great progress mate, once mine is back up and running this will be the direction i will be heading in over winter
Hang in there mate. I had to replace my engine soon after I bought the van - I was concentrating so hard on the condition of the chassis that I fell for the excuses about an engine bay doused in oil and had never even heard the term 'end float' back then. So I sympathise with your experience - a number of other TLB'ers who joined about same time as me have had similar nightmares e.g. yorkshirecampers These old girls (that is vans, not Zoe ) take a lot of TLC but when they are sorted you can't beat it - I feel genuinely sad when I pull back up on the drive after a trip out and I can't say that about any other vehicle I have owned. I have been trying to tackle one big job at a time - engine was forced on me, but then switched to suspension and wheels during last winter and interior this one. I always make a big list which I then break down into smaller jobs and keep picking them off one at a time. Hopefully I am getting close to my dream bus - certainly by July she should be about as I intended.
Tackled new carpets yesterday, whilst the seats are at the trimmers. Decided to go for a full Madmatz set, so binned the old rubber underseat mats and bolted the seat runners through the mats with a bit of glue where needed. The cab mat was a lot more hassle to fit than I had hoped because it is not the right design for a 78 throttle linkage. I had to remove the linkage and then trim the carpet so that I could refit the plastic cover. Got there in the end and pretty pleased with result: Only downer is that I discovered the accelerator pedal return spring has long since rusted away and pedal doesn't want to behave like it did before I disconnected everything. The pin that holds the pedal is seized solid so going to have to figure out how to remove it so that I can fit a new spring - looks like the hinge bracket is welded to the floor so I am most probably going to drill it out and fit a new hinge/pin/spring. Hoping to get my front seats back from trimmer later this week and hopefully refitting them will be a lot easier than taking them out was. Bought some shorter stainless steel bolts that should make life a lot easier. Hoping that I will be ready to camp in a couple of weeks and then it is just the wait until mid June for the cabinet maker to be ready to start on the furniture.
Never seen the plastic cover for the linkage before! Is this common on other buses? Whilst mine was supposed to be a Deluxe it has long been stripped of the good bits! My next job is to whip out the pedals and refinish and paint the cab floor... a nice new cover might save me some paint!
That looks really nice. I'm about to have my own seats re trimmed and I am also going to get some new mats. I've been debating whether to go for black rubber or carpet to hide dirt etc, but I have to say the lighter mats brighten the interior. Could I ask which type of mat you went for ?
They are from Madmatz http://madmatz.absolutewebhosting5.co.uk/prod2.asp?id=279&sub_cat=679&title= To be honest, if I was to do it again I might have stuck with rubber mats under the seats - the contours are a bit curvy down there and the rubber mats are sculpted to fit more neatly. That said, I am sure it will look fine once the seats are back in - just hoping my home made door membranes will keep the water out and stop them getting soggy.
Hi mate. Seems as if it was on post-76 vans - not sure whether they all had it. Mine has been sprayed to match the trimming by a PO - think they were all black originally.
Cheers mate. She is getting there - I reckon by mid July she will be finished. Won't know what to do with myself then - threatening the missus that I will have to buy a Beetle ;-)
Nice. I'm going to be looking for an Opel Kadett C Coupe (My first car you see!). Don't suppose anyone knows of a project or something laid up?
