Date:         Fri, 20 Jun 2003 09:28:30 -0700
Reply-To:     Brian brian <jackstraw723@YAHOO.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Brian brian <jackstraw723@YAHOO.COM>
Subject:      spares story, and a tip for the day
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

Well, it is Friday, so here is a story for y'all.

Two summers ago I had the van (1.9L 84 Westy, about
120K at this point) in the shop for a poor running
diagnosis and was relieved to learn it was merely a
worn-out cap and rotor. The mechanic put on a new one
and away I went to see one Mr. Phil Lesh in Charlotte
North Carolina, leaving from home in northern
Michigan. After about seven.5 hours I was southbound
on I-77 in Ohio when it started to rain. After about
ten minutes of heavy rain the engine started running
ragged and then quit, with no re-starting. I couldn't
make heads or tails of the situation and I really
started to think that I sure would be glad to see a VW
come by about now. Not long after another Westy came
by in the northbound lane; we looked at each other and
I hoped he would come back which he did after a ten
mile trip to the next exit. This kind gentleman with
an 85 Westy suggested taking the black plastic cover
off the distributor cap, which we did to discover huge
visible cracks in it - after only 500 some miles and
7.5 hours! No, it wasn't Bosch, it was ever cheap crap
my mechanic can get and then mark up 100%. My new
friend had another cap - a Bosch cap from a Jetta, and
covered with JB-Weld repairs. "It ain't great, but
it'll get you down the road a little ways." It did,
and I proceeded south to Cambridge, OH, home of the
Beetle Barn, which I had seen many times while on
I-77. By this time it was ten o'clock at night, so
along with some more new friendly local kids I met at
the grocery store buying refreshments, I thought I'd
crash outside the wonderful junkyard until morning.
But the kind owner of the Beetle Barn came out and
said he'd help get me on the road that night, which
was good because the show-time clock was starting to
tick. He sold me a new Bosch cap and away I went,
somewhat to the dismay of my friends who were falling
in love with my wonderfully saintly female rider. We
got about another twenty miles south when the fun
started again. I pulled the new Bosch cap and
discovered one post to be completely discolored, a
weird purplish color instead of nice shiny bright
copper. So, back on went the welded cap from the Jetta
and down the road we went to my good friend at Danny's
VW Repair outside of Charleston, WV, where I had once
previously lived for a couple days diagnosing a bad
ECU. We crashed there and in the morning Danny hooked
me up with another new Bosch cap and we all lived
happily ever after for the most part.

During this experience I learned how to monitor the
health of your spark distribution system - once in a
while, look at your motor (running) in the dark,
_without_ a flashlight. Any spark leakage will be
quickly apparent. A completely new cap and set of
wires won't show any leakage, but this will change
over time. I had probably never looked at a running
motor in the dark without using a flashlight.

This experience taught me to begin carrying spares. I
still have that JB weld cap and it saved me again a
month ago during a night of extremely heavy rain and
several flooded road construction areas when I cracked
two caps on the same night. (I think this is probably
less of a problem in vans with an A/C pump, which
protects the cap a bit more from splashing water).

I have since learned a great deal more about how my
motor works and I have all sorts of spares; I hope to
be able to re-pay my debt to the VW world by helping
out someone else somewhere someday. I just returned
from Bonnaroo, where I happened to ask four Vanagon
owners if they had any spares (I have to pound on my
starter with a hammer about once a day right now (I
have a spare rebuilt alternator to trade)), and all
four of them replied something along the lines of "the
van is running great, why would I need any spares?"

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