New winter project!

As I mentioned a while back, it's time to park the bus for the cold and salty Michigan winter.  I decided it was time to start looking for a new winter project.  My first thought was a rat rod beetle, but I could not find a suitable donor.  I did, However, run across this nice little 67 Beetle that was just begging to be brought back to it's former glory.  I decided to start a new blog for the beetle project.  I will start posting back to the bus blog when I get it out in the Spring.  For now, it's Beetle time.  I hope you enjoy the project as much as I will.

Good times just driving the bus.

I have been having a great time driving the bus and just tinkering with the hundreds of little things that one must do when you own a 40 year old car.  There is always a little clip that needs to be replaced or a seal that needs to be removed and reinstalled, the list never ends.  I have been spending a bit of time working on a hard cover photo book of the bus project.  I found a site that makes this pretty easy to do.  It's called Blurb.  I haven't bought anything from them yet, so I can comment on their quality, or service, however, their software for making the book is pretty good and it's free.  I will be sure to let you know how it comes out.  I thought this would make a nice thing to have sitting in the bus when I take it to shows.
As a part of that project, I needed some pics of the bus in it's finished (current) state.  I headed out to the park and shot a few pics before the weather gets too cold.  Have a look.

Some plans for next summer include a new awning that is a bit more authentic looking than my Walmart pop-up, Maybe a roof rack, I have the front beam adjusters on order so I can lower the front to match the rear, a new stereo, and maybe a new air cleaner and some stainless push rod tubes.  Then it's on to some more shows.  My brother in law and I are talking about making it to Road America this coming June for the big show there.  Sounds like a good time.  Maybe I need a tow dolly or a trailer?

Window seals and a new stripe

It was raining a bit yesterday, so I thought I would see if I could make some headway installing the new door/window seals on the bus.  I started on the passengers side door and just dug in.  It all made pretty good sense as I went, it just seemed to take forever.  I was at it for a bit over 3 hours to do this door.  I didn't get to the door seal itself, just the window and vent seals.  It looks really nice, the only problem I am still having is the window goes up and down very stiff.  I am not sure why this is yet, I can only think it might be how hard the new seals are squeezing on the edges of the glass.  this might be a problem.  I will try putting a couple of wedges in the slot and prying the gap open a bit.  This might help a bit.

The next thing I decided to do was to add a 1/8 (3mm) black stripe to the two tone line between the turquoise lower and the white upper.  I saw this on a white over yellow bus at the show last week and it looked pretty nice.

Upon further inspection, I noticed that my seats also have a black piping on them; it's like it was just meant to be there.  What do you think?  Keep it, or lose it?

New Exhaust II

I finished up the new exhaust last night.  I am very happy with the look, and the sound.  I took it for a ride and it just seems to have a nice rumble now.  Almost cant tell a difference at highway speeds, but rollin' around town sounds much more authoritative, if a bus can be authoritative I guess :)  I considered this pipe when I completed the rebuild and didn't do it, big mistake.  In fact, I considered this pipe, no, lusted over this pipe back in the late 70's when I owned my old Beetle and just never could save up the cash. Again, another big mistake.  I love the sound.  Now I really want to drive the bus, but the weatherman says it's going to be a couple of days.
This is the Before Shot:  In essence, a small piece of water pipe.

Here are a couple of After Shots:

A V-Dub show last weekend

Well, I took the bus to a V-Dub show last weekend.  It was held at the US131 Motor sports park in Martin, MI.  A local club called the GoodVolks puts this show on and it was called the 2010 Fall Bug Run.  It was a really nice show.  There were about 150 air cooled cars, of those, there were more than 20 buses.  Very fun.

  There were some absolutely beautiful cars there.  It is really cool to see how much care and time, (as well as money!) These people put into their cars.

The center stage of this event was the drag racing.  About 25 VW's were there just to race (even a couple of buses were racing.)   I have never heard VW engines that sound like that; amazing and very fast.

The problem with going to a show like this is that you cant help but developing a passion for the little things you still want to do to your car.  This "passion" found me in my garage last night with the rear end of my bus ripped off installing the new exhaust I "bought" at the show (I keep having this strange feeling that I owe someone money for this! I am sure I will remember who, eventually.)

It was fun to see all the cool ideas other folks have come up with, and then to figure out how I am going to work in the ones I like.  More projects.  Anyway, as I watched and listened to the many bugs and buses roll by, I really felt that my bus needed a more "serious" sound.  The quiet and airy sound of the stock muffler just isn't cutting it.  So, along comes the new exhaust.  Cant wait to fire it up.

