My car is an icon

This is a picture of my car on my street. It is an icon for me. My mom loves it because she can always see where I'm at, she just needs to look for the little green bug with the letter P on the side. My mom isn't the only one that can tell where I'm at though.

Yesterday at work one of my coworkers said to me: "i don't want to sound like I'm stalking you, but I know where you live." I had to smile I knew where this was going, I'd heard this before. We had new neighbors move in recently and my coworker's sister was friends with their daughter. She had gone to drop off her sister and saw my bug parked there on the street. 

The beetle is defiantly a recognizable car. There aren't as many on the road any more so each one is unique. My friends are always saying I saw your car at such and such place, or they will wave as I pass them by. It's a hard car to miss, it's very unique in today's world. And for that matter it isn't just my friends that wave, I always love it when people wave or give me a thumbs up. It's not just a car it's an experience, and that goes for any old  VW.

A bug at the Pi

Me and my parents went to eat at the pi pizzaria in south Jordan Utah on Saturday, we were up in the area and my dad loves their Pizza. Their pizza is excellent with a lot of toppings, but that isn't their only up point. I must say they have good taste in art work too. Right as you walk in the door any VW enthusiast would immediately notice this hanging by the stairs. An excellent portrait of an early model bug, so if your ever in the area and want good food in a nice VW environment: defiantly check out the pi pizzaria.

Electric Washer Pump Conversion, done right

I learned a lot about buying a car when I first bought my bug. One thing I learned was inspect everything. I had asked the previous owner if everything worked, the horn windshield wipers and spray, etc. He told me that, yes everything worked. It wasn't until after my dad and I had driven it home that I really started looking it over I noticed a few unusual things. One of the first things I noticed was the big black button underneath the dash, later I found this was the horn, the button on the steering wheel did not actually work. (Now I think it's because the column isn't properly grounded, but the button and steering wheel were pretty cheap so when I tried to fix it the button broke.) 

The jury rigged button

The next thing I was curious about was the red button at the bottom of the dashboard. Why I hadn't asked about this earlier I don't know. But anyway I followed the wires, (I didn't want to push it until I knew what it was) turns out it is the button to operate the windshield washer pump. I need to be more careful about word choice, while everything did work, it didn't exactly work the way it was supposed too. Don't get me wrong I'm still glad I got this bug, it just would have been nice to know these things before I bought it.

The old cruddy pump

Well I've been staring at that red button on the dash for long enough. The cruddy old pump that was in my car before finally gave out, so I decided while I'm replacing that I might as well do the job right and hook up the wires to the windshield wiper switch on the column. It isn't as hard as you would think. 

We had an brand new pump and reservoir that we hadn't used laying around, so I decided to use that. I decided to mount it to the fresh air box as it was really the only place it would fit. Then I took off the wheel and got looking at the switch. It is a newer switch we bought probably a year ago. As I got looking I realized the switch not only came with the air pressurized nozzle but also the metal contact points needed for an electric pump. 

The pump has two wires coming off of it one for ground and one for power. I grounded it on the nut that holds the fresh air box in place, then I routed the power wire into the cab by the column, I had it go to one side of the contact points (shown in the picture) and another wire coming from the other side of the contact points that goes to power.

This shows what wires I added on the switch (click for bigger image)

That's all it took, a fun easy fix to an irritating problem I have been staring at for two years. Now I guess I need to get around to fixing that horn button, that's a project for another day.

Fixing the Seat Wobble

It can become rather irritating to have a wobbly seat while driving. It used to be whenever I would go around a sharp corner or go over a set of train tracks in my bug the seat would bounce around and tip from side to side. My friends loved to ride in my car but that was one of the more major complaints. They didn't like the "auto turn correcting seats" as I called them. I did a little looking around on thesamba.com and it didn't take me long to find the problem.The seat had been rattling around in the seat rails because the old plastic bushings had fallen out. Who knows how long ago that happened, It could have been ten years or more. Anyway it was a fairly simple fix. I just needed to remove the seats. 

This is the tab that needs to be pushed
down on 1973+ Beetles

On 1973 and later models the seats need to be pulled almost all the way back then push down on a tab on the center hump. This tab locks the seat in place so the front driver/passenger doesn't pull the seat all the way out. The seat will then pull back all the way out. (On the earlier seat rails the seats will slide forward and out. There will be a little tab at the front of the seat rail with the lever, push this down and the seat should slide the rest of the way out.) The white plastic bushings then easily snapped in place. I realized I only had one of the 6 bushings needed for both seats that was left. Glad I replaced them. 

Two of the bushings were installed on the seats and the third was installed on the center hump. After that I greased the seat rails with some white lithium grease before re installing them. It makes a world of difference and it doesn't cost very much to do either. 

This is one of the two installed on the
back part of the seat

This one slides onto the
center hump

Sapphire AM Radio With iPod Connection

Hey everybody, I just finished working on my AM Sapphire XV radio to add an audio cable for my iPod. It was a really simple project with very little alteration to the actual radio. The great part is it still maintains the function of the AM radio. Here is a video of the final result: 

I decided to do some looking around to see if it was possible after I installed my radio and realized that the radio itself didn't work very well. I found that the radio couldn't pick up a very good signal. Sadly in my area there is only one AM station with a signal strong enough for my radio to pick up. I wanted a way to have the songs from my iPod played through the radio while maintaining the stock functionality.

After some research I found out how to do it. I added a page to the resource section of the site that lists the instructions for how I made the connection to my radio. Here is a link to  the Radio Conversion for iPod/MP3 Hook-up article.

Thanks for reading,

Todd

Veedub Classics New Site

I have a brand new site that I have put together for Veedub Classics. It is still a work in progress but I will have more ability and freedom on an actual website instead of a blog. I will keep posting my blog here on blogspot. My blog will also be posted on the website. For now the site address is sites.google.com/site/veedubclassics/ if you would like to check it out. Thanks for keeping up on blog posts. You guys are great. Check out my new site and give me some feed back, again it is still a work in progress so some of the pages I have started I haven't finished yet, but I would love feedback. The link to the blog on my site is here: Veedub Classics Blog.

Thanks for reading,

Todd

Google Street View

This is in front of my house.

Last fall, just after school had started Google maps redid the street view for the Provo, UT area. I found out because I drove past or the Google maps car drove past me twice while I was driving around town over the course of a week. I was really excited about that since my car would be on Google maps two times. I kept checking back and they never updated them... until just this week. I guess it takes a bit of time for them to process the new images and put them online. Just for fun I also checked in front of my house and discovered that my car is on Google maps 3 times in total. That is so awesome. I have been excited about that all day, I'm sure I will be pulling up Google maps to show any one i can. Do you guys have pics of your VW's on Google maps?

This is as I was heading to work.

This is as I was leaving school.