Gen Xplained

So, I read this interesting article in Vanity Fair about how Gen X'ers came into being and what that means. I have thought about that article so much, I felt compelled to write about it, and add some things that I think the author may have overlooked. For clarity, GenerationX (GenX) represents those born between 1965 and 1980, roughly. The start date seems to shift around, but most appear to agree that GenX ended in 1980. It is interesting to me that this appears as we close the book on 2019 and enter 2020. 2020 always felt so far away, like the end of some journey. Here it is and here we are; no closer to whatever end we expected... or maybe are we?

His Article

First, let me stress that I really enjoyed his article and the perspective woke me up to things that are part of the common history for our generation. In the article, he describes the interesting link between Boomers and Millennials and how as much as they culture war against one another, both generations come from a place of entitlement: "what they want they will have, and that what they have is right and good". GenX is contrasted as a generational middle child who doesn't get any visibility from advertisers or other power-persons playing the negligent parent role. And, we're kind of ignored or subsumed by our older and younger generational siblings. We GenXers were raised and had elders (teachers, first employers) who were pre-Boomers, mostly, so we were the last group raised prior to the Boomer effect on society. He goes on to describe the 1960's revolutionary aspects of Boomers as really revolting against a placid home-life that their parents were trying to create. In many cases, these homes were created as the parents' reaction to the horrors and sacrifices of WWII. The author then talked about art, music and movies that threaded the needle into the GenX outlook of "I don't care; whatever". He then describes an interaction with a Millennial and then some biographical stuff. Again, I want to stress how much I liked the article, even though I distilled it down to one paragraph. I think there were a few things that fit into the tapestry that were missed.

Television Teachers

Laverne and Shirley

The Boomers had "Leave It to Beaver" and "Andy Griffith" on television, painting versions of an ideal life. GenX had "Good Times", "Taxi", "Archie Bunker", "Alice", "One Day at a Time", "Laverne and Shirley", etc, illustrating life as a hard scrabble consisting of crappy jobs, low wages and lower expectations. Television on a whole turned dirty, in a gritty way, with filthy streets and tattered people, further evidencing to the young that life out here flat-out sucks.

Of course, we also had Sesame Street and other PBS offerings to provide some early education... or child-care, depending on your perspective. By the late-80's television had mostly changed to the more typical white-washed programming still popular today showing people without jobs but inexplicably moneyed so they can have adventures or whatever. Queue the GenX eye-roll. By then, even the youngest GenXer was nearly 10, so world perceptions had already been formed. The easy money-for-nothing model came too late, but just in time for the Millennials.

1970's US Domestic Scene
If the 1960's were when the Boomers revolted against their parents and partying way too hard, then the 1970's had to be the hangover that followed. Some of the oldest GenXer's will remember Watergate and the gasoline embargo/shortage. There were high and rising prices for everything, leading child GenXers to hear "we can't afford that right now" far more than the generation before or the ones to follow. Interest rates were super high; we had "stagflation". By the time we reached 1980, it was already clear that GenX would be the first generation to not have it as good as their parents had it. This was underscored by the unemployment rate and the overall economy as we delved into a 2 year recession after nearly a decade of economic instability. Paul Volcker had the right fix, but it further cemented our early learning that life was not going to be easy for most of us.

Geo-Political stuff

1988 Black Sea bumping incident

We GenXers witnessed 1980 Olympic boycott, the hostage crisis ('79-'81), Iran-Contra in '85, numerous US-led bush wars in Central America (Argentina/Falklands, El Salvador, Honduras, Panama) and Russian interference pretty much everywhere. In essence, the Cold War defined these years. There was always this overhanging dread that missiles could be fired off tomorrow, ending the world in a nuclear holocaust followed by a nuclear winter for those who managed to survive. Made-for-TV and B movies about an apocalypse were a steady fare through the 1980's. By the end of the 80's, we saw the wall Berlin Wall come down and then learned how bad things were within the Soviet controlled countries. "Of course it was bad over there," we thought, "welcome to the f-ing 'free' world". While the Cold War appeared over, it left an enduring mark on our outlook. The persistence of our collective taste for movies about dystopian futures, is a great example. Our hearts wanted the ideal of Star Trek, but frankly expected something like Blade Runner, Mad Max, Terminator, The Matrix or the new BattleStar Galactica. If the Boomers used to say "don't trust anyone over 30", GenXers would have replied "we're not going to live that long, thanks".