A couple of other cool things happened at the show as well, I ran into the guy that I sold my Manx style buggy to there this Spring.  We had a brief chance to talk and it sounds like he is really enjoying the buggy.  Man that feels good.  A car like that, no matter how much you try to make it right, is still a kit car and you can't help but worry a bit about how it will all work out.  I am very glad to know it's working out good for him so far and he is having fun with it.
Later in the day I ran into the guy, his wife and family that I bought the bus from.  It was really good to see them there.  I hope he was pleased with the progress so far.  I remember when we were discussing my plans for the bus when I was purchasing it and I think I have stayed pretty close to the things I was originally thinking.  It wasn't that well thought out, believe me, it just worked out that way.  All that said, I really hope he liked the outcome. He seemed pleased, and that made me feel good.
I also got a chance to take the bus down the drag strip; I have never been on a real drag strip before, it was pretty cool.

It was a great V-Dub weekend.  We are coming to the end of the season, and I will be putting it away in a month or so, it sure has been a fun few weeks with the bus all painted and rolling.

Lower Brake Fluid Reservoir Leaking.... Again

Ever since I installed the new master cylinder last fall, I have had a small leak at the seals where the lower brake fluid reservoir attaches to the master cylinder.  This leak would drain the upper reservoir over a two or three week period or so.  not a big problem, just not right.  I decided to fix it.  I pulled off the hose form the upper reservoir, (1/2" heater hose which has been working very well) and drained the brake fluid into a drain pan.  Next I pulled the lower reservoir loose from the master cylinder and caught as much fluid as I could.  After looking the seals over, I could see the leaking seal was messed up a bit.  It was new with the master cylinder, but it was chewed up.  I decided to pull off the master cylinder.  I cleaned things up, wiped it all down with lacquer thinner, and applied a bit of black silicone sealer to the rubber parts and the then to the upper reservoir to "encourage" a better seal.  After reinstalling the upper reservoir, I can see how this might not have been fully seated.  It's a bit tricky to get all the way down in.  I think the silicone will help with this.  I am pretty sure it is seated now.  I reinstalled everything but the hose to the upper reservoir.  This kept any brake fluid out of the lower reservoir and away from the silicone until it dried.  I left it sit for about 3-4 hours.  I topped it off and  then bled the brakes again.  Everything seems to be working well, I checked this morning and no drips.  No wet spots on the bottom of the master cylinder, so far things look good.  Only time will tell if my "patch" was successful.  After this fiddling around, I took it for a ride last night.  Driving the bus is always a good time.  At least a dozen peace signs were exchanged.  There is just something about these crazy old buses.

Curtain Picture

A quick shot of the curtains.  It took about 5 yards to make the curtains for the windows behind the front seats.  I did not make curtains to block in the front windshield, or the driver or passenger side roll up windows.  Just for the back.

I really would like to cover that white side panel with the same fabric as the front doors.  I had better start thinking about that I guess.

Before the new curtains.

Just an updated exterior shot.  Pics of new curtains coming soon.

New Curtain Material!

I finally decided on a material for the curtains.  This is only the third set of curtains I have made for this thing.  I am getting sick of re-doing these.  Anyway, I have decided on a material and last night I made a couple of curtains and installed them  So far I like it.  The best part is that the first curtain I made was the one that goes behind the wardrobe in the rear passenger side window.  Sounds easy enough, until you realize that most of the interior, from the slider rearward, needed to be removed or loosened to accomplish this.  Well, it's in and it only took a couple of hours.  The rest of the curtains should only take a couple of hours to finish.  I will take some pictures tonight and get them up tomorrow. 

There is a show coming up on the 29th of Aug I would like to attend with my brother in law (the one with the Mexican beetle).  The show is called the Fall bug run.  It is hel at one of our local drag racing strips.  There are several folks in this club that have beetles that are all fixed up for drag racing and this is a great time to see how fast your car is I guess.  I suppose I could race the bus, but they would be checking my 1/4 mile time with a calendar instead of a stop watch!  Anyway, this show is primarily for air cooled V-Dub's  It should be a great excuse for it's first show.  Anyway, here is a link to the event poster: 4th Annual Fall Bug Run .  I will be sure to take lots of pictures and post them.

It's done! Kind of...

The last couple of weeks have gone quite well for the old bus.  After the white was painted, I managed to get a couple of additional days off and I got the bottom prep work done.  I sanded and filled the last few remaining scratches and dings and set the bus on a set of jack stands.  After taking everything of value out of my garage, I swept up, blew the bus off and hosed down the floor.  I then wiped the whole bottom down with a wax and grease remover.  I completed the prep work on Saturday and was ready to paint Saturday evening.  The weather was perfect, 83 deg, and dry air with very little breeze.
My wife was out for the evening for her class reunion, this was the perfect time.  No matter how much you seal things up, some of the smell of painting always manages to get in the house and it’s best if I can get things aired out before anyone comes home.

