The shakedown begins

The first thing I bought after I bought the Beetle was a repair manual, How to Keep Your Volkswagen Alive, by John Muir. If you have an old VW, you need this book. This puppy has everything I need and then some, and John wrote it with guys and gals like me in mind (says so on the cover: "For the Compleat Idiot") so we wouldn't have to blow all our bread on mechanics who charge craziness for labor.

I have this manual and it's my bible. With it, I carry a Haynes manual as a go-to for backup, to clarify something or maybe provide a picture of what I'm looking for. I bought tools galore - most everything John lists in the "Phase I" toolkit in the Idiot book. I lack a few basic things that are a little expensive for me, but that I plan to get later. I bought my first ever tool box. Ahh. I'm now discovering that it's way too small for my needs. So I need to buy another, bigger toolbox, preferably made out of metal or something so I can sit on it while I'm tinkering in the engine.

I have all the basic stuff I need to begin working on my new old Bug.

The first thing I did was probably the easiest thing to do: change the fuel filter. The fuel filter is the yellow-brown-ish cup thing in the picture here:

Notice all the crud inside, and the general brown-ness of the paper filter. There was also a gross murky film on the plastic inside. This is a filter that probably hasn't been changed in a few years at least. I stuck a new one on in about 30 seconds:

The filter cost a couple bucks, that's all. Easy peasy.

Right now I'm in the process of a shakedown, which is where I'll go over every inch of the car and note things that need repairing and replacing. It's taking me a while, since I'm new to this, but I'm liking it because my shakedown is also part classroom. I'm literally learning as I go along, and doing some maintenance and repairs when I get the chance.

With these old VWs, or any old collectible car that's getting rarer by the day, the history of the car can be a total mystery. You really don't know what you're getting most of the time, in regards to what the car's been put through in its life. I took a look at the Bug before I bought it and was satisfied that it was in good enough condition, but I'd done my homework beforehand so I knew what to look for. One of the killers of old Beetles is rust. Those floorpans are notorious for rotting away within just a few years without proper car. Road salt is the enemy! My pans look passable:

They do need some work, but they'll be okay for awhile while I'm doing other things.

So far, with the engine, I've paid to have the generator replaced. The original generator - meaning, originally put on the car 40 years ago - crapped out. It was also put on wrong, I guess it had been rebuilt at one time. Because of time and circumstances (the previous mechanic I'd given it to for work just sat on it for 10 days and did nothing, only to finally tell me he didn't know a thing about old VWs... what an asshat), I ended up paying huge to get this done. I'm low on cash anyway, so the cost was a stinger. Anybody I give the car to now, will need to be able to prove s/he actually knows what's up. Anyway, the wiring had to be redone, because the original generator had clip connectors instead of screw-ons. The new wiring is the big, white wire at the top, going across. I don't like that it's exposed, so it's on my (very long) list of things to take care of.

Also paid to have done, because of time (again): Handbrake fixed (most internal parts were missing), windshield wipers made to work, headlights and brake lights rewired correctly, and some wires in the steering column fixed back properly.

The total for the parts for all of that wasn't too bad. The labor was the ass-kicker. I paid $408 for all, total, and that hurt.

This past Friday I got up under the car for a few hours and felt and poked around to examine everything. I have a huge oil leak right under the engine, and a gasoline leak somewhere in the engine as well. While I was under there trying to find the source of all of that, I checked out what I figured to be the clutch cable and the clutch sleeve or Bowden tube, which doesn't have the sag in it that I've read it needs. My car jerks and shakes madly when I'm starting off in 1st gear, and I've been told this is a nice place to start looking for the problem. As soon as I make my plan of attack, this'll be fixed.

Next up, also, is to do the valve adjustment. When I got under the back, behind the rear wheels, to look at the valves, I got the cover off and just looked at them for a while... what do these things do again? Oh yeah... make the car go. I don't have a feeler gauge yet so I had no idea if they were set right. But when I put the cover back on, I noticed that the wire clamp that holds the cover on apparently hasn't been slid off in a long, long time, because there were no tell-tale scrape marks like what I got when I took the wire clamp off. I looked at the cover on the other side and I couldn't tell if it has ever been opened. The bottoms of the covers do look a bit leaky, so I'm gonna replace the gaskets while I'm doing the adjustments. I've read all over the place that your valve adjustment on these little cars is perhaps the #1 best thing you can do to make it run better and last longer.

