Door Cards

Today I will be picking up where I left off regarding the doors. As I described in my last post, the front doors now open, close and lock like a real car. No slamming, not funny jiggling of the handle, etc. Just open, close and lock. Well, the passenger door lock is different from the driver, but I'll swap that out once I find all my parts. Anyway, since I had to remove the cards to fix the doors, I thought I would take the opportunity to improve them.

Door Cards As-Was

foamed card installed

With operational doors, I got to thinking about how to get the door cards to hold to their respective doors. The Arizona gentleman who ran the business creating and selling these ABS door cards was looking to sell off the business a couple of years ago, so I imagine that has happened by now. He had a mixture of molly-based fasteners delivered with the cards. Either the fastener was a screw that dug into the molly which was pushed through the card into the original mounting hole or it was a push-to-hold plastic bit. Regardless, the molly's did not hold in all of the original mounting holes on my bus (YMMV). This could have been poor implementation on my part, something particular about Hapy or just less-than-ideal engineering on the fasteners. It doesn't really matter; for Hapy, they did not work. When combined with the slamming doors, the door cards would rattle and Hapy had a very junky vibe. Now that the doors no longer need to slam shut, improving the cards adherence to the doors will help un-jalopy Hapy that little bit more.

Door Cards, Mounting Upgrade

broken M4 riv-nut bit

To remedy the floppy door cards, I tried a more permanent solution: Riv-nuts and bolts. The plan: into each original mounting hole in the door, I attach a riv-nut (it's a nut that is applied with a rivet gun, basically), and then send a bolt through a washer and then the card, into the riv-nut. Such a simple plan, and while a little time-consuming, it was easy to do. Of course, I found that not all of the original holes were the same size. To fix, I used some as large as an M6 or as small as an M4. I think this is why the supplied molly-based fasteners did not work as well: the M6-sized holes were simply too big for the molly and they fell out. As shown in the picture here, too much pressure with the riveting tool and you can break it. Once I had all of the riv-nuts set, I shifted to the cards themselves.

Noise Abatement Revisit

setting riv-nut

While I had the door cards out of the bus for repairs, I applied a thin noise-absorbing closed-cell foam to the 3 cards. This material was among the things I got a few years ago when I did the sound deadening effort, and it's application to the door cards was part of that plan. At the time, the research I did (See Hapy Noises - Part 2) indicated that multiple attack vectors would bring the best result: Constrained Layered Dampener, an open cell sound deadener like Jute Thermal and then Mass Loaded Vinyl. These all really address reducing the impact of external (and mechanical) noises transferring into the cabin. Any noises or sound that make it into the cabin which are not absorbed by the seats are prone to bouncing around. I placed some larger acoustic panels (these) under the upper bunk, in the slot where the original sunroof used to go. I believe they are helping absorb some ambient sound. I also covered the ceiling with Mega Zorbe to address the sound reflection and ambient sound absorption. In the picture on the right, here, you can see the MegaZorbe applied to the inside of the outer door skin. 

Based on the tests I did at the end of the effort, the only real gains as-measured were in the "around town" (under 40mph) zone. Decibels at idle or on the highway appeared about the same. In practice, however, using a less complex "measure" like how loud we have to run the stereo to hear it on the highway, it is definitely quieter. An even less precise indicator is how loud we need to speak to each other to have a conversation: barely louder than we talk at home, which is quiet (no yelling house) where we used to have to almost yell without the stereo on. So, I am setting aside the scientific evidence and embracing the anecdotal: this implementation of the sound abatement absolutely and significantly improved our road tripping experience. I may take more readings because the numbers I took before continue to bother me.

Door Cards, Reflective Sound Absorption Added

applying the foam

So, with all that context, I decided to press forward on my original plan to apply the thin foam sheets to the hard plastic cards. I started with the cards along the sleeping deck, running from the rear hatch forward along both sides under the windows to the rear of the rock-n-roll bed (1 foot tall by about 4 feet long). I started here for 2 reasons: it was very easy and the plastic cards were jarring-cold when bare skin pressed against them while sleeping. The foam definitely improved that.

For the slider and front doors, I simply traced the door shape on the peel-off paper side of the peel-n-stick foam and cut along the line with scissors. I aligned the cut along the card and peel-stuck them down, working from one corner, down along one side and then across. I will be applying carpet later, but felt that the foam might help reduce the reflected sound while also providing a cushion under the carpet.

With the foam applied to the cards, I considered the game of "which bolt fits" for each mounting point. I could have just started trying bolts, but that felt like an exercise in frustration. So, instead, I grabbed some painters tape and marked to the outside of each hole (where the card would not cover) which bolt size to use. I set the front door cards in place using the door pull to hold the card in the right spot. Then, I simply sent bolts through a black vinyl washer and then the card into the door. Once mounted, I removed the tape. Easy-peasy. If you do this, I suggest that you do the corners first, and only threaded enough to hold. Then, skip around the card, and have all of them like that before you start tightening. Then, again, start with the corners and pay close attention to the bottom edge near the vent. These ABS cards fit perfectly, but the one hole near the bottom align the trailing edge of the door did not line up for me and I had to skip it. YMMV, of course.

slider door foamed

The door card kit included panels for the wall under the driver-side jealous window and for the partitions behind the front seats. I have yet to do those cards, but I am holding off on doing those until I am ready to fast-follow with carpet. The foam is not as scratch-resilient as the hard plastic, and those cards take the brunt of the abuse when camping or music gear is loaded, unloaded and in-motion. So, I will apply the foam and the carpet at the same time. All of that will happen at some point in the future. As it is right now, there is that little bit less noise reflection happening and when bare skin touches the side of the sleeping area, it no longer triggers a shuddering wake up. We are taking the win.

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

The Doors

Yeah.. not the band, but I really like Ray Manzarak's keyboard. It has been a very busy year, and I have not been playing with cars much until very recently. Zed, the 1979 Datsun 280ZX remains covered and completely unchanged since we moved into the farmhouse. Oliver, the 1978 MGB, on the other hand, has received some of my focus. I'll start there, and then get after the original topic. 

MGB Carb Dis-Assembled

carb tear down

I arrived at the conclusion that a participating reason for Oliver running so badly (and getting worse) could be that the carb was a little gunky when I bought him, and he has gotten little use, making it worse. So, I removed the carb, took it apart and ran it thru a sonic dip / cleaner. I ordered a comprehensive rebuilding kit from Japan, and will re-assemble the carb with those bits and gaskets. I hope this will resolve his issues so we can drive him around this summer.

