Date: Sat, 18 Dec 1999 08:48:25 -0500
Reply-To: Bulley <gmbulley@BULLEY-HEWLETT.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Bulley <gmbulley@BULLEY-HEWLETT.COM>
Subject: LONG Solution to Bucking Bus, NIN, & 'Clown Around',
was Problems heading NORTH
Scott-
Glad to hear you made it in one piece. I had an identical problem on a 1976
bus many years back. It's a bit of a story, so bear with me.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I have a buddy who is a cartoonist/illustrator. During college at East
Carolina University (how 'bout them Pirates, eh?), he was working on his
Masters while I was working my lil' BS/BA. One of the most important things
he could do to get his name into the minds of folks that would hire him was
to go to "Comic-Con", a huge comic book convention held in early August
each year in San Diego.
One winter, I rescued a 1976 bus from the crusher for $75. The motor had
burned, and they had mistaken the melted cooling-fan housing for a melted
motor block; they'd decided to send the whole van to be with Jesus, and the
little lambs, and harps, and clouds. I knew better. The van was immaculate,
other than the fried-out engine room. My buddy, (Parker) and I made a
commitment to use this van to get him out to the 'con' in San Diego in the
summer.
So during the school year, I scrounged around to find all of the bits to
exhume the van. I found EVERYTHING for the Fuel Injection at a Porsche
dealer where a customer paid them to take the FI off his 1976 914 (same
basic motor), and put on dual Delorto 44's. I bet he regretted that. The
dealer had everything in a box, basically to be chunked. $20.
As summer rolled around, to finance our endeavor, I kicked into high gear
with a little business venture I conducted, sanding hardwood gym floors. I
worked with college buddies (like Parker) to do the work, and we'd do 5-8
gyms per summer; it helped pay for some of my schooling.
During this summer, my little VW Bus resurrection progressed. I got an
engine compartment wiring harness from a junk yard 1976 bus that lost its
battle with rust. I scooped up the tail-light lenses and a couple of Kleber
load range D tires. Found a cooling-fan housing and fan for $10. Bought 20
cans of light green metallic Hammerite(r) spray paint at Big Lots, sanded
the van, smoothed little chinks with Bondo(r), taped it off and painted it.
It was beautiful. Really.
In preparation for the trip west, I tinted the windows black, removed the
back seat, built a bed platform and luggage storage area in the back. I
made curtains. But the motor still needed a few things before it was ready
to roll (a battery and a distributor, if I recall).
Time was of the essence, though...The Comic-Con was to be open on August
2nd, in San Diego. We were scheduled to leave NC for CA on the 27th of
July...unfortunately, we had one more gym to complete. I called in extra
guys. We poured on the steam, and finished it in record time, at 4:00 a.m.
on the 29th. Two little details. We weren't packed, and the bus wasn't
finished.
Exhausted from the sanding, I slept for a few hours the morning of the
29th. Parker went back to his place, and slept most of the day, as he had
the first driving stick. Around Noon, I headed to a bug shop, and bought a
009 distributor, and an Interstate battery. In the heat of that late July
afternoon, we feverishly packed our cloths, packed the cooler, loaded the
van, and squeezed our girlies one last time.
It was 90 degrees out, when, at 8:00 p.m. we hit the road in a van that had
about 10 miles on the clock since the fire.
We both worked in radio during school, so music was important to us. Before
leaving Greenville, NC, we stopped at a music store, and bought a tape to
listen to on the road...we chose "Pretty Hate Machine" by Trent Reznor's
Nine Inch Nails (NIN), which had been released a day or two prior. While
this is fairly tame stuff now, when it was released, NIN was REALLY edgy,
hypnotic, techno stuff, particularly if you were sleep-deprived, and on a
long, non-stop road trip from NC-CA, and you had about 48 hours to
complete.
On the way out of town, the van bucked a few times as we pulled in to fill
up with gas. As Parker filled the van, under the glare of the fluorescent
gas station lights, I checked all the common stuff: plug wires,
distributor, fuel relays...nothing appeared as the problem, and the van
started right up; I didn't feel it was resolved. Heck, the 25 wires of the
wiring harness loom were spliced together, and the FI was from another
vehicle, we were in a Frankenstein/Lazarus bus...was it going to run
perfectly?
NIN went in the auto-reverse tape deck, and began playing as we rolled out
of town in the twilight...we didn't realize it then, but neither of us
would turn that tape off for the next 52 hours, it played over and over and
over.
