Date: Mon, 24 May 1999 21:40:31 -0400
Reply-To: Bulley <gmbulley@BULLEY-HEWLETT.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Bulley <gmbulley@BULLEY-HEWLETT.COM>
Subject: Re: High cost of Q-pads
Marks,
As you open the discussion about Q-pads, and their value versus other
materials, I thought should respond. I am off the type2 list for right now.
Your message addresses a philosophy: Value, versus Cost.
Cost is what comes out of your pocket today. Value is what comes out of
your pocket over time.
In order for any restoration to be worthwhile, in my eyes, you have the
working toward the goal of making the vehicle trouble-free for a long time
(value). Beyond all other goals we pursued in our restoration of that 76,
it was trouble-free operation for 10-15 years. Our investment was not a
short-term investment, but a LONG-TERM investment. From the very day we
bought it, we spared no expense in making it perfect. Remember the old
adage, it is the cheap man who pays the most. Very true in VW restoration.
Well before addressing any of the Sound Proofing, Rust Proofing, or heat
related items, virtually EVERY wear related item on the bus had been
replaced. All shocks, brakes, rotors, drums, calipers, brake hoses, ball
joints, tie rod ends, master and slave cylinders, battery, steering gear,
steering pivot bearings, etc. were replaced within the first month we owned
the van. As you saw from a web site, the motor was rebuilt completely, new
heat exchangers, alternator, exhaust parts, etc..
I hate spending money, so I have learned to recognize the broad difference
between VALUE and COST. The cost of replacing all of the above items was
quite high. However, the cost could been quite a bit higher, had we merely
replaced the brake pads, and then gone for our 10k spin across country.
Had a slave cylinder failed somewhere in southern Montana in the middle of
the winter, I would've cursed myself a blue vein for not spending the extra
19 dollars for lousy slave cylinder while the brakes were completely apart.
The cost of Q-Pads was never an issue.
As far as the Kool Patch versus Q-pads debate, as far as I'm concerned,
there is no reason to debate. It is like debating whether to use Casterol
20w50 or Wesson Corn Oil in your crankcase (everyone knows to use Crisco).
They are to vastly different products, used for to vastly different
reasons. Kool Patch is undercoating. It protects the body from rust. It
already contains fiberglass. That's what makes it so thick and strong. I
used it on the interior in places that would be sealed, and never touched,
as Kool Patch leaches a thick, black tar-like substance that would ruin my
Sunday dress and white gloves.
Q-pads, on the other hand, deaden low-frequency resonance. They keep sheet
metal from transmitting noise.
Automobile manufacturers and body shops use Q-pads almost exclusively for
one reason: no cheaper solution works. Tear back the trunk carpeting in
your Jetta, look at the floor of your Golf, look under the carpeting in a
Honda, a Ford, a Chevy, even the lowliest model of Toyota has Q-pads on the
floor. They work, and if car companies could find a less expensive
solution, they would be using it.
The reason for the apparent "redundance" of the products in the interior
installation was to both deaden the noise, AND to prevent interior-out rust
through that is prevalent in "sleep-in" vehicles.
I would never encourage someone whose bus is in need of brakes to spend
$400 dollars on Q-pads. We have not sound-proofed our current van, simply
because we are accruing cash toward other things, like rebuilding the motor
to be silky smooth. I would propose that the operation of the vehicle is
vastly more important than the sound proofing.
I have an update to the website that includes about fifty more pictures,
diagrams, and (if I can work it right) a sound file of the doors closing on
an un-insulated bus, and the dors closing on our (former) 1976.
G. Matthew Bulley
Bulley-Hewlett & Associates
www.bulley-hewlett.com
Cary, NC USA
888.468.4880 tollfree
-----Original Message-----
From: Mark Hineline [SMTP:hineline@helix.ucsd.edu]
Sent: Monday, May 24, 1999 11:41 AM
To: G. Matthew Bulley
Cc: type2@type2.com
Subject: High cost of Q-pads
G. Matthew Bulley's heat and noise site has become, for many people, the
standard for sound-proofing our buses. But keeping a Type 4 can be an
expensive business, requiring trade-offs. How can one justify q-pads
knowing that the brake pipes and hoses need to be replaced?
This got me to thinking about Q-pads, perhaps the most expensive item on
G. Matthew's bill of materials. It seems to me that the high cost of
these things (about $5/sq. ft.) is the result of an application suited to
the stereo installation industry. Customers will pay the cash, so the
installer wants something that is low in labor costs and not messy. We,
with our buses, have lots of free labor, time to kill, and we are
cleaning up messes to begin with.
So I wonder if the coolpatch/q-pad combo isn't redundant in some ways.
Why couldn't one use a material impregnated with cool patch in place of
the q-pad? The two materials that come to mind are fiberglass (which
would be compatible with coolpatch) and that rubber no-slip stuff
(composition and compatability unknown). My guess is that some such
materials would reduce costs by at least a factor of five.
Mark Hineline, miser
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