Door-Slamma-Slamma

Over the course of the last few years, all 3 of the regularly used doors (driver, passenger and slider) on Hapy, the 1972 VW Bus, have become harder to open and/or close. Each had their own unique issues. Starting with the slider, it suddenly refused to close outside a venue after unloading gear for a show. It would slide as far as about an inch from being actually closed and then bang on something. I couldn't tell if it was the front edge or the trailing edge, but did not have time to really resolve. I forced it closed by pushing with steady pressure against it straight towards the bus (not pushing towards the front). Fortunately, it opened and shut with similar assistance until I fixed it.

foaming doors

The driver-side door would not close consistently. I would have to bang-bang-bang it shut until it finally latched. The lock was another issue; once locked, it would not easily become unlocked, especially if anyone touched the door handle when the door was locked. This condition only worsened to the point where the lock started to fail entirely and banging the door was not holding the door shut well enough. I had the door fly open while taking a right turn and the swinging door almost hit another car.

Of the 3 doors, the passenger door was the easiest to solve, but it was the last. That door would not shut easily because the seal in the front lower corner was tweaked. This put pressure on the door handle, which also was hard to depress, so opening the door took a firm grip. The inner door cards were not holding in-place as well as they had when I installed them, so I decided to tackle the door operation and the cards as one effort.

Slider Door Adjustment

None of these issues were stuck-on-the-side-of-the-road level, but they were all annoying and reducing the joy. I started with the slider since I had to have that door open consistently for gigs. I first considered the leading edge latch mechanism. I shot Kroil into the latch, but discovered very quickly that the leading edge latch was not the issue. After shooting Kroil into and around the trailing latch, I concluded that this also was not the issue. Still, this lubrication was long overdue. I could tell that the upper hard-bar, that applies the trailing latch was misaligned (too loose). I tightened it and that seemed to resolve the closing issue, allowing the door to close consistently. Opening the door was still inconsistent. I started looking at the lower sheathed-wire that opens the trailing latch. That sheathed-wire is similar to a bike handbrake cable with an adjustment collar near the leading edge latch. This wire was dangly-loose so I tightened it until it was taught and adjusted from there until the door would easily open from working the handle.

Driver Door Fix

'74-'79 left front door latch

Repairing the driver door operation was next most important. Once the door lock was un-unlockable from the outside, the only way into the bus was through the rear hatch. So, if the bus was loaded with gear, it was an army crawl over stuff and under the headbanger to get to the front door or even the slider. Following the instructions in the Bentley manual to remove the door latch mechanism (remove outer handle, disconnect activation bar, remove inner handle, remove lower bolt in window guide, remove bolts holding latch, wiggle free), I spent a few minutes orienting to it and figuring out how it works. Since it was not working correctly, it was not easy to determine neither what was preventing it from working correctly nor how it was supposed to work. The image to the right, here, is for a later bay bus (the early bay latch does look a little different, especially in the area of greatest interest), but it should work well enough to illustrate. For orientation purposes, the side facing away in the image faces rearward when installed in the door so what we can see are the inner guts usually hidden inside the door. Consider the part furthest to the left; that is the lock/latch mechanism which connects to the activation bar. There are 2 circled springs: one larger spiral facing up (marked 1) and a smaller one partially hidden by a tab (marked 2). On the early Bay, spring #1 is not a spiral, it looks more like a "C", but on Hapy that spring was missing. Spring #2, however, was there, and it was kinda mangled.

I attempted to un-mangle spring #2, and instead it launched from the latch into my yard. Distressed, I cleaned the latch with brake cleaner while trying to arrive at a solution. Once clean, I shot the moving parts with Kroil and worked the latch. I started to come to the conclusion that without those 2 springs, the latch and lock actually worked much better. In fact, they worked great. Curious, I re-installed the latch by literally reversing the steps. I found positioning the latch inside the door and then getting the window guide in place were the challenges. I lowered the window and started testing the latch: open, close, open close, lock, try the latch, unlock, etc. It worked like any other car door latch. I can close the door with very little effort, and it stays latched. I can lock it, it stays locked and will unlock by pulling the lock tab inside the or from the key on the outside. Attempting to open the door when locked no longer fouls the lock. I mean, I can try the handle and then immediately unlock it. Even unlocking it no longer requires moving the key like I was locking it first (which I had to do even if no one tried the handle).

Passenger Door Fix

This was the easiest fix of the 3. The Passenger door resisted closing and the handle needed Herculean grip. I repeated what I did on the driver side first: remove the latch, clean and Kroil it. Then, I re-installed. This resolved the Herculean grip issue. The door resistance stemmed from the door seal not being correctly place in the forward lower corner of the door. It was hanging on the inside edge of the door. I still intend to paint Hapy this summer, so I applied a little carpenter glue on the seal rather than the super-strong black seal adhesive. I held it in place by hand until it seemed to hold and then shut the door to really hold it in place while the glue dried. This totally fixed the close resistance.

I started on the door cards, but didn't complete that. I will post about the door card improvement once they are back in Hapy.

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That's it for today. There have been many adventures and experiments over the last few months. I'll get to posting them as time makes itself available. Thanks, as always, for following along-

4Peaks 2024 - Road and Festival report

It's that wonderful time of year again when Boo and I trek over the Cascades in Hapy the Wonderbus to take in whatever Stacey has cooked up for 4Peaks. After taking a couple of years off, she and her staff put together a fantastic return. Some years, I have spread my love of 4Peaks across 3 posts, covering our travels, the festival and the music as separate posts. Since we had very little in terms of adventures getting to and from, I will only have 2 posts this year, with the other one dedicated to the bands.

Backdrop

4Peak sunset

After replacing Hapy's starter and then doing the seals on the injection pump (see Diesel Dumping Discontinued, we still experience sporadic issues with Hapy starting. Once he starts, he runs like a champ. For example, the weekend before 4Peaks, I had driven Hapy, laden with gear, to a show and then over to the after-party. He was not interested in driving home. So, he came home on a flatbed and after removing and re-installing the starter, he would start again. A 1972 microbus should not behave like Windows 95, requiring a shut-down/restart sequence pretty much anytime the temperature changes.

I am also seeing diesel fuel drips on the bottom edge of the oil pan. Overnight, there will be a small wet spot underneath. While we are all fairly well aware that VW's like to mark their spot (it's usually oil), I think the Injection Pump reseal may not have 100% solved the problem. In fact, I think the failure-to-start issue has nothing at all to do with the starter and everything to do with the pump losing some of it's prime overnight. With starting concerns in my head, we spent the day before 4Peaks locating and packing our gear. I say locating because with the move and all the construction, our gear had moved around a bit. We used what we call "the Boot" to carry lawn chairs, the folding table, a just-in-case personal porta-potty, and a few other larger items. This makes for a much easier vagabond, and much better visibility.

