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Post by PICTUP on Jun 1, 2018 7:04:03 GMT -8
It'll be interesting to see how the new venue works out with everything inside(seems like according to the poster anyway). Forecast is calling for rain, so could be a good thing(although sun was nice last year ).
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Post by Volktales on Jun 3, 2018 20:27:34 GMT -8
So today was the big day, and is traditionally the first car event of the season. So Don, Brian, and myself made the trek up to Nanoose in the mighty Restfalia. And what did we find??? I was tipped off about this the night before by my hot rod friend Terry. He thought I might like this Corgi "African Safari" trim 1200 Beetle. I always liked this version and did not have one, but I didn't like the seemingly high asking price. A little internet research last night showed the price was actually reasonable for this example, so I decided to part with some cash... The model itself was in very nice condition, but not quite mint. The box is a decently done reproduction with weathering. And the plastic rhino was included as well... The cool thing about this version is that the roof mounted spare tire actually steers the front wheels on the Beetle. If I had this when I was a kid, I probably would have worn the wheels right off of it... Next up was a huge stash of Ghia parts. Earlier in this thread is a picture of a blue Ghia convertible at the swapmeet last year. The owner sold that car (for $30,000!!! ) and was now getting rid off his leftover parts. Prices were more then reasonable too. This large pile of original German engine tin is late single port, and is very complete including the near extinct cable that runs from the cooling flaps to the air filter housing. All this cost only $20! This stash was mostly Brian's, and cost him a whopping $10. Those German Ghia rear lights were mine, and included in the engine tin stash. I also picked up a couple of 12 volt Ghia horns... Brian spotted this neat old Sun tester, a high quality garage tool from back in the day. If he didn't buy it, I probably would have... Continued...
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Post by Volktales on Jun 3, 2018 20:54:14 GMT -8
I seldom resist old magazines like this. A buck each, I did not say no... Also bought yet another pile of manuals. This large box contained many items including these two Haynes versions, including the early Super Beetle only version on the left. Box also had two copies of the one on the left, and the one on the right is a Convertible top installation manual for the Ghia. That will be donated to Mark if he wants it for his '71 convertible. The best and the worst in one picture . I bought this whole box just to get this hard cover Bentley manual in perfect shape. And it has the wire diagrams in colour, as well as some extra diagrams inserted. The cheaper soft cover versions are over $60 now, so I figure I did alright for $20 for all of them... So what did the rest of you get? I know HighTopRob was spotted there, as well as Stan and Jason. I did spot Jason buying an original 34 Pict 3, but not sure what else he may have came home with. The current owner of Tony's old split was there as well, but once again I forgot his name. Sorry, I am very bad for this type of thing... Anyway there was a fair bit of VW stuff there, and no I did not buy all of it. I saw several owner's manuals for various years including the 1950's models for fair prices, some dirt cheap Super Beetle parts, some advertising for Type III's, although I did not get my hands on that, I think Rob might have. There were several early VW toys spotted for fairly high prices, but someone walked out with a wind up split window Beetle marked with USA zone Germany on the back... Lots of stuff available if you took the time to look... One funny story: The guy selling the Ghia stuff was letting it all go cheaply. He had enough parts to build likely two sixties era front bumpers, including all the various pieces, guards, brackets, etc. One potential customer was looking at them and couldn't make up his mind if he wanted to buy the parts or not. He went on and on about how he did not want to spend money on parts that may or may not be right for his Ghia. This would be reasonable if the parts were at full Ghia prices, but the owner only wanted $20 for everything! I was very close to saying that I would happily take it all for that price! Very reluctantly the customer cracked open his wallet and paid the $20. And we wonder why VW owners are seen as cheapskates... Overall another good swapmeet and will be back next year...
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Post by busaddict on Jun 3, 2018 23:36:41 GMT -8
I love the old Sun Tach/Dwell meter. I got a nice compression tester at a garage sale for a buck. It still has an old Woodwards sticker that says "$8.00"
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Post by CrazyBrit on Jun 4, 2018 9:56:45 GMT -8
Thanks Russ! It looks like you got a great haul. I wish I hadn't been working - I would have bought his Ghia bumpers for sure!