So What?

Harlem Riot of 1964

I agree with the author that this "irony and a keen sense of dread" may be what make GenX the "last great hope", but disagree on what that means. The author indicated that this disposition will allow GenX to "preserve American tradition". Nah, I think if that were to happen it would be purely by accident, an unexpected result of our eye-rolling over the behaviors of our generational neighbors. I think the irony/dread will drive GenX to make meaningful improvements on their respective personal worlds, ultimately leaving something better than what we were handed (which, quite honestly, was a crap-sandwich). Boomers thought they could change the world. Well, they did, but not for the better. Things today are arguably no better than they were in the early 90's when the oldest GenXers were just starting to make real life decisions. In fact, the us-versus-them energy combined with today's level of intolerance and violence feels like we are back in the Boomer hay-day (the 1960's) but amplified by the wealth disparity of the 1920's and global threats from terrorism and climate change. Maybe we are already living in a dystopia.

So, Everything Sucks Then?
I believe GenXers embrace the Michael Jackson line "if you want to make the world a better place take a look at yourself and then make a change". Powered by that sense of dread, and fear that we are hurtling towards an apocalyptic future, I believe that GenXers make individual changes to avert or survive that. Its not a slogan, a hashtag or even especially altruistic (although there are many who are); it's fairly simple: what's the worst thing, and address that. The media likes to assign many of these revelations with Millenials, but all of them started before Millenials had meaningful decision-making power over their own lives: Tiny houses. Urban off-grid living. Grow your own food. No/Low consumption. Shop Local. Rainwater Barrels. Arguably, many of these started with the commune hippies who were similarly rejecting the status quo.

Today, these are real changes performed by individuals simply for themselves, and are completely bottom-up, not driven from some government policy, corporate sales tag or drive to change the world. I think, in most cases, the individuals who make these changes do so to become less dependent on society's systems. These efforts do prepare the individual for the day society erodes into a Mad Max styled wasteland by increasing self-sufficiency, but more importantly reduce the monthly bills so they are not beholden to banks and employers as much. They also reduce carbon footprints, improving things for everyone, including the entitled myopics. Along the way, some of these interesting ideas catch the fancy of Millenials and suddenly sound like they were their idea. Trigger a GenX eye-roll. We know this behavior like a middle child knows his/her younger sibling will dry one dish and then take the credit for doing all the dishes the middle child just did.

And, What Does this Have to do with Anything?

micro-bus tiny house blog here

For me, I am kind of building an anti-apocalypse bus.. but I keep this blog to simply document it for my own benefit. It is not changing the world, but it is improving my personal one. If it helps someone else, then that's great, but my natural skeptic finds that unlikely. Ultimately, when the societal fabric finally does unravel, we have a vehicle in which we can comfortably sleep as we beat feet outta civilization, burning locally-sourced biofuel at 35mpg. If that n'th degree of dystopia never happens, then we have a very simple source of amusement: just drive it somewhere, pop the top and hang out. Maybe, one day, it will be our tiny house so we can give the mega-banks the finger. Who knows?

So, in Conclusion, I got nothin'
Maybe the destination we imagined when we said 2020 is the dystopia we're experiencing. It would be easy to blame others and other generations, but that's cowardly. We all participated in the creation of this current state just as we will all need to participate in it's reset. Not sure how to fix it, but, as with anything, the first step is recognizing that there is a problem. And, boy, do we have a problem.

Okay... another weird post. I'll get back to the normal next time, but I don't really expect anyone other than me and the foreign bots to be reading these offbeat posts. On that: hello to my robot friends from non-US countries and weird porn streaming sites. Your nearly-constant hammering of my blog has so distorted my statistics, they are now worthless. At least there is no threat that I am pandering to topics which receive the most interest because determining that is totally impossible.

Hapy New Year. Back to cars next time-

TDI install retrospective: Primary Electrical

Continuing the process of back-documenting what I did to put a TDI engine into an old (1972) air-cooled VW bus. Today I cover the Primary Electrical. It probably makes sense to start with what do I define as "primary"? To me, this is the battery / alternator / starter relationship. To be fair, the engine won't start if only these pieces have been solved, but I needed to cut this up, and this was how I thought of it when I did the original work. Before I begin, Hapy Christmas.