There and Back Again

sporting a 2019 cup

With thoughts of no-start in our heads, we followed the philosophy we had years ago when we left town for ChinookFest (see ChinookFest 2017 Road Report) to go one stop at a time. Each time we stopped, we would park on an incline and well out of the way in case we needed to roll-start or R&R the starter again. Luck was on our side as we did not suffer a no-start, but luck favors the wise, and we did not shut off the engine unless we absolutely had to. For example, we had to shut off the engine for the fill-up on our way out of town, but we chose to try to get all the way home without re-filling (that's almost 350 miles round trip, which is especially dicey with a fuel leak). We also did not turn off the engine at the rest stop on the US-22 or any other time until we parked for the night at WinCo in Bend.

The route to and from 4Peaks is well worn by now: US-217 to I-5 South to US-22 East to US-20 East. We left before dark, but it was still almost 8PM. Traffic was light all the way to mile post 72 on OR-22 where we hit a night-time paving operation. Again, we chose to not turn off the engine while we sat for at least 15 minutes. Once we were through the construction, the traffic pressure behind us was downright scary. Apparently, many others who travel at night believe the speed limits and other safety expectations (like not tailgating, not cutting people off and not trying to run others off the road) expire at sunset. 7 or 8 vehicles of the possibly 30 which were in the construction queue passed us before we reached Sisters. Of those, the first 2 were perhaps the most dangerous I've had the displeasure of sharing a road. One was in a lifted truck who was following so close I could not consistently see his high-beams, but they were so bright they illuminated the road around us. Recall, we had the Boot, so the rear of the bus was a full meter further back than the bumper usually was. I now wonder whether a person could have walked between our vehicles, he was so close, and we were going 55-60 mph on curvy mountain roads.

 

When we arrived at the first passing lane, I immediately moved to the furthest right edge of the lane an eased my speed down to 55. He blew past and then I discovered he had a lane-filling double-axled utility trailer attached. If I had made a sudden stop to avoid wildlife, debris or a broken down car, his mass would have plowed through us. But he wasn't the scariest. The truck immediately behind him was worse: He tried to pass after the passing lane had ended and practically skimmed my mirror off as he passed. That road menace was also hauling a double-axled trailer, but his was a camper and twice as long as the utility trailer. I nearly hit the gravel on the far side of the right shoulder before he passed and I could aright Hapy. The others passed during dotted yellow lines or regular passing lanes and mostly did not create too much excitement.

restival

We vagabonded (slept in Hapy without putting the top up) in the WinCo parking lot, parking around back where the employees park, but also where the ground has a slight downgrade towards the exit. We hit the bathrooms and bought ourselves some dinner from the service deli, scarfed and went to sleep. The following morning, we returned to WinCo for bathrooms and breakfast. We were 20 minutes from the gates and had all morning so we hit the shops, collecting the things we were unable to find before leaving town (camp shower, an extra yoga mat, some bath towels, etc), and, of course, the coffee cart for a couple Americanos.

The drive home was less eventful and once Hapy started we didn't shut him off until we got home. We were very appreciative of all of our friends at 4Peaks sending "he will start" vibes our way. There were multiple stretches of road where the traffic was bad enough for us to clutch in and out of 1st gear: heading into Sisters from the East on US-20 and heading North on I-5 between Donald and Wilsonville. These are both common slow traffic areas, but I felt that clutch pedal in my left butt cheek the next morning. Otherwise the roads were clear, the traffic non-threatening and the weather was a comfortable 25*C (77*F).

4Peaks - The Festival

Sonny and Hapy

Boo and I have been going to 4Peaks since 2015 (see the first 1..2..3..4Peaks). The festival had been growing through 2019 and then CoViD hit. Stacey cancelled 2020 for CoViD, did a mini-Peaks for 2021, but then skipped the next 2 years to rethink/retool/refocus (and get married! Congrats Stacey!). I thought, perhaps, 4Peaks was not coming back. Needless to say, we are glad it did. 2024 was smaller, maybe even smaller than it was in 2015 at the old location. It was the same groovy, with art by Ryan Kerrigan, great local food vendors and our emerging favorite: yoga with Nicole. Boo and I hit Nicole's class all 3 days it was offered, and fell all the more in love with her approach. So holistic, and full of explanations of why we're doing certain things. Afterwards, we feel physically great, emotionally centered and a little smarter. Thanks Nicole!

We arrived about an hour after the gates opened, so we were able to set up near the entrance to the festival grounds. This meant that, like mini-Peaks, we would have incredible sound quality at our camping spot. Boo suffered with sinus pressure on Saturday so we heard most of the bands from "home", rather than in-venue, unlike Friday when we spent considerable time inside. The sound was amazing, and when she had stretches of feeling good, we danced in the grass. An additional benefit of where we camped was our proximity to the 4Peaks Founders' camp (Stacey and her closest friends, basically). So, while we had seen most of them over the years at various spots within the festival, we hadn't really met them, had drinks, swapped stories, etc. They're lovely people and massive Phish-heads, so we got on great. Michael, one of their friends, arrived late in a yellow-orange late Bay named Sonny, and set up alongside our camp. Michael farms cherries, and just completed his harvest... causing him to arrive so late. Griffin was in a golden tent and worked at a camp outside Sisters, and Pete drove down from Montana and slept in the bed of his truck. Further up the fire lane, a 1978 VW Westy driven by Natalie (2nd owner!) and her husband camped. She had a sign-sign on the side of her bus encouraging attendees to write a positive note and sign in exchange for a 4Peaks sticker she had made. Of course we participated and that sticker will appear on Hapy shortly. Over the course of the weekend, we re-connected with many of our old friends (Mike and Suzie, now living in Central OR, eg) as well. Obviously, we made a bunch of new ones. There are few things like a couple of old VW's to bring the curious, and we are more than Hapy to chat up whoever drops by.

Main Stage from behind Hapy

The last morning always comes too soon, and like every other year, we left before the final band (Garcia Birthday Band) had completed their set. We were not alone. It is actually fairly common for most of the festival goers to be gone before the final band finishes, and we were not in the 1st half of those who left. We had tried every food vendor, explored every product vendor, visited Kidlandia, played on the swings, walked the entire camping zone, danced and laughed all weekend. We will be watching our email for early-bird ticket announcements for 4Peaks 2025; we are 4Peaks lifer's now.

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That's it for today. I'll post about the bands next time. Thanks, as always, for following along-

temp tattoo from the Founders

Fixing Hapy Furnace (part 2)

Picking up where I left off the last post, Hapy has an operational furnace again.

Fuel Pump Swap

As I mentioned in my last post, the fuel pump which originally delivered with the heater/furnace would not work when I tried to bring things back to life. I splurged and bought a more expensive "quiet" model for $50US rather than another standard pump for $20US. I figured quieter or not, the more expensive pump may have better parts in it, and it may last longer whether it is quieter or not. Or it was just a marketing gimmick and I got took. Let's chalk it up to the cost of an experiment.

