The Velvet Thread - my '66 21-window bus project

A lot of canvas involved.

Buses are notoriously cold. I would go ahead and put a wood burning stove inside and go ahead and run an 1 7/8 merged header with a Fat Boy!!!

No need to run heater boxes with a wood burning stove now is there? It's not like they work very well anyway in a bus.

I only say this because you keep mentioning the stinger so I assume its time is limited.

Ha, ha Mateo. Actually, Hugo's 1600 that is in Velvet has heater boxes, so I'll find out just how effective they are once the hole in the roof has a sunroof in it.

Hugo's motor on the other hand... I hate to hamper HP for heater boxes since I need to decide on an exhaust. It's my Daily to and from GV in winter at night. Ray's checking on racing heater boxes. Tony runs that in his bus and says they work. What are you going to do for heat in May?

Heat in May? Air friction due to sheer speed...

Like when re-entering into Earth's atmosphere from space.

Exactly, Gregg and I are like this.

You can't see it, but I am doing that thing with my hands when you point at each others eyes with your fingers.

You know what I am sayin', you get the idea...

The plate was a great choice Dawn. Looks great in the barn.

Mateo wrote:

Exactly, Gregg and I are like this.

You can't see it, but I am doing that thing with my hands when you point at each others eyes with your fingers.

You know what I am sayin', you get the idea...

I got what you're layin' down.

I like your style.

I found a PO of Velvet on the samba!! He sent pics from 1994, 17 years ago. Pretty much the exact condition as now. Except it still had a sunroof. He bought it from a guy that got it out of a field in WA where it had been abandoned. That guy got it for $20. He got it for $500.

Way cool!

That is cool! I wrote the PO of my bus but they never contacted me. Would have loved to known a little history on it. Oh well, I still love it anyway!

life will get better

rayvallero wrote:

life will get better

WTH????

Anyhoo, we finally have an update!

Velvet's tranny finally went cablooey, completely lost 3rd gear and would barely go into 1st or 4th. She got me to the shop, but she's done. Can't blame her, the tranny was sitting in the bus for 34 years with no engine and it got us to Bus Fest in Vallejo, and to GV, Colfax, and around town for several months. Now she gets a rebuild.

I'm getting one from Robert Skinner at Skinners Classics in Vacaville. For those of you that don't know him, go to his Facebook page and "Like" him or "friend" him, you will be blown at the number of bus recoveries the guy does. He's a bus fanatic and all around great person. Ray can rebuild gearboxes of course, but he is just too shorthanded and behind to do this one for a long time.

So we pulled Velvet's transaxle for a core exchange. The lifts in the shop are all occupied, Velvet is in the old 912 racecar bay for now. He had to use the old fashioned floor jack and stands to get 'er done, like the old days. Back in the peak days of the shop, when aircooleds were everywhere and he was campaigning four racecars, he had to do everything this way. Today he kept feeling the compulsion to go to the button and raise the bus now and then, his knees were killing him.... Ahhh, good reminder of how nice those lifts are!





Here's a third wheel that Ray got from Gene Berg (not for sale, but as a friend back in the day). Very handy, it bolts on to the mount by the same two bolts that hold the gearbox in and then the bus can be pushed around very easily later.



Here's another gearbox that I bought a while back from a fellow racer, backing plate to backing plate. Has no play and seems to be in good shape. I decided to sell this one to help offset the cost of the rebuilt one from Skinner and use Velvet's trashed one as a core.



Here we keep the brake pedal down so that the internal parts in the master cylinder go past and block the intake port or it will continuously leak fluid.



We have to remove the drums and e brake cables.



As you may recall earlier in this thread, Velvet had seriously messed up RGB springplate bolt issues. Some had sheared off, one had been welded on by a PO, and she lost even more of them on the roadtrip to Busfest and almost killed herself and Ray on the drive down there. Seriously, he started smoking again on that trip from the stress, after 14 years.

He had replaced them and now it has 3 on one side and 4 on the other (not even able to use the hole on the one side), he had to drill them out and tap them, and used longer bigger bolts than stock.



Here's one of the shouldered larger bolt that he used. He may use these better ones on the new tranny.



Drained the oil out of the RGB's.



Lots of metal filings in the oil pans. And look at the magnetic center drain oil plugs.





All clean, shows the amount that was metal filings in the pics above.



Hey, here's a great opportunity to take the gas tank out and clean it up. It also needs a rubber gasket where it mounts and at the filler (I have them from Wolfburg West).



The gauge never worked, suspect that it's 6v, the bus is now 12v (and had been because the tranny was ground for 12v). I was told it should work fine, regardless. But we couldn't find where the wire to the front went, it'd been cut at the sender and we suspected a new one would have to be pulled through. BUT, after poking around while I watched the gauge, we got LIFE after 34 years. So, all I need is a new sender. Yay!



Dropped the gearbox out of the bus.



This is how Ray locks it onto a floor jack to make it stable and push it around safely.





