Air-Cooled and Itinerant 2009

The subject: Gertrude Butterblume

The culprits: Colin (the one with the legs), whc03grady

The issue: making a 38 year-old car our daily driver 

We found out a few interesting things about Gertie when Colin was here a couple weeks ago. For instance, though she herself is a 1971 model (built in October 1970), she has a 1972 engine. Also, an owner in the distant past had replaced the fuel damper with an inline fuel filter. This singular genius at some point also decided to forgo the stock fuel pump mounts in favor of bungee-cording the pump to the front beam. Above, Colin and I curse him and his sons and his sons' sons.

Ludwig kept Colin's bus--583,000 miles and counting--company out on the street. Did I mention that his bus has 583,000 miles on it and is still on its original CV joints?

All told, Gertie runs somewhat better (a lot better, according to Melissa) now. She steers better (a lot better, according to Melissa) after we tightened up the front end, and doesn't leak gas into the crankcase, since we put in four new fuel injectors; this was also partly the source of the dirty engine Melissa mentioned in an earlier post. We also diagnosed a failing manifold pressure sensor, which will be replaced as toot sweet as possible. Later, he gave us a lot to think about as concerns her rust and our stash of free parts. 

After Colin drove her he said "she has a good spirit, but has to try so hard to rise above the neglect and abuse dished out by [her] previous owners." That part got Melissa a little misty-eyed.

Thanks Colin, and we'll see you in 2010!

Addendum: I'd like to note that none of the scorn I've heaped upon Gertie's previous owners applies to Gertie's immediate previous owner, a very nice guy whom I'm certain did nothing untoward to the car in the very brief time he had her.

Blog procrastination

We know some of you might be eager to read about Colin's visit and our trip to Maupin for the 4th Annual Deschutes River RendezVW, but we've been so busy working we haven't had time to blog. I swear. I even have the pictures to prove it. Since we don't have Fang Fang anymore, we have to make sure we don't slack on the VW upkeep. As I'm sure you could guess, it's really more demanding of Mitch than me, since I don't really know how to do anything mechanical without his instruction, but there are a few things that I can do.

I spent most of E's sleeping time on Friday cleaning up Ludwig's paint. Here's a before/after shot during the progress on his back hatch door.

E and I "got lost" Saturday morning, so Mitch could have some distraction-free time to spend working on Gertie and Ludwig.

 We found Mitch dutifully working away under Gertie when we returned.

He'd spent the better part of the morning cleaning Gertie's engine. Stay tuned for a post from Mitch to read about the cause of the filth, and the repairs made during Colin's visit.

After E was well in to her afternoon nap, Mitch was finishing hooking the engine back up in Gertie (he'd dropped it a few inches to return part of the cooling tin) and on his way to giving both Gertie and Ludwig oil changes. I got started on replacing Gertie's passenger mirror.

The mirror was snapped off when we bought her, but luckily we got three other mirrors with the Fastback parts. None of them were in good enough shape to use on their own, but I was able to take the glass from one and put it in another mirror.

 While the glue was drying, I got to cleaning some of the 38 years of grime off our little beauty.

Two hours of cleaning, and all I finished was the visors, dash, front door panels, and under one of the windows in the back seat (seen above). Did you know that Gertie has three ashtrays? A smoker's delight, to be sure.

I never saw Mitch multi-task so well. I think working on two ACVWs suits really him. 

Passenger side mirror: check!

And we managed to get it done before Tater Tot finished her nap!

Bye Bye, Fang Fang

(miles 60,015-122,540)

...And More Parts, or, Free Fasty

Melissa and I took little E for a stroller ride (you know, because we did a lot more walking during that time, since our two daily drivers were rendered undriveable) through Northside (not to be confused with Westside, where we live) a few weeks ago to get Tater Tot to sleep and check out how their community gardens were coming along. Out of the corner of my eye I saw something strange going on a few blocks down so I asked Melissa if we should turn and investigate. What I thought I saw was someone working on a Type 3 Fastback. 