The old fuel line path was relatively simple. The "hard" (clear but firm plastic) lines that delivered with the furnace had short (50mm / 2-inch) stretches of fuel hose between them and the pump. The pump was suspended from a cross beam by the included rubber mount held in place by a single sheet metal screw. After a few turns with a screwdriver, the pump was on the ground. A few more and the fuel lines were removed from it. The supply fuel line started dripping fuel after a few seconds, so I caught it with a pan. The line on the pressurized side was completely empty, so no drips. I simply reversed the removal: added the rubber mount from the supply end of the pump, added the supply fuel line, suspended the pump from the cross beam and then added the pressurized-side line.

Prime and Fire Up

The Afterburner has a control page where you can direct only the fuel pump to fire up. This allows you to get fuel all the way to the furnace without the glow plug turning on (drawing the battery and maybe burning out the glow plug). I had not connected the pressure line to the furnace, but I wanted to clear the lines of any bad fuel, so I moved the pan under the dangling hardline and triggered the Afterburner to prime. Within a minute of the prime starting, fuel started spurting out the end of the line. It took longer than I expected it to, but perhaps that is an indication of how little fuel these units actually consume. Once the fuel leaving the pressure line looked like the fuel supplied at a filling station, I stopped the prime function and connected the hardline to the fuel hose dangling from the furnace.

While the pump was slightly larger than the original, it did not seem much quieter during the prime. Of course, I hadn't heard it pump in a couple of years, and memory is a funny thing. I do recall that when the furnace was running, I could hear the tick-tick-tick of the fuel pump over the whoosh of the furnace. With this in mind, I set the furnace to start. I did not want to consider the experiment with the new thicker, dedicated wiring yet, so I left the battery tender hooked up. At no point did the battery fall below 13.5V so either the tender was working hard, or the new wiring is a hit.

Regardless, the glow plug got lit, the fan started spinning and after 2 or 3 minutes the furnace ignited. This felt like a considerably longer period of time than before. Perhaps the priming was incomplete and I needed to prime again after connecting the hose to the furnace. Perhaps it took time to ignite simply because it had been so long. Once it ignited, a huge plume of smoke poured out of the little muffler. There was virtually no wind, so the cloud grew and sat slowly obscuring first the rear end of the bus and slowly 2/3 of the bus before a light breeze broke it up. After a few minutes, the cloud dissipated and the exhaust emission was reduced to nothing. All that remained was a light smokey haze inside the bus. I regret not taking a picture of that.

Noise Observations

While the temperature inside the bus slowly crept up from 55*F (13*C), I noted the noises. I could only hear the fuel pump ticking inside the cabinet where the furnace is located and even then, only when I stuck my head into the cabinet. I think the pressurized line is transmitting it. I stuck my head into the rock-n-roll cabinet above the spot where pump is actually installed and could not hear it. Maybe this new pump is quieter. Then, I moved outside where in the past I could clearly hear the pump from several feet away, even from the passenger-door side. I could not hear it, but I could hear the furnace whoosh. Of course, my muffler-ing of the furnace is different this time, having removed the second small rectangular muffler and the motorbike muffler. Perhaps the pump is no quieter, but the furnace is that much louder. To determine if the muffler configuration is a variable, I decided I will conduct another test at a different time, after re-attaching the other muffler bits. I had thought about bringing them along for while-parked use, and maybe I will need to, out of respect for our festival-going neighbors. In the past, I took decibel readings, but they were for while the furnace held a temperature, not during temp catch-up (full blast).

I will continue to experiment with noise readings and post if I find any readings are different than they were 4 years ago. I expect that once I put the extra rectangular and motorbike mufflers on, the readings will be what they were before. The only real mystery to me is whether the fuel pump can be heard over it. At this point, though, the pump seems significantly quieter.

Thanks, as always, for following along-

Fixing Hapy Furnace (part 1)

Having finally arrived at a place where we have some heat while we're moving, I felt motivated to fix the heat for when we are standing still. Today's post covers most of the saga of getting a Chinese diesel heater operational again. Spoiler alert: the heater isn't running by the end of this post.

Brief History

Back in the early days of CoViD, I installed one of those Chinese diesel parking heaters into Hapy (See Parking Heater 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and Final for deep detail). While I was able to run it a few times, I found that the heater pulled the voltage way down on whichever battery was connected to it. I tried to solve by providing multiple batteries to source from: one to start, one to run, but switching from battery to battery seemed like a bad practice. I had other priorities, so I just let the furnace sit unused. When I did the sound deadening effort and the luxury electrical re-wire, I dismantled the cabinet which housed the furnace so I could get sound deadener underneath it and electrical cables through it. This meant dismantling part of the furnace too. Later, when the band wanted to use Hapy for the album cover, I removed the furnace exhaust so it would not appear in pictures. So, I had a furnace without an exhaust, and would draw way too much juice.

Electrical

Over time, and with more learning about electrical stuff, I have concluded that the wire used to convey electricity but perhaps more importantly the wire for a ground were far too thin. It was due to these thin wires that the voltage would drop so badly as the furnace attempted to compensate. Wires which would have been barely up to the job had the battery been sitting right on top of the heater will definitely NOT be up to the task once you move the battery a few feet away. This is exacerbated by running the ground to the body of the bus instead of back to the battery. The ground location should not matter as much, but I'm citing it as a participant cause anyway. So, addressing the electrical came first after removing the furnace from the bus.

A small harness of wires leaves the furnace body and enters a black plug (see picture on the right). The harness that ships with the furnace includes a pigtail that clicks into the furnace black plug. To my eye, the red and black wires in the pigtail are not nearly as thick as the wires leaving the furnace. This probably saved the manufacturer a few pennies, but the amp draw issue starts right there (and in my case got worse). So, I cut the main power and main ground wires from the furnace black plug and put male/female wire ends on them (12V/ground respectively). I made them different so I couldn't accidentally plug it in backwards. I then prepped a thick 2-wire black/red cable with matching wire ends, and routed it over to the luxury battery. At the battery end, I added a ring terminal for the ground and added a 20Amp fuse into the positive side before adding a ring terminal on that end. I left things detached as I switched to preparing for the exhaust.

