Tuesday Jan 06, 2009

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9 days left until I begin my month vacation. My last day working is the 15th, at which point I hope to god my car is finished. When I took her for her initial test drive last week, my friggin drain plug fell out and luckily I didn't sieze her. I did however destroy my brand new main bearings. So I paid another $50 for an oversized drain plug and another set of main bearings. I'm hoping to get that done tomorrow. My mom's birthday is next week, and we are going to a seafood buffet restaurant. $25 gets ya all the sushi and oysters you could ever want to eat. The bonus being that if you go on your birthday, as my mother wishes, you eat free! Then a last trip to see old friends, and then I'm outta Washington. I am moving to California with my boyfriend, and it's going to be a long strange trip, that's for sure. His cousins are huge partiers, and I'm sure I will be joining them. I am transfering to a new store, so I start on the new pay period, which will give me a month off, and that would give me plenty of time to acquainted with the new area. And a question for my mechanic friends: 73 VW Vanagon, 1700cc with dual carbs. She runs rough, but didn't shift a year ago. Trevor started actually playing with her, and now she shifts fine, and he didn't even do anything...but the thought is, he just timed her and syncronized the carbs, but she can't reach 45 on the highway...she hesitates when floored, and the chokes are frozen open. Think just carb work would fix most of it or you think she needs some deep loving?
guitargeek:
Oh, that's a fuckin' drag about your Geo! The advice I'd give you is to plastigauge it and make sure you have the proper tolerances, and to flush out your oil passages to make sure there's no debris floating around in there, check your cam journals for galling, make sure your oil pump still pumps up and that there's nothing in the screen. Bummer about your galled main bearings, but you've dodged several several bullets, namely bent or thrown con rods or other carnage.

As for the VW, your spark plugs will tell you a lot! First, adjust your valves! That's step one before you do anything, then measure your compression. Provided that's good, then pull your carbs and clean them all out and sync them. Start with new plugs (and make sure your distributor, cap, rotor, and wires are good) and learn to do a plug chop. Going by what your plugs tell you, go up or down on your jet sizes until you have the proper air/fuel mixture.

Don't be afraid to ask questions!

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