Date:         Thu, 16 Nov 1995 11:21:44 -0600
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         drphibes@siu.edu (Peter DePaoli)
Subject:      Re: How I got home from work (broken clutch cable)

At 12:35 AM 11/16/95 -0600, Cheese wrote:
>Why stop to fix it at all?  When this happens to me, I just drive it home
>and fix it there.  You just gotta (look both ways first) put the bus in
>first gear, turn the starter over until the bus starts and give it some gas.
>You just gotta get the revs of the engine just right (so that the rpms of
>the engine match the rpms of the tranny?) before you make a decisive shift
>into second and so on.  When you get good enough at it, the gears hardly
>grind at all..
>
>Cheese
> 
>

hey Cheese... I once drove my '71 Westy home to Chicago from Columbus, Ohio
with a non-working starter motor, a malfunctioning idle-stop solenoid and
then to add to my frustration the clutch cable broke.  the only problems i
had was when  I approached stopped traffic for road repairs and then when I
got near Chicago at the toll booths.  Mind you I was power shifting, and
operating this Bus with two hands and three feet.  Oh  my brake pedal
started sticking in the depressed position as well so I added a piece of
rope so as I could pull up on the brake pedal after I depressed it.  Yes
indeed I was quite a nervous wreck when I got home.  And you know what? now
that I look back at it, if i were driving anything but a VW, this trip would
have ended in a very large tow bill! Peace. :)

Peter DePaoli
Carbondale,IL
'71 Westy
'69 Camper
73 Super Beetle