Exhaust

From under the bus, it was clear that I had not made the hole(s) large enough for the exhaust, intake and fuel to be easily maintained. Quite the contrary, I had installed it such that once it was all together, it would have to all come apart to fix anything. Frowny-face. So, I started by cutting a 4-inch square hole into the lower belly pan. Many buses do not have these, but I got lucky. Anyway, with the hole cut I could see where the furnace sat, and noticed that the exhaust was getting pinched by the too-small hole in the floor as the exhaust left the furnace. So, I went topside and expanded the upper hole both in the floor of the cabinet and the steel floor of the bus. With the larger hole, the exhaust easily fits and things could be maintained from below. Still, I did what I could on the furnace itself before lowering it in: Connect a 6" long stretch of fuel line, attach a small circle of window screen to the intake (so bugs and pebbles don't get in) and then attach maybe a foot of heat-wrapped exhaust. I set the furnace in place and attached a small subset of the muffler arrangement I had used before: just one rectangular muffler. I may bring the expanded muffler set up for use when we are in tighter camping spots (like festivals), so we can bolt-on some extra quiet. I mounted the muffler to the underside of the frame rail, with the outlet pointing rearward and slightly away from center (picture on the right).

A keen eye can see some fresh Rustoleum primer + paint above the muffler where I discovered some rust had eaten all the way through the body. When I was working on the other stuff I ground the metal down, removing the rust, but exposing the holes. Sadness. That rust traces back to when this bus had a small vent window directly above this spot. That vent window was badly leaking and the rust had already been forming to the point of marring the paint when I bought this bus over 20 years ago. I eliminated the vent window in 2015 (See Calling "glass") with a window I purchased from BusBoys in Redding, CA in 2009. Some things move slower than others.

Fuel

I shifted over to fueling at this point. The fuel line that had been between the included "hard" line and the furnace had breeched, probably when I did the sound deadening. The fuel in the line looked dark, so I dropped the line into an empty pail, and figured I would prime the fuel system, and purge the bad fuel at the same time. Unfortunately, the fuel pump is no longer functional, so I am waiting on a replacement to finish this job.

Afterburner

Back when I first did this job, I bought an Afterburner from the guy who hand builds them in Australia. Apparently, there are people building knock-offs, eating into his business, since they basically have cloned his work. So, if you are looking at getting the much nicer controller for your parking heater, please connect with Mr. Jones in Australia and get the real deal. Anyway, with the Afterburner, I tried to prime the fuel system, but the fuel pump wouldn't respond. When I unplugged the pump, I got a code; I concluded the wiring to the pump was good but pump was bad. So I ordered a new, supposedly quieter, one. We'll see. While I was clowning around with the Afterburner, I got it onto my home network, downloaded the newest firmware and wandered around the new-to-me website that the Afterburner hosts. It's really cool. I am looking forward to triggering the furnace to warm the bus from inside. For reference, here is a link to the user manual.

This is as far as I've gotten. I am waiting for a new fuel pump to arrive. I need to purge the old lines of nasty fuel, and install that new pump. I expect there will be other discoveries, and I need to rebuild the cabinet innards. There's always opportunities to improve things. Anyway, thanks, as always, for following along-

Hapy Speedometer Cable replaced

I mentioned in my last NewOldHouse posting that Hapy's speedometer suddenly stopped working on the way home from a party. It worked on the drive there, but didn't on the way home. Fortunately, there was lots of traffic for me to keep pace with ,but it's still annoying not having a speeod. Today's post covers the adventure of replacing the speedometer cable. Before I begin, today's my birthday, so Hapy Birthday to me, I guess.

Symptoms

working on concrete!

It makes sense to start with the symptoms I noted before the speedometer stopped working. Other than the obvious of it not working, during the drives prior, I noticed that the speedometer needle was bouncing an awful lot. This is often a sign that the cable is binding either due to age or because it hasn't been lubricated recently. Since it was the original cable, and I had never lubricated it (I know bad owner), I concluded that the cable had broken. Had I recognized these symptoms earlier, perhaps I could have prevented the failure. Ultimately, I am not sure the cable actually broke, but at this point in my process, my conclusion seemed solid. Before I began, I disconnected the battery. I did not want to pop a fuse or smoke another wire.

Removing

Someone posted on the Samba that replacing a speedometer cable took 15 minutes. I know better, and assumed it would take me hours, which proved correct. Because of the size of the holes through which the cable passes, it can only be removed one way: from the wheel up through the back of the dash. So, I started with raising the driver-side front corner and removing the front wheel, and then the grease cap. With a pair of pliers, I removed the hard rubber boot on the rear of the wheel (that the speedo cable passes through) and then pulled the cable through. I wiped off the grease and then got under the bus, pressing back the 2 sets of tabs that hold the cable to the underside. Then, the cable easily pulls through to the front of the bus.

Next, I reached around the steering column and detached the cable. In Hapy, the cable actually enters a converter box that creates a wave pulse for collecting speed and mileage for the TDI computer. I hadn't connected the wiring for that, but it was between the speedo cable and the speedometer. With the speedometer disconnected, I could pull it up through, feeding from below with one hand while pulling taught with the other. Once the cable was out, I tried turning each end, and watched the other end turn, albeit sporadically. So, the cable was good, but not working very well. Since I had a brand new cable, I decided to keep going.

Preparing

cable lubrication

I took the new cable over to the side and started working silicone-based cable lubricant into it. My process was fairly simple: shoot some into the speedometer-end of the cable until it pooled up to the lip. Then, wiggle and turn the cable from the other end until the puddle disappeared into the cable sheathing. I repeated this may times. Once I was satisfied that there was a lot of lubricant inside the cable sheathing, I laid the cable flat so the lubricant could spread out and took a long lunch.

I added a little bit of lubricant to the outside of the wheel-end of the cable so I could easily add the rubber boot and then started my re-install. I had purchased 2 circlips for the wheel end of the cable and a new grease cap. I shot the new grease cap with some wheel paint so the brassy cap would not be so grossly out of place. 

Installing

I started by passing the cable from behind the dash, choosing to not pass it through the oval hole in the steering column support. Why? That hole seemed to prevent the cable from easily installing, and actually seemed to force the cable to bend unnaturally. By skipping the hole, the cable had a much more gradual curve back behind the dash. Time will tell if this was a poor decision. Finding the hole through the floor in the nose proved to be the single most time-consuming part of my process. Since I had added holes and electric cables, I had more wrong ones to chose from. Once I found it (there are 2 original holes, one directly in front of the other. The speedo goes through the one that's rearward), the cable easily passed through and I was able to route it the rest of the way to the wheel. I refrained from securing the secure-to-body tabs at this point so I had the most play in the cable at the wheel.

I slid the rubber boot on and then passed the cable through the wheel. I left myself plenty of excess so I could add the grease cap and circlip. I found, however, that the new grease cap did not fit. It is just a hair too small. After many attempt to make it work, I abandoned the new cap and switched back to the original. Because of the nature of the grease cap, I found the grease had found its way to the edge where the cap needed to seat on the wheel. With grease on that lip, the cap would not rotate with the wheel. I think this may have been part of the bouncing speedometer needle. To remedy, I cleaned the edge of the cap and the seating lip with brake cleaner, careful not to let it near the greased wheel inside. Once clean, the cap fit on correctly and rotated in time when the wheel spun.

