Master Cylinder Award

So this is what I was working on last week, and why I didn't post last Friday. It is my fathers day present to my dad, he was gone on father's day so we celebrated last Sunday. I was really excited to make it. I had a lot of fun.

                                                                                                                                   

 For those of you who don't know it is made out of a master brake cylinder from a VW Bug. It was the old leaky one we pulled off a few months ago. I wanted to make something for my dad to say thanks for all the work he has done on my car, I thought this was rather fitting. To paint it I just used gold, metallic spray paint from Home Depot, I was really surprised at how well it turned out! Tell me what you think, what other creative ideas have you guys had with old unusable parts?

Car Show!!!!

Today was my car's first car show, and the first one I was ever able to enter! I had a great time. It was the Trinity Mission Health and Rehab center's 2nd annual car show. The show had mainly American Muscle, for a while I thought I would be the only Volkswagen there, or only foreign car for that matter. Eventually two more VW Guys showed up in there bugs.

One of the guys there was really helpful and gave some great advice. Some things to twink on my car make it a little safer, little things. He also suggested that instead of just replacing the rear axle's I repack them with grease, they might actually be fine. That made me happy, another way to save a little money.

The other two bugs that were there were quit opposite. One was way worse than mine and one was way better. The black one had a lot of issues, but it was a work in progress, trying to fix the previous owner's mistakes, I understand that, I think any VW Owner can. The blueish green bug was in way better condition than mine, it had a very powerful engine in it, it was nice. The one thing I don't understand is that he took out the heat pipes. How can you run a bug in Utah without heat?? It was a very nice car  though.

I'm looking forward to the next car show in July, that one is all VW, I'm very excited. My car's second car show! 

Book Review - Bug Tales

I finished a great VW Book and I thought I would share it. If you have ever read any of the Chicken Soup books, this is very similar. Its like Chicken Soup for the Bug Lover's Soul. The book has ninety-nine relate able stories about people who have owned Aircooled Volkswagens. For example one story in the book tells about two friends who took a beetle on their road trip. While driving on the freeway their accelerator cable broke. While sitting on the side of the road they figured out that one friend could sit perfectly on the bumper and run the accelerator with the decklid up, while the other friend drove from the front. By shouting they were able to communicate enough to drive down the freeway. It wasn't long before they were pulled over by a cop, and he escorted them to a parts store where they were able to purchase a new cable and continue home.

There are many great and hilariuos stories, so if you haven't read it, go and pick it up. It is a great book for a summer read.

On a side note, what "bug tales" or any other VW stories do you guys have to share?

Happy Father's Day

Well, I hope you had a great Father's day yesterday. I had a great one, I'm not a dad yet, not for a while, but we had lots of family over. I just wanted to take a post to say how much I appreciate my dad, if it wasn't for my dad my car would never be running. My dad knows a lot about cars, and more about VW's than he ever wanted to know, but he still helps my bring my bug back to life whenever it dies. It's been an ongoing Father-Son project.

I have never worked on a car before and the bug I got is one that only stays running for about 2 weeks. (Almost exactly, it's uncanny.) I would have no clue on my car if it wasn't for my dad. He has the skills to figure out whats wrong and fix it ourselves. I look up to him a lot and all that he does for me, he is a great man. So thanks dad!

Have you guys had many father-son VW Projects? I would love to hear about them, please comment below.

Volkswagen Journal

Last Christmas my mom gave me an awesome gift. This is a journal she covered for me. She made one for each of us in our family. I think it is amazing. It is made from a cloth she found online and covered the journal. She also found a VW Bug bead for the book mark, surprisingly she found that at a local bead shop called the Bead Fairy. I'm actually writing in my journal for once, mainly because it is VW themed. I love it. Have you done anything similar to this? Please comment below and share.

"Economy" Paint Job

Rustoleum

So I was looking around the web last night and found an interesting idea. Ever since I got my car I have wanted to redo the paint job. It has quite a few blemishes. The previous Owner did not do a very good job on the paint. There is a spot on the hood where the paint has flaked off. On the rear fenders the paint has chipped off, and there are some spots where he simply painted over the rust.

 The only problem is that painting a car can be expensive, and I can't afford a whole lot. So I was left with the option of doing it on my own, well I would still have to pay for the equipment and automotive paint can still be somewhat pricey. So I found the poor man's way of doing it or as I prefer the "economy" way, Rustoleum.