What it was was some kid pounding on the shell of a Fastback with a hammer. I've seen stranger things. Right, well I have too. But it was still really really strange. We approached and an older guy climbed out of the shell. (So why was the kid beating on the shell again?) I asked him what he was doing, and he said he was stripping this car down to the pan to make a trike...

...like this Beetle-based one in his garage. So I said, what're you gonna do with that pile of stuff you took off of it? (And why was that kid beating on the Fastback anyway?)

This pile, fenders, doors, hood(s), bumpers, et alia that had escaped the hammer's blows. He said he was going to take it for scrap. I said how much for it, he said "nothing, but if you take any of it you have to take all of it."

Sold. So we borrowed Melissa's super-generous friend Melanie's truck and piled it in...

...and I tossed it in the yard until I made room for it in the garage. Above, Tater Tot is helping me inventory it. (At least our kid doesn't beat on cars, or car parts for that matter, with a hammer.)

So there it is: most of the panels off of a 1973 Fastback, many in better condition than what's on Gertie already. When I hauled it off, I asked the guy what he was going to do with the front clip (the front of the car from the dash forward). He said he'd cut it off and set it in his driveway for us to pick up later, which he did and we did (with help from Beau--thanks, Beau). We also got a pile of unusable parts (unusable because they're either Fasty-specific or redundant for what Gertie has) that we can sell, making the price on this deal even sweeter. 

Parts, parts, parts

We've been awash in parts lately, as we prepare to make Gertie our daily driver and Ludwig our road warrior.

This box of air cleaner components, carb linkage, and intake manifolds for Ludwig came from Busted Bus in Colorado.

I forgot to get this mixture distributor (again, for Ludwig) from Busted Bus, but got it later from Interstate VW in California.

Lastly, we got these four NOS fuel injectors for Gertie from a classified ad on the Samba. "NOS" stands for "new old stock", which means that they sat on some parts store's or VW dealer's shelf and never got sold, until someone dug them up all these years later. NOS is just about the best way to go anymore since so many of the new replacement parts made for these cars are basically garbage.

I know I said we were "awash" in parts and the above may not seem like much, but there's much more coming up--with a much much more interesting back story--in another post.

Beavertail Hill Redux

Remember our first attempt at camping with the baby? This past weekend we gave Beavertail Hill another try.

By some incredible stroke of luck (even though the campground was well on its way to filling up) we were able to claim good ol' site #22, the same fated spot where Mitch's appendix was on the brink of bursting just last year. It's unarguably the best site in the campground with private river access, quite a lot of distance to the nearest campsite, and reasonably close (yet distant enough) from the pit toilet and water. Since our camping crew consisted of 4 adults, 3 little girls, and 2 hounds we were doubly pleased.

Tater Tot and A aren't as innocent as this photo might lead you to believe.

Mitch had the brilliant idea of strapping TT's lil' red wagon to the roof and brining it along. It's great for hauling gear, or girls, around the campground. We'll definitely be taking it on future trips. Although it was the source of a couple minor scuffles, I think the girls liked having it at the campground.

Ludwig & Meriwether

Meriwether is a 1983 air-cooled VW Vanagon. (Sometime ask Mitch about 1983 VW busses, and he'll tell you all about how 1983 was "the biggest mid-year change in automotive history", when the engines went from being air-cooled to water cooled.) Pre-kids, Miriam and Nate travelled around the country for several months in Meriwether before settling in Missoula. Since, they've added two to the family, and we were lucky enough to be able to join them on their first family voyage.

I'm always impressed by how much the rivers swell up the banks in springtime. It's not a bad view during breakfast either.

There was a nice kid friendly one-mile hike with plenty to see: horsetail plants, an abandoned hornet's nest, a perfectly clear stream, trees knocked down by beavers, and E's favorite wildlife, ants. Somehow I managed to be the only person without a baby strapped to them for the entire hike.

Meriwether & Ludwig

The trip went great. Mitch taught E how to haul jugs of water, the busses ran great, and no one had to be shuttled to the hospital for an emergency appendectomy.

(miles 220,157-220,209)