Some of the club members met up today to enjoy the good weather, friends and to have a picnic. We decided to go for a short cruise around the Rockton area, stopping at a few local places that have some yummy treats. We arrived at Westfield Heritage Village to have our picnic lunch. After that some folks headed for home, but others stopped at our favourite ice-cream shop nearby.
Thanks to Ron and Wayne for organizing this and running the cruise! And to everyone who attended – it was great to have such a wonderful bunch along. I’d say it was a perfect day!
Last month, we wrapped up completing the disassembly process of the suspension, radio body and most importantly, the gear box. This month, we will look at the restoration of the gear box.
Last month, we left off with an introduction to the Sand Scorcher and a bit of a history. This month, we dig in to taking it apart. All of the original parts are not going to be used, just what we need as there are some better parts purchased for the restoration. We will focus on the gearbox as it’s a bit more involved as I remember correctly.
I hope everybody is doing well and is safe during these interesting times. Hopefully many of you are keeping busy working on projects around the house and of course, your VW’s! I’m going to bring you a bit of a different VW restoration of sorts in a series. This VW doesn’t even take up any garage space and can be worked upon on the desk in your office! We’re going to do a restoration an original 1979 issue of a Tamiya Sand Scorcher!
Have you ever been in the middle of a repair job and torn the gasket you needed to use? Weber carb gaskets are only available in a full kit, and if you need a just gasket, this can be expensive. Sometimes gaskets are no longer available, and you need to salvage what you already have or cut a new one from stock with an razor knife – very carefully!
I recently ran into this issue, and found a high-tech way to solve it online and adapted it. I’ll share my technique, but be forewarned – it’s really geeky!
My wife is an avid crafter, and she has a couple of Cricut machines. A Cricut resembles a computer ink-jet printer, except they are generally set up for cutting. These machines can cut a variety of materials from lightweight paper to heavy weight stock. There are other manufacturers of cutting machines that can even operate with third-party design and cutting software. This can be advantageous as they can import and work with multiple computer file types. I use a file type called SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics). The reason I use the SVG format is clarity. You have probably seen an enlarged digital picture or graphic, it’s very clear when it is small, but when it’s enlarged it becomes blocky and fuzzy, lacking a defined clear edge. A sharp clear edge is absolutely mandatory for a gasket.
Let me take you through how I make a gasket in broad stokes. It takes some trial and error to experiment to get the technique right.
First, I take my gasket and place it on my digital scanner, the same one you might use for pictures. If the gasket was completely missing or too badly damaged, I might put the part directly on the bed of the scanner. I then acquire the image from the scanner in a format such as PNG. (portable network graphic)
Second, I import the file into a free computer program called InkScape. InkScape is a computer graphics program. It’s probably not quite like any other graphics program you may have used in the past. It’s a Vector image editor. It represents the image so it’s made up with nodes. Nodes are the individual points that form the image edge. Kinda like string art, you connect the string point-to-point (or node-to-node) to form the art – this is the same thing I do digitally. You can add, delete, move and reposition the nodes in order to clean up the image. Depending on the quality of the source image, this will dictate how much “post processing” you will need to perform. Once my image is “clean” with crisp edges and round through-holes in the correct places, I save the modified digital image as a SVG. Since it’s in SVG, I can make it a little bigger, or a little smaller without loosing clarity.
Third, I import the SVG into my cutting machine program. There is a scale on the margin of the image and I use this to calibrate the gasket true size for printing. I use a digital vernier caliper and check the source size and confirm the size on screen, confirming both x and y dimensions. When the image is sized correctly, I try to print a few copies by using up the free space available on the cutting surface. I save my work at this point, in case I would like to produce more gaskets in the future.
Fourth – The cutting surface is a thin plastic mat about the thickness of a credit-card which is covered in a low stick adhesive. This is where to place your gasket media. Since most of my work is small, I use the the small machine to cut with. The mat size is 12″ x 6″ . This allows me to cut most gaskets that might be used on an air-cooled VW except for the transmission gaskets. For that, I may need to use the larger cutter machine (16″ x 24″) which I have not attempted yet. I use bulk gasket material that is fuel/oil tolerant and trim it to place on the small 12″ x 6″ mat.
Fifth – I’m now ready to produce the gasket(s). I tell my cutting software to cut all the lines twice, and I adjust the dials on the cutter machine to apply maximum pressure to the mat surface, and to operate at slow speed. Depending on the number of cuts and the size of your gaskets this can take from 5 to 20 minutes to complete.
Cutting the gasket – Pict-34 Carb
Sixth – When the cut is complete, you now need to remove your newly cut gaskets from the adhesive mat and any debris left behind so you can continue to use the reusable cutting mat in the future.
I find the gaskets built using this technique to be just as good, or even better than the commercially available gasket, and this allows you to modify the design to suit your application if required.
When I bought my bug, I expected some electrical issues. I’ve had a few. From issues with my headlights to some issues with basic grounds. You can come to expect these kinds of things on cars approaching 45 or more years old.
Another issue I encountered on my own beetle was an intermittent starter issue. In this post, I’ll break down how the starter system works electrically and mechanically since this topic has come up a few times with a few friends in recent days.
I’ve started a new project for my bug this winter. I think I’ve committed to building a new engine. It’s a costly project, and to save some money where I can, I’d like to be able to re-use some parts from an engine that I acquired.
I used to think that quote from Joseph Lucas was reserved for Lucas automotive electrics – but I nearly experienced it myself. I could have been my very own prince of darkness.
This weeks article is a rather short technical idea than a full fledged project. It’s about keeping your brakes adjusted on your Bug, Ghia, Thing, Buggy, etc. If you’ve ever adjusted your brakes before, you are aware the the issues of the brake adjustment stars. The stars typically corrode in place, so we remove them, clean them up in the wire wheel. We typically apply grease or anti-seize compound to ensure they remain free (for a while at least). The next step is to adjust the brakes so they just slightly drag on the drums. Take it for a test drive, feels great doesn’t it! But wait a minute, by the second time you drive it you need to adjust your brakes again – whats going on here!?
Ok, this seems like this will be a simplistic article. It sort-of is, everything is basic, but you need to be very conscious and meticulous to prevent trouble from finding you. There are a few nuances about doing an oil change on your air-cooled engine that you may or not be aware of, things that I have noticed while working on the air cooled wonder. Perhaps I’m too picky about how to do simple things. The devil is usually in the details.