Battery

Of all of the electrical parts, this was the easiest part, as you probably assumed. Simply put, get a battery rated for your engine. Consider that the battery tray is definitely long and wide enough for a large battery, but there isn't much headroom. Some of the batteries are fairly tall, and you will need to put the battery-top fuse box on top of it. The usual battery is a group 94R, and though I have read of folks using group 44, I would encourage you to use the biggest battery you can. The 94R fits. Using the donor positive battery cable (you got that, right?), wire up the battery-top fuse box and run the main line to the alternator and starter. I had to extend the run to the starter, but I was able to reuse the run to the alternator without cutting it. I re-used the bus-original ground cable, grounding against the block behind the oil cooler as well as against the body. Once you have confirmed your runs, I strongly suggest you disconnect one or both from the battery.

Alternator and Belt
Use the alternator that's already on the donor engine. This seems obvious, but you may be tempted to upgrade the alternator. This could fall into the "while the hood's open" trap of changing so many things you can't figure out why it doesn't work. So, pick your initial upgrades carefully. The larger alternator does fit right in, and with the access hatch, or even with out it, getting to the alternator on the TDI is way easier than getting to it on the old air-cooled engine.

Taken from the original post about the belt (All Work and No Play...) the correct belt to run the alternator when you don't have power steering nor air conditioning is GoodYear (part number 4060295) - 29.5" effective length. It pops right on, held snug with a tensioner that can be eased with a 5/8" crescent wrench on the exposed nut. Thread on the cable from the battery and plug in the plug from the engine loom, if it had become detached.

Starter

starter adapter

The original bus starter will not start this engine. There's no point in trying. Sell it instead. If you didn't get the donor starter, these can be expensive. I was very fortunate, and Justin gave me one that was making noise, but still worked. I have since had to replace it (the noise foretold it's weakening, and it eventually broke). Now, the TDI starter will start the engine, but it will not fit into the starter hole in the bell-housing. Remember the starter adapter I mentioned in the preparation post (See TDI install retrospective: Preparation)? They are from Westy Ventures (buy here). When I bought mine, they did not have one that fit the 002. So, I got the one for the automatic which was closest thing they had and trimmed away aluminum with a Dremel until it seated properly. Basically, I would dab some grease on the adapter and test fit. Where the grease had smeared off, it was hitting the bell-housing, so I'd trim a little bit. Wash-rinse-repeat until the adapter sits flush. Then bolt it up and then bolt on the starter.

Primary Wiring
With the alternator on and wired and the starter on, we're ready for the final piece: wiring up the ignition control. This took a considerable amount of time and research and the help of AndyBees. There are so many posts back in 2009-2010 as I wrestled through this, I couldn't possibly post all of the links.

First, we had the clutch pedal lockout. This was jumpered around at relay #3 (185 printed on it) so the starter will engage regardless of the clutch pedal position. Because of the weird nature of the wiring, it seems like other things could also prevent starting, like an open door or something. This is why we jumpered the circuit rather than fake a pedal switch. Oddly enough, I used the lack of this switch to move the bus around the driveway with the starter once. I don't recommend it, but in a pinch....

The computer needed to know when the key was in the "run" position to trigger switched circuits. I ran a wire from the fuse-box at front of the bus from a switched circuit back to the spare tire well where all the wires and the computer for the TDI reside. I had this wire trigger a standard relay to send 12V to the TDI ignition switch. After we suffered the ignition fire (See 4Peaks 2018 - Road Report), I moved the "switched signal" to come directly from the ignition switch circuit rather than piggy-back off of a random switched circuit as I had it before.

Out of respect for all of AndyBees' work and because he asked, I'm not going to post a picture of the ignition switch diagram. I will stress the importance of sending always-on power into both of the #30 female clips in the switch. This just needs to be signal-strength thin wires, sourced from a fused, always-on circuit. I am sure that if you asked (on TDIClub) he would bend over backwards to help you.

