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Date:         Sun, 11 Jul 2004 16:06:37 -0400
Reply-To:     Debbie Walters <debbwa@EARTHLINK.NET>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Debbie Walters <debbwa@EARTHLINK.NET>
Subject:      Trip report
In-Reply-To:  <200407111218.1bJJPW13J3NZFmQ0@tanager.mail.pas.earthlink.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"

Just got back from three weeks of driving to Montana from Florida and back (spent 10 days in Red Lodge, Montana).

Awesome terrain! Stopped in Memphis and got two new front tires, kept hearing a ³fop, fop, fop² noise, and discovered cracking along the inside radius on the inner side of both front tires. Thought the belts might be separating, so replaced the tires.

Then, had an intermittent banging noise the rest of the way to Montana that sometimes sped up with acceleration, sometimes sounded like it was coming from the front passenger tire, sometimes sounded like someone beating underneath the mid chasis. Stopped 5 times to research and try to figure out the problem ­ concentrating on the front wheel. Couldn¹t find anything.

Got to Montana, and got a vanagon owner who was at the same event I was at to help me track it down. Jeez! It was the rear passenger CV joint, and my break shoes were crumbling apart. Took Gypsy to a local tire and lube place that said they could get the parts and fix it, and they did. The bracket attaching the CV axle to the hub was broken and 3 bolts had worked loose and/or snapped. They replaced the CV axles on both sides, and new brake shoes. They retapped the holes for the bolts. Glad I down shifted while descending those mountains rather than using my brakes!

So, I¹m driving back to Florida and start hitting states that put ethanol in their gas. I had been putting a fuel additive in the tank so I could use mid-grade fuel rather than premium to try and save money. Well, I put in the additive with the ethanol laced fuel. Whooooo! I think Gypsy O.D.¹d on octane. She was revin¹ up a storm. She was idling at 1300 RPMs. I ran that tank down as much as I could and filled it with regular unleaded to try and water down the ethanol. Three tanks later she was still idling too high, so I adjusted the timing. At the same time, as we started hitting hot weather, the AC stopped working, so we (the dogs and I) spent our last two days sweating to death trying to make it home.

BUT, it was an awesome trip! I did start checking out pick up trucks on the last day and a half of driving (thinking of replacing Gypsy) ­ the AC always breaks at the worst times, and there¹s a coolant leak somewhere that occurred within the last three days of our trip.

Here is a link to the pictures I took along the way. There are 4 pages, so click the links at the top of each page to get to the next.

http://homepage.mac.com/debwalters

deb Œ85 Westy ³Gypsy² Orlando


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