Satisfied with the cable attached to the wheel, I added a touch of silicone grease to outer edge of the rubber boot and fit it into the hole. I tried to fit it without the lubricant, and it would force the grease cap off. With the lubricant, the rubber seated and the cable is set. I moved to the body-securing tabs next and closed them snug. Last, I returned to the behind the dash to connect the cable.

Extra Conditions

Hapy as album cover

It was at this point, that I started to question the quality of the speedometer cable converter box. When disconnected from everything, spinning one end of the converter had no resistance: is spun normally. If I connected it to the back of the speedo and gave it a spin, the needle would move. What was interesting was when I connected the cable to other side of the box. The output would not be fluid consistent. I could spin the wheel and see the cable rotate freely by itself but as soon as I connected it to the converter box, the converter box output was all over the place. At this point I concluded that the box was the main problem. Since I had not been capturing or using the output of the box, I decided to not integrate it, connecting the cable directly to the rear of the speedo like everyone else.

To test, I spun the wheel a few times and I could see the odometer slightly move in the 10th-of-mile. I concluded that the main issue was resolved. Since I was back behind the dashboard again, I needed to confirm I hadn't done anything wrong, so I verified the running lights, fans and hazards after reconnecting the battery.

That's it for today. While it was a little frustrating getting the cable replaced, it re-excited me about working on Hapy. I have a serious backlog of things I want to do, so if the weather is willing, and I have some time, maybe I'll get after one of them next weekend. Thanks, as always, for following along-

Noise Control Update

I started working on the sound abatement/control/contain effort in fits and starts over the last couple of months. Since I have been making some progress, I figured an update was due. I have only started the Constrained Layered Dampener (CLD). At some point I will be done with the CLD, and ready for the next layer. For more about my plan for noise control, see Hapy Noises Parts 1 and 2.

Sound Deadening

high-cost / high-value CLD

Sound deadening is slow-going stuff, even when you have time. The actual application of the CLD is fast and easy; getting access to the spots where you want to apply it is what takes a while. Some areas are virtually uncovered; like under the carpet in your trunk, the rear under the mattress of the camper bus is open bare steel. The metal gets cleaned with oil/grease remover, the largest square/rectangle of the highest quality deadener you can find is carefully applied and then you roll out any bubbles for a firm bond. In this way, the exposed steel was relatively quick work. I suggest you wear thin protective gloves because the edges of the foil layer can make tiny cuts in your fingers.

Accessing the Ceiling

To get to the largest sections of steel (the ceiling), I needed to remove the wood (Baltic Birch) headliner. The headliner is actually 4 distinct pieces: the rear, the front and 2 sides. Between the sections are channeled aluminum bits to hold the pieces together. Then, around the opening in the middle of the bus, a plastic pinch-surround holds the lip of the wood against the steel. The plastic pinch-surround removes with little effort: just grab and pull. In fact, getting this thing to stay put had been a bit of a challenge over the years. With some channel-lock pliers, tug on the aluminum channels, pulling towards the center of the bus, to remove them. With the channels and pinch thing gone, the rectangular piece over the sliding door fell right off. The one of the opposite side was held on by the '79 Westy interior 2-way light. Two screw removals later and the light and ceiling bit were free.

not quite done, but getting there

On Hapy, the rear section had been falling down for years, and I had resolved it long ago with self-tapping screws, through the metal ceiling. Recall, the westy was built on a "sunroof" bus model, so there are actually 2 ceilings (well, 3, if you count the Baltic Birch) with a gap between them where the sunroof would slide when open. Once I pulled the screws, the wood hung down in a familiar way. I simply helped what gravity had been doing by giving it a wiggle, and it fell onto the rear deck. This left the front section, which was quite snug. The internet instructions indicate that you simply need to remove the dome light and use that opening as a grip to pull the ceiling free. This did not work for Hapy, even after I removed the front shelf (See Sunshade to Shelf) I added, like, 6 years ago. Recall, the shelf was attached by re-using the sun-visor mounting points so it was a simple matter of removing some screws. With the shelf out of the way, I could get to the screws holding the 12V accessory plug, and then there were some very small screws along the front edge of the Baltic Birch which held the front lip snug against the front of the bus. After removing all the fasteners I could find, the ceiling still did not want to come down. I had to force it, and I accidentally split the driver side. I had no intention of reusing the old wood ceiling, but it would have been nice to give it to someone who is restoring theirs. Oh well.

Ceiling CLD

Once the front bit was down, I could see old-style fiberglass insulation had been installed between the drop ceiling and the steel, but only on the driver side. Perhaps the passenger side had been removed long ago. Regardless, I was not intending to keep it, so I pulled it down (wear gloves or you may get tiny fiberglass particles embedded in your skin. Ouch.), and scraped the glue residue off the metal with a putty knife. Similar to the rear floor, I cleaned and scraped and cleaned the metal in preparation for CLD. I used a combination of ResoNix (high cost / high-value) and the leftover Noico (cheap / lower value), hoping to maximize the vibration noise control. I may have overdone it, but I figured an extra pound of CLD might make a difference on the steel closest to my head.

rear half under top bunk

The ceiling in the rear had not been insulated nor had anything glued to it, so it was pristine metal. Still, it got the oil/grease cleaner treatment, and then multiple squares of ResoNix CLD. Recall that the sunroof model has 2 rear ceilings, and I had only addressed the bottom one at this point. The upper ceiling was much harder to get after. From above, it is covered with the floor of the Riviera-sourced upper bunk. From below, it has less than 2 inches of space between it and the lower ceiling. After mentally wrestling with how to deaden it, I decided to remove the plywood floor of the bed so I could apply material. There was simply no way to get good coverage 5 feet deep through a 2-inch tall gap.

The bed is supposed to be nailed down to the side rails with many tiny finish nails. In Hapy's case, I, uh... kinda didn't nail it down much. So, it would have been easy, had I not parked the bus where the pop-top would not open all the way. Instead, I could only get it halfway. So, I lifted the bed, pulled it as far forward as I could and then dealt with the noise suppression in 2 steps (rear half / front half). I took one extra step during the re-install, and added small squares of foam on top of the rails before setting the bed back in place. My thinking was that there would be less vibration and squeaking compared to the stock wood-on-wood. I will be adding sound absorbing material into the 2-inch tall cavity rather than on top, so I am hoping that I will not need to get under there again. Once I have confirmed that, I will send some thin screws through to hold the bed to the frame.