White car painted with Rusoleum

Blue Car with Rustoleum

Some of you may have heard of this and are disgusted that I would attempt this! But it won't be the permanent paint job, just something to get me through, and I was actually quite impressed with the results shown in the images of the blue and white car. You use Rustoleum protective enamel oil based paint. It is applied with a roller brush after you sand your car and take care of any rust. You apply three cats between which you went sand and use mineral spirits. Then finally you apply a clear coat all for under $200. Pretty nice no? Hopefully I will have a week this summer I can repaint my car, maybe even before my area's big car show! At any rate, what do you guys think? The hardest part about all of this though is the color, I'm thinking either a dark green or blue? Any suggestions on this project?

If anyone else is interested in this here is a link to a video I found very helpful: Rustoleum Paint Job

Timing and a River

Today I took time to figure out my timing light. When I first got it a couple days ago I got it all hooked up right (or so I thought), turned on the engine, and pulled the trigger to turn on the light and it would force the engine to stall. I tried it several times to no avail.

Thanks to Ludwig and Gertie's Adventures I was able to figure out my problem. On the blog it was pointed out my problem. I had the red clip hooked to the wrong side of the coil. A simple problem like that. In the picture to the left I show which side to connect it too. For a ground I found that a bolt under the alternator worked well. So now that I have the timing light figured out I will have to pick up a distributor sometime hopefully my car will then run better.

On a side note, yesterday I took the bug over to the lake. No I didn't drive it into the lake, I know that bugs are supposed to float (watch this video), but I didn't dare try that with my rusty beetle. I had a teacher last semester that did try that once.

It was in the spring and it had been a very wet spring. My teacher was driving his wife's bug when he came to a river crossing. It was very deep because of all the rain. A bunch of guys in big beefy 4x4's were parked off to the side of the road looking into the river to see if it was safe enough to cross.My teacher didn't even give it a second thought before plowing over the river. He drifted across the river and went on his way. All the other guys didn't want to be outdone by a bug so they hopped in their trucks and took off across the river.

The story got me thinking, has anyone else had a similar experience, have you guys floated your beetle at all? Please comment, I would love to hear your stories and thoughts.

Timing light with spark advance.

Today I found out how to "properly" time an 009 distributor. Before I just did a static timing at 7.5 degrees before top dead center. Static timing means a timing while the engine is off. But the best way to time the distributor is to pick up a Timing light and time the engine while its running at 3000 RPM to 28 - 32 degrees. You can buy a timing light that lets you set the advance of the spark to whatever degree you want. I picked one up today from Harbor Freight.

My engine set up right now.

I also went to buy a distributor from Parts for Imports, but they didn't have the distributor I wanted. I want to get an 009 distributor because they are inexpensive. Parts for Imports had an 009 but it was fairly expensive. For a stock carburetor like I have a Vacuum advance distributor is best, because teh 009 has a flat spot where it takes the distributor a moment to get going, so it means you have to give it a bit more gas on take off. I found another distributor on the California Imports page here is the link: 009 distributor. I'll keep you updated on how the search goes.

This week I drove to work and was making a stop at the bank so I took the freeway there. It wasn't very far but I figured it would give my car a good run. As I got off the freeway my car started backfiring really bad. So I pulled into the Krispie Kreme parking lot and let it sit for the day I had to have my boss come pick me up, that's embarrassing. After I got it home me and my dad worked it over we tuned the card and did the timing, but it still didn't help. After a test drive we thought it might be a wire. The wire that connects to the carburetor from the coil was really shoddy so we replaced that and it helped a little but it still was having issues. After a bit of research we finally believe that it is the distributor that is going out, so that's on next weeks list to do. There is always something on this car.

I thought I would share this video that I did for a digital media class. We needed to do a final video that had sound, our own film, and some sort of  a story or theme. I chose to do a video with my bug. I found a video a couple years ago that was a promo video for a beetle and I thought it was pretty cool, so I decided to do one of my own. You can find all sorts of cool Volkswagen videos on Youtube. Tell me what you think.

Today I was just sitting home so I decided to do some sketches. I sketched the pictures out of the Hot VW's Magazine.

Speaking of Hot VW's the next issue should be coming out soon. I like the summer issues because there are typically more car shows.