The next morning I pulled the tape from the top to see the contrast with the white.

I masked off the wheel wells and sprayed undercoating inside to make the wheel wells look nice and fresh.  After that I put the wheels back on and dropped the bus back on the ground.

Next was the bumpers.  I sprayed the bumper mounts flat black and re-attached the bumpers.

Over the next couple of days I re-installed the door handles, door seals, door trim, lights and trim rings, added the wiper arms, cleaned the interior and windows and added the roof vent and electrical outlet.  Finally Monday evening my son and I took it for it’s maiden voyage as a newly painted Bully.
Remember way back when I started this project, I said “There are two wonderful days in the life of every restoration project. The day you tow it home, and the day of the first ride once it is completed.”  Well, today is the second of those two days.  It’s done!  That being said, there is a list of things a mile long that still need to be done.  As I was completing the wiper assy., for instance, they suddenly stopped working!  I have no idea why, I guess they are just 40 years old and that’s what seems to happen at that age.
My wife and I took it to the ice cream store last night.  What a hoot.  I am looking forward to the next part of this project.  Slowly finishing off the details and actually living the “bus life.”  I have a sneaking suspicion that it is going to be pretty fun.  As I have mentioned, the reaction I get is usually spectacular.  There simply aren’t that many of these left in this part of the country, especially not ones that have been fixed up a bit.
More bus adventures to follow, stay tuned.  Maybe I should plan a trip or something.  That will give me lots of stuff to write about!

Body work and paint

Things are progressing nicely with the body and paint work. Cant you tell by the pics?  I apologize for not having updated pics, however, I sold my old digital camera, ordered a new one and it's not here yet!  I will be sure to add them soon.  I now have the wheels, bumpers, front emblem, and the top of the bus painted white, I chose a white that was slightly off.  It was from a 2010 Chevy Impala.  It still looked a bit bright to me, so I mixed in a bit of the Pearl white I used for the interior.  This color works great with the interior color, very close.  The paint came out with a few specs of dust, but it's pretty good for having done it in my garage.  Nothing a bit of sanding with very fine paper and a quick buffing wont fix. 
I had the tires flipped on the rims yesterday as well.  I flipped them so the white-walls are showing.  If I am not going to put custom wheels on the bus, at least the stock wheel/cap design will have a bit of extra sparkle I guess.  I will try that for a while and see if I like it.

One thing I did discover is that it's getting difficult to find a tire store around here that has the ability to balance the old VW large-5 bolt pattern wheels.  The adapter is getting scarce.  The wheels did not have wheel weights on them when I got the bus, so maybe it will be OK now.  Apparently the previous owner ran into the same difficulty finding a tire store that could balance them.

Car Show Weekend

Having half of the weekend set aside to work on the bus, I was pretty excited to get started.  Just finishing up my breakfast and sipping a cup of coffee when my phone rings.  It’s my brother-in-law.  Apparently there is a VW show down in SouthHaven, MI this weekend and he was going to head down with his 1982 Mexican Beetle (The tomato red beetle next to my bus on the right.)  “Do you want to come along?”  “Naah, I really should stay here and get something done on the bus.”  Well, 20 minutes later the bus was packed up and heading South to the show.  It was the longest trip I have made with it and apparently I have never really gotten it up to temperature just driving it around town;  I got about 20 miles down the road and it started to spark knock pretty badly.  No problem, pull over and a quick turn of the distributor to retard the timing a pinch and she was running perfectly.  I took the old Blue Star Highway South from Holland to South Haven.  It was a beautiful day for a ride.  The weather was perfect and the old bus ran like a top.  She seemed to be quite content running along at between 55 and 60 mph. Windows down, vents flipped in to blow air on the driver, Nice cold soda in hand (no cup holder yet!) and nothing to do but drive.
The show turned out to be really nice.  This was a charity event put on by the local V Dub club called the Good Volks. 

All proceeds and vote money were going to the Leukemia foundation.  Almost 60 cars showed up, I think 9 were busses.  Great turnout, nice little swap area and a beautiful day.

I am glad I took the time off working on the bus to go.  There will be plenty of time to finish the project.  No hurry.  We need to enjoy this nice summer weather while it’s here.
Driving the bus is always an adventure.  It’s fun to watch people’s reaction to it.  Most people that notice it simply smile, or maybe a wave, however, occasionally someone will react in a more animated fashion.  Peace signs, thumbs up, finger pointing, and always big smiles.  There is something about the bus that makes people smile.  I have noticed that (to date) every person I have taken for a ride in the bus will climb in, sit down, close the door, look around and immediately smile.  It is amazing.  There is something pretty cool about a vehicle that has that affect on people.  It brings a smile to my face just thinking about it!