Exposed Metal

some easy-to-access steel

The last area, well, in terms of timing, this was actually my first, I addressed with CLD is the bare exposed steel around the bed along the sides. The keen eye will see that this is the Noico stuff. Yes, I did this area before I took the plunge on the ResoNix. Still, the tone of the tool-tap implies that the end result is less ring-y than without. Would the ResoNix had been more effective? Probably. Anyway, I mentally wrestled with applying material here at all because the rounded metal interior is part of the signature of an old bus. Arguably, so is the incredible racket you hear while driving. In fact, I used to drive by ear, listening for bad sounds from the original engine because the lack of instrumentation kind of forced me to. Anyway, the area below the window will ultimately be covered by a door/interior card. I intend to apply a headliner of some kind down to the tops of the cards, so the CLD you see in this picture will be hidden longer-term. 

Well, this is as far as I have gotten on the noise control stuff. Some of these steps were taken months ago, and others I just completed. That's just how life is these days: take many little steps and eventually you look around to discover that you have made some progress.

Thanks, as always, for following along-

VW Bus Cold Air Intake

Back when Hapy was getting regular long summer drives, I noticed that the engine bay would get pretty warm. Recall back to the Newberry trip report for example. So, I put together a cold air intake concept to drop the temp going into the turbo inlet. I really do not expect to notice much of a performance difference. While I understand a cold air intake can reduce intake temps, and improve engine performance by a handful of HP, I just don't think what I did will have that kind of impact. Still, it was fun to do.

For someone running the original engine, with the engine tins and surrounding foam in place, this modification makes absolutely no sense. The tins already effectively separate the hot side of the engine from the air intake. If you have lost your tins (or foam), and for some reason cannot replace them -or- you are running a modified engine where tins cannot be fitted, something like this might work for you too to keep the hot side from meaningfully impacting your intake air temperature. This whole bit is triggering memories of that old Burger King advertisement about keeping the hot side hot and the cool side cool.

 

Before I begin, today marks the Ides of March. I am not really sure how to recommend ways to celebrate that. Pay off your debts? Enjoy a celebration picnic with revelry and drinking? Wander out of town in an animal skin? Perhaps we can all just hope Putin will suffer Caesar's fate this day for the inhumanity he is visiting upon our Ukrainian friends. Whatever transpires, in a couple days, it will be St. Patrick's Day. So, I will just get some rest to prepare for that. Hopefully, we can tip a drink within 2 meters of dear friends to celebrate a post-pandemic Spring.

Orientation Thoughts

On topic, consider the VW bay window bus engine bay from the rear hatch (picture on the right is of a '68). Most to the rear on the left is an otherwise unused battery tray. Some folks (like late-bay Westy-drivers) have a luxury battery there to power the fridge when shore-power is not available. On Hapy, there are just a lot of wires, so it's actually not much to look at. The spare tire well hangs down towards the front, meeting the rear tire well. Above to the rear there is a tall open area that eventually reaches the finned ear behind the rear window. Running along the bottom edge, front-to-rear, there is a small lip or perhaps a pinch weld that's about half an inch tall. My thought: wall this in, and create a pass-through for my engine intake, isolating it from the heat generator (engine exhaust and the turbo). Keep the cool side cool.

Parts

My go-to for all things metal fabrication these days (at least for air movement) is HVAC flashing, and this is no exception: I started with some basic 20ga HVAC flashing that I had lying around ($0). Onto the air intake, I need to add a 90* turn ($14US from siliconeintakes.com) so the air filter which used to sit next to the rear end of the spare tire well can instead go into the new cavity. The last piece is pipe flashing (like this) which cost me about $18US to provide safe passage for the aluminum pipe through the HVAC. The air cleaner needs to fit through the hole left in the basic wall when the pipe flashing is removed, so getting one large enough for this purpose was important. I had some HVAC flashing lying around, but at the time I did this, a 4 foot by 3 foot sheet (common size) would have run about $20US. A smaller sheet would cost a little less, but not much. So, all-in this would cost around $50US plus your time.

Cleanup

paper model

I learned along the way that this wall idea is not as straight-forward as it looked. As I started trying to model with a large sheet of brown paper, I realized there were some wiring clean-up items left undone. I tidied up the wiring a little bit, and strung as much as I could into the upper rear corner where the fuel vent line passes into the new cavity, securing them together (and to the vent line) with a cable/zip-tie. Below this bundle of wires, at the rear-most bottom, a couple of wires need to pass as well, so that makes 2 gaps to manage. The front-to-back T-12 cable (See the Chasing the Hapy Electrical Gremlins posts for context) routes into the engine bay where the flat rear meets the upward angle of the rear tire well, so that's a third gap to seal. Last, the stock TDI engine management cable routes into the engine bay from under the center-point of the spare tire well, so that's 4 gaps. Had I planned for this when I did the wiring, I could have potentially cut this list in half, or even reduced it to one. I preferred to not revisit the electrical again this winter, after last winter's adventure. So, I made 4 distinct gaps for wires to pass through. I numbered them in the image of the paper model on the right, here.

Model with Paper

With the wiring bundled, I could start working on the wall... with a model. I started with brown packing paper. These days, so many things ship with large sheets of brown paper as the padding, and that stuff is nice and thick, and sometimes wide enough for things like this. It is also 100% recyclable (unlike the bubble wrap), so I'm doubly a fan. Anyway, I started with a basic measurement: 22 inches deep by 16 inches tall. Of course, I discovered that the hole is not square, and the 22 inch measurement is correct from the bottom of the rear wall to the point where the engine bay curves towards the fuel tank. The top is more than 24 inches from rear to top of fuel-tank compartment. Also, the section is not flat: the bottom curves slightly inwards while the top remains straight.

 

cardboard model 1

Then Cardboard

After a few rounds of test-fit, measure/cut and some added painter tape for strength, or for adding material for sizing, I arrived at an approximate paper model. I transferred the paper model to cardboard with a pencil using some tracing and some angle-square. Consider: the rear wall makes a 90* angle with both the top and the bottom, and (I thought) the rear wall is straight. The top run is straight, though I chose to cut some of the area away which would have been pressed against the spare tire well. I made this choice for 2 reasons: first, the vacuum control valves are mounted there, and I did not want to move them. Second, having a sheet of metal against metal like that would have created rattle noise I would have to solve. With my outline and wire bundle cut-outs defined, I cut the line with a razor blade and cleaned up the edges with scissors.

test-fitting a model

With this stiffer model, I performed another few rounds of test-fit, measure/cut until the cardboard wall completely covered the gap, the wire bundles easily fit through their respective gaps and the edges of the wall were clearly in a place where I could envision mounting. The final cardboard model, in-place in the picture on the right, also eliminated a large triangular shape from the lower front corner which would otherwise have set against the driver-side wheel well. Similar to the cut out from the spare tire well, having a large metal-to-metal contact area would create a vibration-noise opportunity. Looking back, this cardboard wall looked at least as good, if not better than, the final metal wall.