Last, we want to notify the computer that the switch was moved to the "start" position. I extended the original trigger wire from around the starter back to the engine bay, along the firewall to the passenger side and then up to spare tire well. This was also wired into a relay similar to the "run" circuit. Because of the manner of the TDI ignition switch, the "run" circuit needs to be energized when the key is in start position as well or the engine won't start. Since the bus is not wired that way, I wired a one-way diode (like this) from the start signal to the run signal to remedy: regardless of bus switch position (run or start), 12V is going into the "run" position of the TDI ignition. Then, from the other side of the TDI ignition, I traced the starter signal wire and extended it to the trigger plug on the starter.

Lots of text there, but basically, I extended the wires from the bus key back to the computer sitting in the spare tire well by using some bus wiring, some new wiring, a couple of relays and the TDI ignition. I have revisited the spaghetti of wires in the spare tire well before, and I intend to do another round to really tighten it up, but the wiring design as described above works, and has supported the TDI-in-bus for almost 10 years with an annual disconnect/reconnect cycle for the wires to relays and donor ignition switch.


Prior related posts:
Preparation
Fuel System
Physical Mounting
Vacuum System
Air, Inter-cooler and Exhaust

Next related posts:
Cooling
Secondary Electrical
ECU, dashpod and Sensors

Nemo Rides Again

Returning to the Nemo work, today we button everything back up and test things. In the first of these 3 posts (See Sadist Engineering), we diagnosed and removed the head. In the second (See Nemo Head Install), we took the head to a shop, had it tested and decked and then installed it back onto the engine. So, we start with the head and engine back together again, and torqued down.

Intake and Turbo

With the head on, next came connecting the turbo: slip a new gasket between, then slide the other 2 bolts through. I held the turbo from below and got those 2 bolts to thread in by hand. Once I was able to get them tightening down with a spanner, I could get the bolt closest to the head through to the turbo and finger-thread in. Tighten to spec. The intake was a bear to remove, but it was actually kind of easy to install (with a new gasket). I did not need to replace that one bolt, either. In fact, upon inspection, I couldn't easily distinguish it from the others. I was able to get them all snugged down tight. Torque spec was lower than I expected (like 20 pounds or something), so these were on too tight when I removed them.

Timing Belt
The last big/hard piece was the timing belt. Luke had really cleaned the head, so there weren't any paint-markings on the gear on the cam sprocket when I got it back. So, getting the belt in the exact same spot threatened to not be the simple case I had expected. I did know, though, that the engine hadn't moved and the head was at TDC, so I just needed to get the belt perfect-tight on the left side (front-is-front) and make sure I did not shift the engine timing when the belt was tightened. It turned out that I was smarter than I thought, and had put the head cam mark on the belt where the timing dimple appears on the gear. So, the alignment was actually a snap. That's one to grow on: mark the belt based on the timing mark and the shop can't erase them on you. I was able to re-use the belt tensioner (belt was replaced less than 20K ago) by slowly re-compressing it in a vice and sliding a paperclip into the hole to hold it compressed during install. Put on the tensioner roller, put on the tensioner verify everything is right and pull the pin. There are much better instructions with the belt kit than I could provide in this space. Regardless, once the belt is on, it is recommended to rotate the engine one full rotation by the crank and then verify that the timing marks are still spot-on. I apologize for not taking any pictures along the way, here. I got going and kinda forgot to.

Accessory Belts
After the timing belt is on, the lower timing belt cover is added and then the lower crank pulley. At this point, I put on the accessory belts, and the belt tensioner for the longer serpentine belt.

Hoses
With the timing belt and corresponding covers on, the hoses were next. Since I did not swap any hoses, and I removed as few ends as I possibly could, the hoses flopped back to where they were, and it was rather simple to plug hoses onto nipples. Getting the evil outlet flange on, though, was it's typical challenge. I used 10mm bolts instead of the Allen-keyed bolts and found them much easier to start and torque. I consider this an upgrade. Before I switched from cooling stuff, I mounted the overflow bottle.

Vacuum
Once everything else was in place, the vacuum lines just flopped into place. I didn't expect that, but I had only disconnected a few of them. I needed to find one that simply disappeared: the line from the intake manifold to the fuel pressure release. This is only about 4 inches long, and I had thought that maybe it wasn't on there when I started tearing things down. Turned out, I simply dropped it and found it on the tarmac after we moved the car. By then, I had put on a fresh hose.

