Date: Sun, 4 Feb 1996 22:41:25 -0500
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From: Sglw@aol.com
Subject: sam's dumbness Re Distributor
Susie and I went to martha's last nite & met a bunch of other bussies.
It was a disaster.
we left at 6:15 in the bus and got 5 miles when it died in the dark with no
flashlight. I think that there is a fuel problem, anyway good ole AAA came to
the rescue and we got towed back to bret av. The tow guy even managed to
back it in the driveway and we pushed it to infront of the garage. So we left
in the blazer but the road to moraga whree M lives was closed by the police
due to an accident so we wnt around the back way and I couldn't find Devin
Av. Valled Martha on the cell fone wher-upon her daughter Sarah said can she
call you back!!, so I asked to speak to M and she came to get us from the
centre of town. Upon finding us she did a U turn on a double yellow line and
got chased by the cops. Luckily no ticket was issued but it certainly got me
there v frazzeled. The return trip as also a disaster we somehow drove up &
down the Oakland Hills and came back on HWY 13, It was not really a bad route
but druving through winding hairpin bends in the rain & dark is not my ideal
way of homeward driving at 1:15 am. I have had a good listen to Klick &
Klack and must now get going.
At De Anza I found a Westphalia brochure from I think 69 the bus did not have
rear side lights, I have lent it to David Schwarze to get into the tent page.
There is a great set of fotos of the tent and a whole description thereof. I
want the little hanging net that goes across the back as a junk storage
place. If you see one please get it for me.
Well I am back home now with this dumb work report to write and a bus that is
not running.
IS this an example of ultra-dumbness????
Well as I said the bus died 5 miles away from our house in the way to
Martha's. What I did was adjust the timing with a light sometime in the
afternoon before we left. I thiught by all the symptoms that there was a fuel
problem, but when I had checked everything the fuel was discarded as a
potential problem. Well then I took of the distributor cap and everything
seemed fine, then I grabbed the rotor and tried to turn it, and lo & behold
it would freely rotate if lifted. This explained how it ran great, died the
ran again. I called Clara'a SO and he said that all I had to do was push down
on the distributor shaft as I tightened the 10 mm nut and it should be OK.
Well that has been done and everything seems alright.
MOTTO. When adjusting timing make sure that the distributor shaft is well
pushed down.