Then Model with Cardboard Again

The front and bottom have a lip I can easily attach to. The top and rear will need some kind thought and some creative drilling. One additional consideration: on the rear pillar, there are grounding points which cannot be disturbed. I decided to add a small tab on either side (above and below) to hold the new wall to the rear. The top will mount directly to the spare tire well for the front 2/3rds. The rearmost section of the top, will not get any treatment at all. I thought about it, and decided that there were already enough planned fastener points to hold the wall stable without adding another hole in the cabin floor. I transferred the cardboard model to another sheet of cardboard after a few repeated fit-attempts. I want to make sure the HVAC, when cut, will fit correctly. Last, I modeled mounting tabs with scrap cardboard and more blue painters tape so I would have them in the right place and the right size when I cut the HVAC. The picture above was taken before I added the mounting tabs to the model.

Plan the Intake Pass-Thru

note imperfect rear line

With the cardboard wall in place, that side of the engine bay looked considerably better... well, it hid what looked bad, anyway. Motivated, I planned the intake route based on the placement of the new 90* aluminum intake pipe. I made a rough cut in that general area of the cardboard wall and put it back in. The 90* pipe is too long on both ends. I needed to remove about 4 inches from the end that juts into the cavity, so there would be room for the air filter (7" tall from rubber grommet to chrome top) without it touching the side of the bus. The filter housing allows for up to 2 inches of pipe before it bottoms out, so there is some wiggle room for my cut on that end. Similarly, the engine-intake end of the 90* pipe needs to be shortened. Again, the silicone collar that attaches the new pipe to the air flow meter on the end of the intake allows for a couple of inches of play. I did not make the actual cuts to the pipe at this point, though.

 

The intake looked about right, so I added in the pipe flashing. I drew the edge of the flashing on the cardboard and then drew another set of lines 3/4-inch to the interior of the tracings. I cut the smaller square out of the cardboard, making a square that was about 6-1/2 inches per side. I tested that I could pass the air filter through that hole. Otherwise, maintenance of the air filter would require removing the entire wall. It fit, but barely, leaving about a quarter of an inch on each side (the widest part of the filter is 6-inch diameter).

Adjustments

HVAC test fit

I transferred the last model above to a sheet of HVAC, but I did not fit properly and had to do another round of cardboard before I was able to get a good HVAC design. The big barrier for me was the location of the vacuum valves (so probably not an issue for anyone else). Ultimately, I removed the valves that were no longer being used (anti-shudder and EGR), and moved the turbo controller to the rear mount. This freed up the front edge of the spare tire well. The second issue will appear for everyone who tries this: I thought that the rear inner wall was perpendicular to the floor and ceiling. It is not. Consider, the contour of the rear of the bus has a slight curve; the inner skin does as well. The picture just above on the right shows the deviation from pure vertical / 90* angle. That picture also shows on the bottom rear corner that the body panels do not have clean 90* transitions either. I cut off that little tab in future efforts. With these considerations, the models were working: showing me how to get to a viable wall.

 

Assemble

prepping the wall

For the second time, I transferred my cardboard model to HVAC flashing, complete with marks for mounting tabs. I cut the HVAC with my tin-snips, and formed the wire pass-thru's with pliers. For clarity, I marked the outline of the hole and then cut crossing lines through the center of that marked area. I folded the triangular bits of HVAC back upon itself to create the opening while also avoiding a sharp edge where the wire bundles would pass. With a hammer and dolly, I smashed the fold-back flat. By doubling the material at the openings, the wall was effectively stiffened; I had not anticipated, but will definitely appreciate that. For the upper rear wire pass-thru, I left a tang or tab nearest the rear wall that I could bend back into place, so the rear edge of gap #1 (visible in the pictures of the installed cardboard model) could get covered up once the wall was in place. Once I drilled the mounting holes in the tabs I set the wall in-place, marked the holes on the bus and drilled them out.

Pipe Flashing

wall installed

At this point, I considered how I would attach the pipe flashing to the HVAC. First, I transferred the square-ish hole from the cardboard model to the HVAC, and cut it. I need to be able to remove this section so I can clean the air filter. I drilled out 4 holes in the pipe flashing, one each per side, where the rubber had dimples for that purpose. I set the pipe flashing in place and marked the HVAC. These spots were within the folded-back HVAC, making the area thick enough to tap. Sweet! So, with a M4 (.75 thread-pitch) tap, I tapped the 4 holes in the HVAC. Into these threaded holes, I sent bolts from the cold-air side with thread-lock so these bolts will act like studs for the pipe flashing. The picture above on the right shows the studs through the HVAC.

Finishing

cold air intake

I moved the wall into place and secured it to the side of the bus with sheet metal screws. I had thought about tapping the holes and using bolts instead. The holes were too hard to access with a tap and I don't think this wall will be coming out with much frequency anyway. Even so, removing some sheet metal screws is not hard. With the wall in, I re-checked my measurements for cutting the aluminum pipe. Once verified with the permanent position of the pass-thru, I cut the pipe down. I pushed the shortened 90* aluminum pipe through the rubber collar and attached the air filter. I sent the air filter into the cavity, and maneuvered the not-filter-end of the 90* pipe through a connecting silicone collar to the rest of the intake. I set the pipe flashing against the HVAC and threaded on the 4 9mm nuts.

 

When I maintain the air filter, the process will be the same as this initial install: remove 4 nuts, loosen the hose clamp and remove the cold air intake assembly. After I clean the air filter, I would re-install by fitting the flashing atop the studs, finger on the nuts, get the pipes connected and then cinch down the nuts.

final install

Now, Hapy has a cold air intake, and the left side of the engine bay is no longer a complete visual downer. Instead, we have a nice clean wall and the engine will get colder air than it used to. This wall does have some small gaps, of course, so the air will not be as cool as it could have been. Perhaps I will circle back later with something on top of the wall to better seal the edges and pass-thru's. Longer term, I may apply a thermal layer onto the engine-bay side to help reduce temperatures even more. The picture on the right, here, shows it in its current (final) state, though a keen eye will see that I had not yet plugged in the AFM (air flow meter) when I took the picture.

 

This took quite a while to actually complete, having started before the 2021 winter holidays. I had other things going on, and this was a lower priority for sure. Also, there were multiple modeling cycles as I figured out the unique puzzles added to the driver side of the engine compartment from adding a TDI (and related vacuum control valves) to the mix.

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