Electrical
Re-installing the spark plugs was next for me. I could have done this earlier, but I got to it now, when I needed something that didn't require me to be bent over because my back was starting to flare up. So, I gap'd the plugs (.028) and installed them. Then, I plugged in the coil packs, bolted down the related grounds and verified everything I could reach was plugged in. I noted a few that could only be solved once the front end was re-attached, but that was becoming a very short list.

Front End Assembly

test ready

And just like that, I was ready to put the front cowl / radiator support back on. This would have been much easier with a helper, but I started with the passenger side, getting one of the upper bolts by the fender loosely threaded in. Then, I repeated the driver side. Now, I could arrange the large steel bar which runs behind / below the radiator and the lower mounting points of the cowl. Held in place with my knee, I set first the passenger side, then the driver side bumper supports with a single bolt. Bouncing from one side to the other, I threaded in the other bolts, and then tightened them down.

With the front end mounted, I could complete the hose connections to the radiator and confirm the route of the charged air. I swung the A/C condenser around and mounted it to the radiator and then added the large front inter-cooler. I plumbed the large pipes for the inter-cooler, and then checked for missing connections and not-plugged-in things. I plugged in the horns. I mounted the headlights and plugged them in. I found and plugged in a small green plug below the radiator and the sensor just above the lower radiator outlet. Or is it an inlet?

Test
I had run out of time and daylight to do anything else, but I knew the next step was to fill the system with water and test fire it. I wanted full daylight for that, and a night to sleep on it so I could come back and inspect with fresh eyes. The next morning, it passed visual tests and T dropped by for the test start. I filled the system with plain water.. yes, I know that's not a good thing to do long-term. This was simply to see if it started. I figured if it didn't I would be draining the system to fix it and didn't want to waste good coolant for that. We hooked up the battery and turned the key. Vroom-vroom.

We let the car sit and idle while the temperature came up. There were no drips so I ran my gloved fingers around the various coolant components. The gloves came back without moisture, so we took it for a spin. We drove for 15 or 20 minutes and watched the engine temperature rise and fall as we pushed it and let off. When we returned, we backed Nemo back into the service parking spot and let it idle again. No drips, no coolant loss. And, the temperature sat still.

Road Ready
We turned off the engine and did our little happy dance. The next day, I drained the coolant system and filled it 50/50 with G40 coolant and water. Once the system was burped of air bubbles, it was ready for T to take back home.

So, that's pretty much it for Nemo. I replaced a couple of fuses for the tail-lights, and the registration has expired, but otherwise, the car is ready. T collected the car, drove home to Eugene without incident and has driven it on errands and fun-runs multiple times since. We'll call that a win. Thanks, as always, for following along-

TDI install retrospective: Air, Intercooler and Exhaust

Continuing the process of back-documenting what I did to put a TDI engine into an old (1972) air-cooled VW bus. Today I cover the air intake, the inter-cooler and the exhaust. Arguably, these could be addressed independently, but in my mind, it is all one system, with the turbo linking it all together.

Exhaust

I'm starting with the easiest part: the exhaust. When the TDI is installed longitudinally (versus transverse), the exhaust output of the turbo faces towards the front. This doesn't make it harder, it just means that the exhaust that was originally on the car won't work. I brought it with me to the muffler shop, though, so the shop could re-use parts of it. They used the mounting flange, but did their own thing from there. From the flange, it curves down and then rearward, leveling off at the oil pan lip at the bottom of the engine block. Here, the pipe runs straight back and curves 90* towards the driver side where it enters a not-terribly-interesting muffler. The muffler exits into a 90* bend out the rear. Not fancy, nor expensive. I had asked for something bigger, but this has served the need. Perhaps, if I do that Malone tune I've thought about, I'll upgrade the exhaust to a wider pipe.

