Date:         Sun, 7 May 1995 20:57:28 -0700 (PDT)
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         David Schwarze <schwarze@superc.nosc.mil>
Subject:      '73 Safare Update - CB radio, cabinet, etc.

Volks,

These last four days have seen major changes for Da Boat once again.

Thursday and Friday, I built the small cabinet behind the passenger seat.
This cabinet's functions are to:
1.  Cover the gaping hole cut into the metal support behind the passenger seat.
2.  Cover the propane fitting coming up through the floor
3.  Provide some additional storage without taking up a lot of floorspace.
The cabinet is 29" high, 6" deep, and the width of the passengers seat minus
3 inches on each side.  This allows the sliding door handle to be accessed,
unlike the previous cabinet which blocked the handle.  I wanted to make the
cabinet look as much like original Safare equipment as possible, without
killing myself.  The top and sides are done with the new paneling I bought,
which closely resembles the original.  On the front face, I ran into a
problem because I wanted to use one of the doors I got from the Safare in
the junkyard, but it looked tacky because the paneling was different than
the rest of the front.  So, I butchered my old cabinets which are sitting in
a corner of the garage.  I found a nice big piece of Safare paneling that had
been covered up for 22 years and cut it to size.  The old paneling splintered
badly - I finally solved that by sandwiching the old paneling between two
scrap pieces of the new paneling when I cut it.  Put in two shelves, then
the front piece (with oval holes in it - Westy style) then the door.  Looks
okay considering I made it, but some of you will probably have a good laugh
when you see it.  :)

Saturday, I decided I needed to do something about my squeaking and dragging
brake calipers.  Called up Vee Parts, and for once they didn't have what I
needed for very little money.  Caliper rebuild kits, $19.95 each.  Ouch!
Decided to look around the junkyard for a pair of decent calipers instead,
cause it would be less work to swap than to rebuild, and the junkyard only
wants $12.00 per.  Went to the third Pick-yer-part that I haven't been to
for a while.  Found several vans, but none had calipers that looked like
they were any good.  Peeked inside a late 70's Westy - score!  It's got the
clock in the dash!  10 minutes later I'm on my way home, happy that I didn't
make the 50 mile drive for nothing.  As for the calipers, I'll have to be
content with putting some anti-squeal stuff on the pads.

Installing the clock was easy, but moving the oil pressure gauge turned out
to be a significant amount of work (the oil pressure gauge was in the clock's
space).  I have oil temp and CHT mounted in a little bezel plate thing
under the dash already.  The easiest thing to do would have been to get a
new bezel that holds three gauges, but I had been thinking for some time
about moving all three gauges to the empty spot on the dashboard under
the radio slot.  I saw someone's bus once with the three gauges mounted
there, and it looked really nice.  So, I get out the 2-1/8" hole cutter
and go to work.  Not a moment's hesitation cutting into the dashboard,
because I know it's an easily replaceable part, should I mess it up too
badly.  After 30 seconds or so of cutting, it becomes apparent that the
hole saw wasn't going to cut through the metal backing.  D'ohhhh!  Piece
of crap blade.  Now that I think about it, it probably wasn't made for
cutting metal, but I thought it would work cause the metal seemed really
thin and flimsy.  Uh-uhhh.  The saw made a nice groove in the metal, but
that was all.  I managed to create the hole by drilling multiple holes in
the metal with a small bit, and tearing chunks of the metal out with a
pliers.  Wasn't too hard, really, because the groove that the saw cut made
a natural tearing point for the metal.  After all this, the gauge doesn't
fit too well.  The hole is slightly too big, and the lip on the edge of the
gauge isn't large enough to keep it from slipping in if I push it a little.
I think I can make it a little better by wrapping some electrical tape
around the gauge, but I haven't tried it yet.  All in all, it doesn't
look *that* bad.  For now, the other two gauges will have to wait.  I have
to go and buy a hole saw that is *made* to cut through metal.

Ah yes, the CB radio.  How many of the GNATT participants have CB's?  I
was hoping quite a few.  Shore would be handy for communicating on the road.
I had a CB sitting in a box since my accident on August 17th, 1993 when
my Capri was T-boned by a little old lady in a Chrysler.  I had been meaning
to install it in the camper for some time, but hadn't gotten around to it.
In the Capri, I had one of those "dual use" antennas that was supposed to
work for the radio AND the CB.  Well, it sucked plain and simple.  Radio
and CB both had very poor reception.  I know, I should have expected this,
and I kind of did, but I didn't want to mount a CB antenna on the Capri.
It would have looked, well, how you say?  Stupid.  Anyway...

I let the dual use antenna go to the wrecker with the car, where it 
belonged.  Bought a gutter-mount CB antenna at Radio Shack - $22.  Mounted
the CB under the headlight switch - fit perfectly except that the steering
wheel spoke kind of blocks the display, but no big deal.  Mounted the
antenna about 3 inches back from the very front of the rain gutter.  It
sticks up about a foot above the top of my bubble top.  Now, how to route
the cable from the antenna to the CB?  Stupid Radio Shack, the end of
the cable that attaches to the antenna is riveted to the mount, which means
I would have to cut it or drill a hole in the body of the camper big enough
for that huge nut to pass through.  We're talking 3/4" here.  No way.  So,
I decide to take the cheesy route and run the cable in through the door.
It actually worked out well - the door closes fine and the cable just dis-
places a bit of the door seal.  The only problem is routing the cable from
the gutter to the base-of-the-window-level of the door.  This was the least
obtrusive place to run the cable in, as there is a little fold of metal
that the cable can sit in.  Does that make any sense?  Anyway, where the
cable runs from the top of the window to the bottom (along the A-pillar)
I need a way to fasten it.  I'm thinking I might just submerge the cable
in clear silicon (it's lying in an L-shaped channel).  Right now, a couple
of discrete pieces of duct tape are doing the job.  God I love duct tape.
I have about 6 rolls of it.  :)

Anyway, the CB works well.  Seems to have decent range (~5 miles) and I can
hear it over the engine, which is one thing I was worried about.  Only two
more weeke left till GNATT! (well, for us at least, we are leaving on the
20th to drive to St Louis!).  Thanks for listening...

-David

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David Schwarze                     '73 VW Safare Custom Camper  (Da Boat)
SAIC Comsystems, San Diego Calif.  '73 Capri GT 2800            (Da Beast)
e-mail:  schwarze@nosc.mil         '87 Mustang Lx 5.0           (Da Sleeper)
http://papaya.nosc.mil/~schwarze   '93 Weber WG-50              (Da Piano)
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