.  Then you can replace the lead in the backing plate.

The light is not ready to install yet, as we need to add juice to this lead.  If you look at the backing plate, you will notice the leads coming together at one edge with just enough space on that edge to insert a fine washer between the lead with power and the lead that goes to the socket you just modified.  This will be your easiest power source - keeping it internal to the light.

Replicate on the other side and enjoy the doubling of your rear visibility.

Front heater core - Partie une

OK, as previously noted - my front heater core was clogged.  Now in my mind, if I am going to spend a couple days removing and replacing the dashboard, I will be damned if I am going to install a used part.

So given that the wife's CR-V was hit a couple weeks back and we will need to have it repaired, I cannot immediately tear apart the van as I will need it to get around.  The wife will take the S420 and I will look cool in the Thingamajigger.  The S420 is about 4 feet longer than her CR-V, so I am a bit afraid for its well being.  C'est la vie.

So to get a jump on the project, I procured a heater box from my NH friend Peter who has a few vanagons he is parting out.  The following is the rebuilding of the box to be ready for the tearout.  I have also ordered a new wiper motor for the simple reason of mental ease that I did it when the dash was out.  I am hoping that the wiper arms are in good shape and can be lubed and re-used.

This was the box just after tearing it down.  It was one of the glued versions, rather than the clipped ones.  The difference being about an hours more work in separating the box, and then another hour preparing the surfaces again for putting back together.  The clipped ones come right apart after removing the clips.

As you can see, the heater core is pretty well gunked up, and that's the outside.  The clog keeping it from flowing is internal, and probably removed with some CLR, but I am not taking the chance.

Here is the new core and the original.  The older one is of really good craftsmanship, and the newer one not as much but still good stuff - made by Behr in the UK.

So I started tearing it down, removing the pieces, the flaps, the motor.  Once the flaps were out, I contemplated how I would rebuild those.  I stripped off the old deteriorated foam seals and was left with this to work with.

I wire brushed the best I could and was not satisfied, so I broke out the spot blaster and spent way too much time cleaning these up.  I really need to buy a sandblast cabinet.

Once the flaps were rust free to my acceptance, I cleaned them up with some paint prep solvent and spray painted them with some black paint I had on the shelf.  I hung them above my propane heater to cure up real well and went to work on the box itself.  The box was really dirty, dried dust from many years of use, but no mouse nests.  A toothbrush, air gun and some dried rags took care of the dirt.  A final wipe with some simple green and we are ready to go.

I deliberated for a bit on which way to go with the seal material, and determined that the synthetic felt used for window insulation would do nicely. 

This stuff stretches out perfectly, seals up nice and should hold up long time.

A few correctly placed slits down the middle allowed for perfect alignment and a quick pass with the lighter cleaned up the edge strands.

After doing this to all three flappers, I was ready to rebuild.  Reversing the process for installation, the flappers went in with a slathering of grease (because I did sand blast the arms), and got them working beautifully.  Some new stainless screws to ensure no deterioration down the road, and some one sticky sided foam  (1/2 in by 1/2 in) stuck to the periphery of the heater core to seal the spaces around the core and prevent rattling.



The picture was taken prior to cleaning the box with Simple Green, to test the foams ability to seal the gaps around the core.  You can see the tabs that were previously glued and now separated.  I cleaned them with a dremel to ensure a correct fitment when reassembling.



The felt seal installed with the stock mount clip bars, and in the housing.

Next part - the installation of the blower motor and reassembly.

And then he said - Let there be light!

When doing the radiator, I noticed the headlights had some water in them.


As you can see, they are H4 upgrades, but obviously done some time ago.  The seals had dried up and was allowing water to enter the bulb.

I tried to clean them up, and silicone them sealed.  Cleaning the lens was easy, but the backing of the bulb had a reflective coating that was wearing off, and my wiping off did not help.

Only one way to go - time for some new ones.

I procured a pair of new Hella H4's from a parts source and went to install a few days later.

Holy smokes, what a difference!

New cooling system

A few weeks ago, I was feeling the need to tinker one evening, and had the time to do so.  I went out to the Thingamajigger to find the stack of parts I have waiting for just such an occasion.

The impulse hit me to tackle the radiator job.  This was something I was holding off as I had recently tackled the radiator in the wife's CR-V and that was probably the single, largest pain in my ass I have ever encountered when doing a radiator.  EVERY bolt was rusted, or seized, the access was minimal and nothing went right.  The CR-V was 15 years newer than the Vanagon, and generally better maintained.