Air Intake

air filter example

The fresh air intake is very simple as well. I re-used much of the TDI-donor plastic pipes, which route along the driver side of the engine. I attached a small silicone sleeve to the end, where the mass air flow (MAF) sensor housing attached to the plastic, and to that, I connected an extra MAF housing which I retrofitted with a vacuum nipple. This is the source of filtered air for the vacuum system. For the nipple, I simply cut up a small square of metal flashing and bore a hole through it large enough to press a vacuum nipple. I sealed around the nipple with RTV, cut some gasket material to go between the flashing and the housing and threaded it into the spot where the MAF sensor bolts in. Attached to that MAF housing is a large washable B-and-M air filter. I have cleaned the filter at least annually, after each trip into the Central Oregon desert. I have thought of adding more pipe and routing the filter up into one of the high louvered vents. I considered it, but felt that I would need to block off the vent from the engine compartment to really get "cold" air. I'm not sure there is considerable ROI for that effort, but I encourage you to think about it. I still might.

Inter-cooler

The inter-cooler is probably the most complicated part of this effort. Still, it isn't that complicated. First, the inter-cooler on the TDI is an air-to-air, so it needs to be in the air flow to really reduce the temperature of the compressed air. The air flow around a bus is not well designed for passive cooling like this, so I added a motorcycle radiator fan to the rear side of the inter-cooler. This fan is controlled by the same switch as the radiator, pulling air through the inter-cooler. At this point, this fan is the only truly non-VW part I used for this project. Sure, there are aftermarket things, but they are all designed for a VW. This fan isn't, but it was the only thing like it for this conversion... until 2 paragraphs down.

With the reuse of as much of the plastic plumbing as I could, the inter-cooler ended up in a not-so-great location as well. In my case, it hangs from the engine support bar, so the heat radiating from the turbo is kind of heating the air that enters it. I have thought about how to resolve this, but nothing elegant has come to mind yet. Regardless, the length of the run of pipe from the turbo to the inter-cooler inlet is less than 5 inches so there is little opportunity for boost loss. From the inter-cooler outlet, the charged air uses a short run of silicone hose before returning to the original donor plastic pipe up to the intake. I omitted the EGR, so between the intake and the inter-cooler there is the shiny race pipe. This post has some deeper detail.

In order for this layout to work, I needed to replace the inter-cooler from the stock NewBeetle inter-cooler. The stock has the inlet and outlet on opposite sides (one on the top, one on the bottom). This would have forced the inter-cooler to either sit much higher in the engine bay, or have one of the charged pipes hanging way down low. Or, the pipe routing would have required more plumbing. I didn't like any of these options, so I purchased a Saab Blackstone inter-cooler where the inlet and outlet were both on top. This is a fairly common choice for Vanagon conversions which I learned about on the TDIClub forums. Once in-hand, I had to retrofit the inter-cooler with a boost pressure sensor. That meant cutting into it. Not my favorite thing to do to an otherwise functioning thing, but the ECU needs a boost reading. This was simply a case of tracing the lines and carefully cutting them with the Dremel. Once set, I drilled 2 holes for the mounting screws and it's set.

One thing I learned along the way was to make doubly sure that the inter-cooler is being held up entirely by something other than the charged-air hoses. Otherwise, the hoses will eventually work themselves free of the inter-cooler.

appendix:
Prior related posts:
Preparation
Fuel System
Physical Mounting
Vacuum System

Next related posts:
Primary Electrical
Cooling
Secondary Electrical
ECU, dashpod and Sensors

TDI Fighting Frost

Another departure from the TDI retrospective posts, today's post covers my efforts to install a FrostHeater into the new-to-us 2004 TDI JettaWagon. I discovered that this is a later-year model, so it does not have the ALH engine, rather the BEW. Neat. But, that's a different story.

Why a FrostHeater?
Our weather turned especially cold in September and never really recovered, here in the Pacific Northwest. While the rest of the country appeared to enjoy nice warmer weather (as evidenced by the short sleeves at the Major League Baseball playoff games), we were breaking out our hats and gloves. After scraping ice multiple days, I decided something that got the engine warmer faster would be a good idea, both for the car's engine as well as it's inhabitants.

http://www.frostheater.com/

I looked for and found the FrostHeater, courtesy of the TDIClub. Everyone loves these things, and while they are more expensive than many others, they are 100% USA made and they do exactly what you would expect: the coolant is heated so the engine is warm when you try to start it. So simple. No weird hot-patch glued to the oil pan, creating a small area of intense heat, and not really helping the engine warm up. There were tales of those things falling off, too, so mid-winter you are suddenly without it. Not good. It's hard enough to work on the car outside when the weather is kinda crummy; full-on winter is beyond-the-pale unpleasant.