After that, I'm going to do my first-ever oil change. Yippee! No, really, I have no idea what to expect. I'm terrified that some scary sludge is going to come oozing out when I open 'er up. I wonder when the oil was changed last. If it's like most other things on the car, probably years ago to never. When I fill it back up with oil, I will be adding an additive to clean it up inside, then I'll probably change it again soonly, after it's had a chance to have a nice drink. I expect a lot of crud and crap to be in the oil, kinda like what I expect to find in the gas tank.

The gas tank is on my short list of things to get done as quickly as possible. I will have to take it out (it's in the front of the car, under the hood), empty it, then take it to a radiator shop to test for leaks and seal it up. But I'm thinking it's probably just cheaper, after you figure in all the time and expense, to just put a new one in. Then I'd need to figure out a way to get rid of the old one. So we'll see.

The carburetor needs big work. Probably should just replace it. The oil bath air filter is dirty, dirty, dirty. It still has the original horse hair filter element (yes, you read horse hair). That's what the car breathes through. This guy soaked his in kerosene for an hour and it was still dirty! The distributor needs to be replaced or rebuilt, though it's in good shape right now. I haven't gotten to check the spark plugs but I suspect they need to be replaced, so I bought some new Bosch Platinum Plus'es the other day. I should probably replace the wires while I'm at it, huh?

The ignition coil is older than God, so time for a new one. And who knows what state the fan is in. I tried to stick my hand back in there but couldn't reach. I'm picturing giant wads of the Wall Street Journal from 1972, along with twigs and petrified critters jammed in there.

That will take care of the basic stuff for the engine. Then we move on to the underside of the car. I've got to take care of the clutch (think it needs replacing), and the accelerator cable, and the fuel line, and check for problems. The entire muffler exhaust system is crap and needs replacing, heater boxes and all. Brake lines need to be done, as well as new brakes for all 4 wheels. Don't know anything about the tranny yet.

Then there's a strange leak in the driver's side floorboards that I need to sort out. Where's it coming from? My brake pedal is outta whack and falls forward, so I need to figure out how to tighten it up.

I need to get the windshield washer working. Hah, hah. That entails figuring out where the problems are now, and hooking it up properly to the spare tire, and filling the spare tire to the proper pressure, and then hoping for a miracle.

I replaced most of my fuses the other day. I have 10 fuses, and only 1 is a 16 amp. The fuses I found in them were mostly 25's and 16's, with a few 8's. This can't be good? I popped out all the wrong fuses, and replaced them with the right ones, and replaced a burned one, which fixed the little red light in the handle of the emergency flasher knob. The blinkers and flashers are kaput, though, so they must be fixed pretty soon because I'm getting tired of sticking my arm out the window to make a turn. There's no cover for the fuses, they're just under there flapping in the wind, so I need to buy one. I think they're a buck or two online.

Someone, at some point, put a new headliner in my Bug, but they never replaced the interior light they took out to do it. So I need to figure out where that goes, cut a hole for it, and snap it back in. The headliner needs to be glued in a couple spots. Not to mention it needs to be cleaned something awful.

The knob on the glove box needs to be replaced, as it's mostly broken off. I'm thinking I'll replace it with a lock instead of just a button, same goes for the hood button and the engine deck lid button. The headlights kinda point in two different directions, so I'm going to line those up. I have two different styles of brake light covers on the back. The parking light covers on the front are cracked and so faded that they're not very bright or yellow anymore.

I'll soon be sorting out the pile of wires behind the dash, and sorting out the bedlam. I figure I'll probably get some zip-ties and try and clean it up a little. The radio isn't working - and I found it's because it's not wired up and there is no speaker. Chuckle, chuckle. I think the radio goes in a '73, though. It'd be nice to have one that goes in a '68, but I won't be too picky. The station dial fell off, so gotta glue that back on. At some point, I hope to put a deep cycle battery in, solely to power an amp and speakers, so I can port my ZVM to the Bug without having to buy a stereo and install an alternator.

The front seats are rusted into place and can't be moved, and the carpet inside is cruddy and old. Some long weekend, I should probably just take all of that out, and scrub down the inside with a wire brush, and coat it all with that POR-15 stuff I keep hearing about.

And believe me, this is only the beginning. There is a lot more to investigate and get done. My goal is to get it into decent shape before winter comes, since I won't have a garage I can use anytime I want, by then.