There is probably a contingent of ACVW owners out there who scoff at the idea of having some guy come help you with your car. I suspect many of the members of that contingent have other things in common as well: their newest (i.e., "real") car is much much less than 36 years old, and they don't know about ACVWs nearly what they think they know. Me, I know I don't know. And, these cars are our cars; we're living without net. So I like having Colin stop by. This was year three.
After the unfortunate demise of the Road Warrior last year on the high plains of Eastern Colorado, Colin decided to press the BobD bus (~46,000 miles) into service. I wanted a better picture of his arrival but he caught me off-guard by coming in from a non-standard direction.
I was so ready to be proud at how I'd cleaned and organized the garage, but since it was a ghastly 80F and achingly sunny, Colin preferred that we stay outdoors and work on our melanomas. Ludwig's engine still being in the hands of one Rocky Jennings of Walla Walla, we set to work on Gertrude. There was all that trouble with the fuel hose, and when she finally just wouldn't start a few weeks ago, I assumed it was a fuel starvation issue (I'd installed hose with a too-small diameter). Nope. Colin tracked it down in about 40 seconds to poorly adjusted points, and she was running. A diagnostician I ain't.
But she still wasn't running quite right--lots of stumbling at the demand for power; running very rich--so we tore tore tore in and got very intimate with Bosch D-Jetronic fuel injection.
This isn't screwing around, it's how the Bentley says you're supposed to test a manifold pressure sensor for vaccuum. Note my serious face.
There was a lot of multimeter action which I was glad to take part in because we fuelie owners especially need to know how to run these things. At one point Colin said something about his disappointment at having brought zero expertise to the situation. Uh, what? The car runs better than it ever has since we've owned it. Colin left at about 830pm with a word to try a cold start in the morning. If the start was good, he'd be on his way. If it was bad, he'd come back that afternoon.
It was good.
7 comments:
Thank goodness for Colin.
Colin needs some type of super hero name. Gertie looked happier. Was this his first time tinkering with her?
Nice Ministry shirt!
I fall into the category of owning a newer "fall back" car but still like to have my VWs double checked. My standard operating procedure once we got past major stuff has been to bring both VWs to Paul every June - regardless of issues - to have him look over my accumulated work from the year. I'm learning all of this for the first time. It helps to have him review and share and fix. It's like an annual checkup.
We've been very lucky that both the bus and bug have run the past two years just needing maintenance and haven't had an running issues.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go knock on some wood...
I concur, that Ministry shirt is rad.
I like the Ministry shirt to, but what does it say on the back?
"No man with a good car needs to be justified."
http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-478
Alright,
whc03grady.
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