Removing the nosecone to use on the rebuilt one. Ray and Robert say that aftermarket ones are often very poorly done. Found out the pinion nut was extremely loose. We know the main bearing is shot, but cannot see inside. If we'd had more time, I'd have liked to crack the thing open and see just how trashed the gears were, but it's a core, so we didn't bother.



Empty now.



Hopefully we'll be putting a good one back in next week or so...

Oh good. I'm glad to see this getting taken care of. I was hoping that Velvet wasn't going to be down for long.

Me too! It's just that she won't have an engine until Hugo's new motor is finished... But once it is, at least the tranny will be in and ready to roll.

Also, I have a thread over on thesamba about rust repairs that I'd like to get taken care of in the meantime while waiting... Check it out:

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?p=5702156#5702156

Now that Hugo's motor is in the car, we can finally move forward on Velvet.

We have the 28 year old 1600cc from Hugo and a rebuilt 3.88 FF trans with RGB's through Robert Skinner (www.skinnerclassics.com), ready to install.

But there are a few things that need to come first since access opportunity is excellent right now.

-- Gas tank.
-- Heater cable.
-- Spring plates.
-- Shift rods.

Ray took out the spring plate that had been welded on by a PO and also was rusted solid to the torsion bar. Pressed it out in the machine shop and got another spring plate from Robert Skinner.

Removed. I love that everything inside and out of this bus is Velvet green.



Cleaned them up:



Mateo (now known as Ray's "Little Buddy") painting them:



We can now turn the outer splines to where Ray thinks we will hopefully get the bus to sit where we want.



Purty:



Next is the small heater cable tube. The cable was broken inside and the tube was FULL of rust and bits of cable. Two man job that I, unfortunately, had to miss due to getting my taxes done (I think I'd have rather been sprayed with rust). Ray would have the blower on one end, they'd spray oil into the tube, Mateo on the other end pushing a wire into the tube and has rags to catch the crud coming out.



2-1/2 hours of this until it finally came out with only oil and now more rust being purged.





The tranny horns and area has to be cleaned, which is a big job of 46 years of grime. Had to spray it and soak it and scrub some more.









Better:



Looking at the left tranny horn clean now. The brown spot is stained from the old axle boot. That shows why it is so important to have it clean because they touch it. Note also the nice clean heater cable tube.



Next up, the shift rods. Here's the new birdies (called this because they look like badminton birdies), bushings.



Right off the bat, the bolt broke off to the rod.



Old birdie, rusty shift rod.



Nice:



Next is the gas tank and the heater ducting. Getting close to installing the trans and motor!

Nice work!! Can't wait to see this go back together.

I am a master ninja with a rattle can. It comes from my growing up in the bario down south and painting a few pieces of my own art. I know it's hard to believe, but I hung out with some hard core vatos. CVL! (Corona Vatos Locos) You can't see it, but I am throwing down the sign with my fingers.

That being said, now I am more like Beaker from the Muppets when working with Ray. I got a few face fulls of rust when cleaning out the heater control tubes. He 'said' he could not hear when I told him to wait before applying the compressed air but I think he was doing it on purpose!

THERE WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A RAG ON THE OTHER END TO CATCH THE DUST! But often times there was not and so I found myself dodging supersonic bits of rusted heater cable and eating clouds of rust.

It does not taste great and it is not less filling.

There, "now you know the rest of the story..."

Mateo wrote:

hard core vatos. CVL! (Corona Vatos Locos) You can't see it, but I am throwing down the sign with my fingers.

Quote :

THERE WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A RAG ON THE OTHER END TO CATCH THE DUST!

And you are such a GOOD friend to me and Velvet to have sacrificed yourself by catching that dust with your face when the rag was not available in time. Thank you for being such a stand up guy.

Shift rod painted now:



Front half of the rod cleaned. Ray had to repair the threads after having to drill out the broken bolt. Now it's ready, rethreaded, cleaned and painted.



Back half. All clean, repaired, painted.



Ready to install now.



The shift rod tube is clean now also. It is about 7 feet long and we put a long steel rod though it with rags on the end to clean the hole so that the birdy moves freely. It's the hole in the middle.



Gas tank, cleaned and repainted. Going to install the new sender, and new rubber gasket underneath and at the filler.



Torsion bar covers for the spring plates.



For those of you that have asked to see a better view of the PO's "battery door". This is the only cut on the OG body bus, but considering that, it was done well and was very handy for us when we didn't have an ignition or key yet and would jump it every time to start it and kill it.







And while we're at it, here's some pics of Velvet with her butt in the air. Will be so nice to get her rolling again!



[

Oh my God. I literally just almost sh-t a brick!!! I've never noticed your battery door before and as I was scrolling through the pics, I thought you did that today!

silvertonguedevil wrote:

Oh my God. I literally just almost sh-t a brick!!! I've never noticed your battery door before and as I was scrolling through the pics, I thought you did that today!

I shouldn't have said anything about it being there and messed with your head a little more. Heh, heh.

It scares me to think of what I might have said to you though.

Shift rod installed. Set screw where the bolt broke off.



Gas tank gasket in place.



Filler tube rubber in place.



New sending unit for the guage.



Gas tank is in!

Looks great. It will shift SO nice with all new bushings