Crusty!



So, back to the Vanagon.  I had a new Behr radiator, had a bunch of hoses and clamps, temperature sensors, mount washers and gumption to get it done. 

The offending radiator is to the right.

Secure the front end of the vehicle high enough to have plenty of work space.  With my lowered van, the ramps were barely enough and I needed to do some manipulation to get it out.

The Vanagon holds some significant amounts of coolant, and it needs to be drained and disposed of properly.  Never reuse coolant.  Stuff is cheap, buy new coolant.  No sense putting all this money into the system and fill it with used coolant.

This radiator has spooked me since the get go, I must be looked upon by the Vanagon angels to have made it through the season without popping it.

It was susted thoroughly from the bottom, and is the original (or at least OEM unit).  The weight of this unit was easily double the weight of the Behr replacement unit.

The removal of the radiator was marked with a couple minor problems.  The first was the spring clips that hold the nuts to which the supports are held on.  The clips rusted enough so that the nuts themselves were spinning, and they needed to be cut off.  I replaced them with some body clips and stainless hardware.

The picture on the right shows the older ones and the replacements.

Once the support brackets were off, hoses disconnected, fan wires disconnected, the radiator can be lowered from the van.    Be cautious, the radiator surprised me with its weight.

When the radiator is out, you can start disassembly.  The shroud needs to come off with the fan unit. I took this opportunity to wire wheel the whole thing and give it a coat of paint.  If I had access to a sandblast cabinet, I would have used it here, but I do not right now.

New hardware, temperature sensor, and a spiffy coat of paint, the unit is ready to go back in.  Now to do some hoses.

The front two hoses are definites, the others are still under consideration.  Reasons for this is that I do not wish to simply slap in hoses to a motor that will be removed come tax season for an upgrade.

From the picture on the left, you can see my hose replacements for the two front hoses.

With the radiator out, it provides access to a whole bunch of stuff. I added some more soundproofing and got to replacing the heater lines while I had great access.

Since the system was drained, I used to opportunity to replace the heater lines.  I bought 30 feet of high grade heater line, some brass T's from Home Depot, crimp clamps and set to work.

I started from the rear while the fan shroud was drying completely.  Started with the feed line from the cylinder head and worked my way forward.  I replaced the lines going to the rear heater core and plugged into the brass T.  Make sure you get new grommets to protect your lines through the bulkhead.

I ran the other line from the return tube down to the T fitting and chose to run both of the lines forward together, as I thought this to be easier than running two single lines.  Seemed to work out okay.  Not a whole lot of access down there without stripping off half the undercarriage.

Then I worked my way forward to the front end.  I ran the new lines through undercarriage in the same location as the originals.  When I got to the front of  the van, and the smaller hoses that attach to the front heater core I wished I could have found replacements, but I have not yet been able to.

After connecting up the core and double checking all my hose clamps, I returned to the radiator installation.

The lifting of the radiator assy would have been easier with a second pair of hands as you need to juggle the placement of the radiator, the installation of two support brackets and insert the bolts.

I still need to get a couple new air diverters for around the radiator to direct air in the proper manner.  Connect up the radiator fan wiring, the temperature sender wiring and make sure the fresh air inlet is not full of gunk.

Now there are a few different schools of thought on filling the system with coolant.  I happen to have an incline on my second driveway that leads to my garage, so backing it onto the incline and filling there allows for an air free system.

My confusion started when I had a half gallon to go and the system was full.  Could not figure it out.

I took the van for a ride, figuring there was an air bubble that somehow did not get out.  Van ran great, temp gauge was fine, but while driving I tried the heaters and found that the front core (which was not attached to system when I bought it) was clogged and not allowing hot coolant through.  Now that's why I couldn't get that last half gallon in there.  Guess that is a project for another day.

December already?

Holy smokes Batman.

Been on the road a bunch for work.  Have been tinkering, but not as much as I would like.

I have been accumulating parts on a massive rate.  Setting myself up for disappointment when I do not get all the projects done I fear, but I would rather have them around when I have time as opposed to having some time and no parts to play with.

First project will need to be the front suspension.  I have all the powerflex bushings, and new parts (tie rods, ball joints, radius arm parts, etc) to complete the job.  Only thing I still want is a set of control arms to have completely rebuilt prior to starting the job.  They are in the works from a local parts guy who is parting out some Vanagons.

Maybe I will get the control arms early in week and get them blasted and painted so they are ready to receive the bushings.