Date: Thu, 20 Jun 2002 10:53:23 -0500
Reply-To: "Cookson, Noel" <ncookson@CELOXNETWORKS.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: "Cookson, Noel" <ncookson@CELOXNETWORKS.COM>
Subject: Re: TIICO: cruise control/parts
Content-Type: text/plain
Steve,
I have assembled the parts you suggested. I also purchased a 6mm metric
grease fitting to use for the ball-joint ball. I plan on grinding off the
nipple, filling the cavity with brass. Tap it out to 5 mm and then attach
that to the pulley with 5mm stud. Maybe I will get a smoother, rounder
sphere this way? If that does not work then I will try creating my own ball
joint ball like you suggested.
According to your directions I must be certain not to hit the pulley return
spring with the drill. I looked for this spring and did not spot it. Can you
tell me how to locate this spring?
Noel '88 GL tiico
-----Original Message-----
From: Steve Hoge [mailto:steve_hoge@who.net]
Sent: Tuesday, June 18, 2002 4:16 PM
To: Cookson, Noel; Tiicolist@vgonman.com; vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Re: TIICO: cruise control/parts
Cookson, Noel wrote:
>
>I am ready to begin working on adapting my '88's cruise control
<snip>
>I need to locate one of these ball joints before I can start.
>Anyone out there have an old throttle body or actuator they can sell
>the ball joint from?
Here's how I retrofitted mine, excerpted from an email I sent to Ryan
back in November. I've got about 5500 miles on it now and it still is
working great. Of course, these instructions won't make a lick of sense
unless you're standing over the engine compartment holding the parts in
your hands...sorry I don't have a digicam for pix...
[ NOTE: if you decide to reuse an old one instead of fabricating a new
one, the ball joint on the throttle body is a DIFFERENT SIZE than the one
on the vacuum bladder, and mates only with the appropriate socket/slider
on the throttle arm. ]
===========================================================
How handy are you? I didn't have to fabricate anything new except for
one screw.
I disconnected the L-bracket that holds the vaccum bladder, and remounted
the bladder on the opposite side of it, after rotating the bladder 180 on
its mounting axis. The vacuum port now sticks up over the end of the
L-bracket instead of passing through a hole in it. (The bracket was
actually the top half of a clamp - I discarded the bottom half.) I bent
the L-bracket slightly (w/out the bladder mounted, of course) to get the
right angle and then mounted it inside the engine compartment through the
fender wall with a nut on the backside just aft of the rear shock
absorber. The mount point was chosen so that the CC's throttle arm was
in nearly the same plane as the throttle body pulley and positioned so
that bladder was just at the throttle arm's length from the point on the
throttle pulley where the "ball" is mounted. I had to tie-wrap down an
air hose (crank-case breather?) which passes through this area to get it
out of the way of the throttle arm.
You will notice that the throttle arm has a "ball and socket" connection
on each end, with a ball (whose position is somewhat adjustable) attached
on the vaccum bladder and a ball mounted on a little arm that used to be
attached to the throttle on your WBX motor. The balls look like
miniature trailer hitches. The bladder-end ball stays mounted on the
bladder, but you can't reuse the one on the throttle-end, since it is
press-fit onto the arm and can't be removed.
Instead, you get to fabricate a new ball to fit in the (sliding) socket
on throttle-pulley end of the throttle arm: take a 5mm x 3/4" stainless
steel allen-head bolt and grind the head down to a sperical shape that
matches the old arm-mounted ball (you saved it off your WBX
throttle-body, didn't you? ;-)) I just used a power sander and went down
to a very fine grit to get a smooth polish on the ball. Note that this
ball and its socket are smaller than the vacuum-end ball and socket,
thank you VW!, so you have to grind it down to match the sliding plastic
socket, *not* the ball on the vacuum-bladder end.
Once you have a reasonably spherical and smooth ball that rotates freely
in the socket, you get to mount it in the throttle pulley. I chose an
angular position on that pulley that put it near the end of the arm's
extension when the throttle is fully closed, but when pulled straight
back by the vacuum bladder would fully open the throttle. I chose the
radius (distance from the pulley axis) by more or less matching the
length of the original WBX's ball/arm assembly. Conveniently, there
are several round depressions on the thick "shoulder" of the pulley that
are right around that ideal point, so I chose to use one of those
depressions (the next-to-most clockwise one) as my mounting point.
I carefully drilled a hole all the way (about 5/16") through the pulley
at that point, being careful not to hit the pulley return spring, which
is coiled up underneath. Then I tapped it out for the threads on my 5mm
"ball", which still has its allen-head socket on top. It threaded snugly
into the (Delrin?) plastic, and I went for broke and Super Glue'd it in
(foolishly, before I'd even test-driven it!), since I was worried about
the constant back-and-forth friction from the socket unscrewing it.
However, it *did* work the first time, and the only modification I've
made is to get a generous amount of new vacuum hose to run around the
engine compartment between the bladder, control unit and valves up-front.
Sorry no pictures, but if you're ever down this way you're welcome to
come by and take a look at it.
=================================
If anyone's down Santa Cruz way, the offer stands to come by and check it
out!
-Steve
