8 posts from June 2009

Bumps.

Stand back folks, the man is about his desecration antics again.
I see now why most people dont run Porsche rear brakes, cos it widens the track about 50mm. Probably because of the internal handbrake. But I am determined to run the Monobloc's at all 4's so back on they will go.
And im running 8 inch rear wheels which doesnt help any. But over here Fuchs are pretty hard to come by. About as rare as barndoor deluxes id think.
Anyway the problem is I cant get the rear wheels off without suspension disassembly. Recently I hit on the idea of fabricating a lower bolt on bump stop. Then when I need to remove the wheel I could just jack the axle down and viola, clearance for wheel removal.
So this is what I did, not quite what was planned and not actually tested, but I recon im headed in my right direction.

Boggin it.

I got sick of lookin at the patch line along the front nose skin, so I decided to hell with it, im gonna put some bog on this bus. So what, itll still be a light weight cruiser, theres probably less than 1/2 a kilo of plastic on it now.
The bonus is, the bus looks alot better.
Well for a dayglo blue bus anyway!

Yeah a Volvo.

I think id actually buy one of these. An aero Volvo ute.
And with a V8, too cool.

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Look out Pedrosa.

So I was just browsing Gumtree. I dont know why and I cant remember what for, but somehow I ended up at the motorcycles for sale area. And the first thing on the list was this postie bike. Itd just been posted up and was about 20 minutes away so I gave the kid a call. Next day I went over to take a look, yep it was old and yep it was rough, but it was all there and the kid only wanted $270.
He had a few calls, he said so I coughed up and loaded the thing in the Bulli.

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Its got its problems but rides like a Honda should. Soon as I get the signaling working, ill be comin after ya Danni!

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Porka

Oh yep, you guessed it.
Ive found a local brake shop than can help me with the paperwork to get approval for this mod sooo.
Im putting the Porsche stuff back on the old fella.
Luckily for me I didnt modify my modifications to get the drum brakes on to get rego, so all the porka bits should just slip back on!
I got the old mother(s) out to polish the wheels and viola!

Liquid Snails.

So yeah, we got back from the Shark Bay trip with no problems. Good ol bus!
But the insulation I put in with the "new improved" liquid nails didnt hold. On the first hot day it all fell on the floor.
So after getting back home and after a quick clean up, I decided to put all the insulation back on with contact.
And the first  real job on the outlaw now was to put in some interior lights. I had some new Wolfsburg West lenses. Found some old light bases in the pile. Went down to a local auto electrics shop and bought some new wire to make a harness. I think thats the first bit of new wire ive put in this bus,...few! wheres my head..

Kalbarri

So we made it to Kalbari, problem is its now day 4 of our trip and we aint even half way,...mmmm.
We headed off to the store for some essentials and then to a cafe for some caffeine and some travel planning.
Consequently it was agreed by all that we and the Outlaw Barndoor were just not gonna make Exmouth and see all the bits in between and get back to perth intime. Negotiations continued, a solution was to edit Exmouth and Coral Bay from our itinery and head straight for Shark Bay and relax there.

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Afterall thats what holidays are spose to be for arnt they. To get to your destination and relax.
Often we travel around frantically squeezing every activity and significant point of interest in, so it all ends up a bit of a blur. We get back home after the holiday and spend the next week recovering.
So it was a no brainer,... find a beach with a bar close by and spend several days wandering between the two.

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So this was our first bush camp at the bottom of Shark bay. There werent many facilities, but the water was pretty close, the neighbors were pretty far and the cost? well, pretty cheap,... $1 a day... Lets stay a week!!

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After a couple great days at the bush camp we decided to head on up to Denham, which is kinda the capitol of Shark Bay. It got a bit hot on the way so we stopped into Shell beach for a quick dip.
Yeah it was standing room only!

First track.

Well finally it was departure day. So we got up early, packed the bus, grabbed the dog and headed north.
Straight to our first cafe for a brew....
Its about 1300 ks to Exmouth from Perth so we really cant muck around too much cos weve only got 2 and a bit weeks.
Theres plenty to see on the way. Geraldton,Kalbarri, Shark Bay with the neccasery stop into pat the dolfins at Monkey Mia. We planned to do as much wild camping as possible, now that the fire bans are over, so should be a good trip.

Just north of Perth we drove down this track a way .

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Next day we arrived in Geraldton, checked into the Batavia Backpackers and headed to the beach for a bit of body surfing on the reef.

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Alternator.

So im doing a tune up and oil change to ready the ol outlaw barndoor for his epic first camping trip and damn the alternator has got a clunk in it somewhere. Sheesh! I havnt got time for this.
Anyway its gotta now come out.
I cant risk a busted alternator in this bus , or getting stranded down some dirt road in the middle of no-where..
Its pretty strange, this alt is pretty much brand new, and I dont run the belt over tight.
Ive never ripped an alt apart so this is new territory for me. Turns out its pretty simple, it all un bolts and presses apart. No high temp soldering needed, which was my first concern. My second of course was that maybe the shaft or the housings were pounded out somehow. There was slack in the shaft but the bearings actually felt good, so i was expecting some kinda nightmare.
Turns out, it looks like its just slack manufacture. The bore's that the outer races sit in look like they have been machined too big. What to do. I was quite worried at this stage, cos its pretty critical these things run true.
I decided id risk it and just loctite everything back together with special bearing retainer loctite.

Liberace stylee.

So to finish off the insulation.
I hadnt had much success with the spray on contact glue with this ripple rubber mat stuff, so, I got hold of some new "high temp" liquid nails.
Hope it holds, looks good and I can feel its stopped the ringing of all the panels so hopefully its  30 bux well spent.
Also I glued up the airlite roof insulation in the front roof, so it looks like a disco in the cab at night.
 Ill disco the back later, as our impending maiden voyage/departure date, is fast approaching.