So Parker drives. From NC to SC, GA to Alabama, he drives, listens to NIN,
and I sleep. Every once in a while at highway speeds, I was jolted awake by
our bucking bus. I would wake up, and the tempo and pace would smooth, and
I'd go back to sleep. When we'd stop for fuel, Parker would pump fuel, and
I'd check all the same wires and stuff I had checked before...nothing. He'd
hop back in the chair, I'd hit the rack, and on we would roll, through the
steaming July/August night, with NIN playing the whole time, over and over.
I took the wheel somewhere in Alabama, and drove through the heat of the
day, through the rest of Alabama, Mississippi, across Louisiana, and into
Texas. The entire time, the bus arbitrarily jolts, bucks and smoothes out;
NIN plays, we eat the sandwiches and boxes of cereal we packed; drink
caffeinated soda, and roll west under the blazing sun.
Sometime in the evening, somewhere in Texas, somewhere on I-20, Parker took
the wheel, and I headed for the hot sheets in the back of the van. The same
pattern ensued. Roll at 65 mph, listen to NIN, sleep awhile, wake to
bucking, stop for fuel, check wires---nothing. And again.
Finally, at about 2:30 a.m. the bucking had increased to an intolerable
level, and I began to wonder if we might break a motor mount or two...it
had become violent, frequent. We had to stop.
We were in the middle of nowhere, literally. Those of you from Europe, or
who have never been to Texas may not be able to imagine just how FAR away
you can be from ANYTHING when you are in West Texas. There are places where
from the horizon on one side all the way to the horizon on the other, you
may be able to make out one light, one sign of life. That is where we were,
at 2:30 a.m. when we had to stop, and find the problem.
Ironically, as I hopped out of the rack to tell Parker to pull off the side
of the road, an exit appeared... "Pull off THERE..." I pleaded. As we made
it to the top of the grade on the exit ramp, within a 1/2 mile of the exit,
we could see a street light in the middle of the desert darkness...
"...There!!!...go there!", I requested wearily. What we saw next has lived
in our memories ever since.
We had been on the road for 30 hours straight. We started our trip
exhausted, and we hadn't overcome it. The pulsing, spiraling, ghostly
melodies of NIN had us in a driving trance. Following the lone street lamp
light the Messiah's Star, we turned the corner into a gravel parking lot,
and saw the only building for miles: a two story warehouse-looking place,
with HUGE clown head on the front...the grinning, disembodied head was 2
stories tall.
"CLOWN AROUND" it said on the building. One ancient, green-fluorescent
street light illuminated the gravel parking area; it flickered wildly. It
was 90 degrees, 2:00 a.m. and we are in the parking lot of CLOWN AROUND in
the middle of nowhere in Texas.
With the motor still running, for fear that it wouldn't restart and we
would have to live the rest of our lives in this alternate reality, Parker
and I got out of the bus. We smelled the sage brush whistling in the night
wind, and stood silently for a moment, pondering the 2-story glaring clown
face, with it's merry, conical hat and delirious face paint illuminated
like a strobe light in the flickering street lamp. NIN played in the bac
kground.
I don't recall either of us saying anything...but I know we both thought
the same thing: "What the HELL is THIS?". We never got an answer, but in
the flickering light of the parking lot for a freakish warehouse in the
middle of nowhere, I found the problem with our bucking bus.
I couldn't see it in the glaring light of the gas stations, but in the dim
flicker of the CLOWN AROUND light, I beheld a small blue arc, from the
negative battery post, to the negative ground strap terminal. I, in my
haste to leave NC had not adequately tightened the terminal. If I pulled
the terminal, the bus sputtered, and died. If I attached it firmly, it was
smooth as cream. A few spins of the pliers, and it was done.
As we crouched near the motor box of the van, making our repair, a sheriff
pulled in, rolled down the window on his cruiser, and asked if we were
okay. It only punctuated the paranormality of the situation...there wasn't
a town visible for miles, WHERE did he come from? No one could have seen us
from the road...how did he know someone was in the parking lot? We waved
him on, and told him we had it fixed; soon we were back on the road...NIN
playing the whole time.
To this day, I have no idea exactly where "CLOWN AROUND" is. Somewhere off
I-20, in the middle of West Texas, on a hot August night, when I was
younger.
Start your van in the dark, open the motor box, check all your grounds.
G. Matthew Bulley
Bulley-Hewlett
Corporate Communications Counselors
www.bulley-hewlett.com
Cary, NC USA
888.468.4880 tollfree
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