More Sadism
I brushed up against the sadistic nature of the German auto-engineers when I did the head removal on T's Audi A4, Nemo (See Sadist Engineering). That was nothing compared to what they set up when they did the hoses behind the radiator in the TDI. On the driver side, we have the oil:coolant exchanger where the oil is cooled or warmed by the coolant. This is actually a really great idea, but the way it was implemented puts your hands behind the fan housing, if you want to mess with those hoses. At some point, you will need to replace them. In my case, I was removing the hose that runs from the bottom of the exchanger to the upper radiator hose. The rear of the fan housing, at least in my case, is hard and sharp-edged. By the time I was finished, my hands looked like I had spent the day baling hay: covered with little cuts (20 or more of varying lengths and depths on each arm/hand) and pink from knuckles to elbows. Note to the reader: get a set of hose spring clamp pliers like those shown in the picture here. The skin on your arms, and potentially many hours of suffering, will be saved.

Lower Hose
Again, I encourage you to get a set of hose spring clamp pliers. I have a set now, and will actually enjoy clowning with these clamps next time. Start by removing the under-engine pan. Then, put a catch-pan below the oil:coolant exchanger and remove the lower hose from it. Allow the coolant to drain. Once you're fairly sure you are not going to get coolant dripping on you, start positioning the heater unit. On this engine block (BEW, remember?), there are 2 holes which could hold the heater. You want the one that is closer to the passenger side, but not yet. First, route the hoses. The lower hose runs parallel to the bottom of the engine block and loops up and around to the lower fitting on the oil:coolant exchanger. I suggest attaching it entirely, with a hose clamp. It is easier to thread the bolt from the heater bracket into the hole in the block if the hose is partly helping you hold it in place. Even then, this is not easy unless you have abnormally long, thin fingers.

Heater Unit

Frostheater unit

Before you start with the bolt, shoot the hole with some brake cleaner and mop it out with a rag or paper towel. If the threads aren't clean, this only gets harder. Anyway, you are on your back, holding the unit up with one hand while slipping your fingers between the bracket and the block. With your finger tips, you will need to wiggle on the bolt, lightly turning it until the threads set. I found the bolt would just bite into the threads before it was too hard to turn with my fingertips. The tight space makes it impossible to gain purchase with more of your fingers. With a 17mm wrench (socket won't fit), tighten it down being careful not to cross-thread the hole.

Upper Hose
In the instructions, the FrostHeater folks indicate that you should route the upper hose before you attach the heater unit. Yes, it could be helpful to do it first. I routed and re-routed this hose many times (both before and after the heater was bolted on), mostly because the directions and pictures were not very useful for this part. The hose runs around the oil filter housing from below. The directions indicate that the hose runs between the AC hose and the housing. While that's correct, they omit the part where it runs around the front to the oil filter housing to the upper radiator hose. The picture in the instructions doesn't show it. Anyway, once you have the hose routed, remove the old hose, and slap that new one on.

Retrospective
The instructions and the web site indicate this is a 45 minute job. It took me 5 hours, which further proves my shop-time math. We test drove it to work the next day to make sure any air bubbles worked their way out, and plugged it in overnight that night. The swift-start and instant-heat from the heater was very welcome. Everything behaved as expected: at start-up, the coolant temperature was at normal operating temp (NOT), and once we started moving, the temp dropped a little bit while the warmed coolant met the cold that was in the radiator. After the coolant blended, the temperature rose back up to NOT quickly, like, by the time we were on the main roads. While this install was a super PITA, we will enjoy this heat for years. Already this autumn we have greatly appreciated how little we have had to scrape ice even though all the other cars in the driveway had icy windows in the mornings. Having heat coming out the vents before we're out of the driveway is really really nice too.

The main take-aways from this are: get a set of those hose clamp pliers, give yourself lots of time, and recognize that the hoses are probably original, so they will be super stubborn to come off. If I ever get to driving Hapy in the winter, I would definitely install one of these. In fact, this install gives me a thought for how I could install the coolant filter I got over the Summer.

That's it for today. Thanks, as always, for following along.