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Post by Volktales on Jun 14, 2018 20:59:03 GMT -8
So there was a bit more to this swap meet story after all. When initially looking at the stash of Ghia parts on the owner's trailer, I noted he had a sign indicating he had a couple of 1500 cc engines for sale. At the time I did not think to ask him about them as I really did not need a 1500 anyway. For those that don't know, 1500 cc engines were used in 1967-1969 Beetles and Ghias only, and surprisingly I don't have any of those! However once home I began to think about that maybe I should have inquired about them, given he was selling everything quite cheaply. Luckily I did have his phone number... This one was originally in an AutoStick equipped car, and the owner ran and drove it before removing it. Serial number shows it is from August-September 1967, but this looks like a re-stamp on a factory rebuilt/replacement case. This may or may not be a good thing... Engine number two is also complete, as I had already bought all the missing parts from it at the swap meet! This engine is NOT in good health however... The end-play was good, but nasty clunky noises occur when trying to turn it over. If anything, it will provide parts for the other engine... This one is a January 1968 engine, and it looks very unmolested, although that won't mean much if it turns out to be scrap... So as you might have guessed, I bought these for the reasonable price of $150 for both. Then the owner asked if I would pretty please talk away ALL of his left over VW stuff in the garage. It would have been rude not too, so I left with a truck load of stuff, both good and not so good. An example of the not so good; a complete Auto-Stick transmission. Absolutely no one seems to want those... So why did it want these engines in the first place? Well my rarely mentioned '66 Sunroof Beetle has unfortunately cracked its case and is spewing oil everywhere. If this 1500 will run well, then it would be a decent stand-in until the '66's original engine (not currently in the car) is repaired. We will see how this works out...
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Post by busaddict on Jun 15, 2018 7:28:04 GMT -8
Awesome, now you need a barn for all that!
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Post by Volktales on Jun 21, 2018 19:51:45 GMT -8
Sooo, last night I had a bit of time to investigate those engines that I bought. Thought I would start off with the bad one, and see just how bad it really was... Yup. That ain't good. Strainer plate was chock full of metal. And there was not really any oil in there either, and I don't think someone drained it... Popping open the case revealed LOTS of shrapnel. Everywhere! And this is why. Number one piston and what is left of the connecting rod. Ouch. Impressive though... The crank pin is well and truly done. And pretty much everything else. But wait, there is more to this story... Look at all that debris! Never have I seen so much in one engine... Look at the rivets on the cam. They should NOT be that shiny and polished looking... And that is why. This is the back of the oil pump, and that pin should not be sticking out like that. The pin had shifted and was happily eating its way into the camshaft rivets!!! So here is a summary of what likely happened. Engine was using a lot of oil (leaking), out of the rock hard cooler seals. Oil pump pin came loose and started contacting camshaft gear rivets. This would have made a very loud knocking noise, but would unlikely have affected the way the engine ran at first. So the owner, knowing the engine was already leaking, and now noisy, decided to keep driving it into the ground. Eventually the cam thrust bearings would wear out (they did), and the resulting metallic bits circulated through the low dirty oil. For whatever reason, number 1 rod bearing was the victim. This must of started knocking violently, but given the other noises present, the owner just didn't care. And they kept driving... Carbon deposits show the engine was running rich. Even when the engine was in the process of self destructing, it likely was running well as the pistons were not melted. Even after the rod completely broke, and number 1 piston was jammed into the bottom of the cylinder head, the engine still continued on three cylinders. If you look carefully in the earlier photo, you can see the other crank journals were still OK, indicating that some oil pressure was still present. I bet the owner even made it to wherever they were going. It did not actually seize up, which is quite amazing. As you might expect, it is complete scrap, and the only internal part salvaged was the distributor drive. Everything else is garbage... At least the external parts were OK, and the cylinders heads actually look fine. The flywheel has been salvaged for the other engine, and my intention is to bolt it up and see if we can get it to run... Fun times ahead...
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Post by mitchy965 on Jun 21, 2018 20:18:34 GMT -8
that'll buff out.
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Post by Volktales on Jun 24, 2018 20:45:33 GMT -8
Sooo, it was time for round two. Would the second engine that was rumoured to run be any better??? So here is the beast, all set up and ready for action. The previous owner said it did run, but ran poorly and was running on very old stale fuel. Regardless, I did a significant amount of checking things over before attempting a start. First up was replacing the missing flywheel. Actually this engine was in an Auto-Stick application, so it had a "flex-plate", instead of a flywheel, and this had been previously removed. Fortunately someone had the sense to roll up some paper towel, and stuff in around the crank seal to keep out dust and dirt. The original end-play adjusting shims were present as well. I installed the flywheel from the junk engine, and the end-play was fine. Next up was to check the valve adjustment. Turning the engine over by hand revealed that the compression seemed even from each cylinder. Checking the valves revealed that only two were slightly loose, and the rest were all bang on! Nice and clean under the valve covers made me happy too. A loop of hose and some ATF was added to the metal lines poking out under the crank pulley. These originally fed the Auto-Stick transmission, and are attached to the engine oil pump. The pump for this transmission type is a dual action pump with two sets of gears; one for the engine oil, the other for the trans. Anyways I did not want the trans pump portion to run dry while testing the engine. Also I had to find a fan belt, and sanded the rusty pulleys so it would not wear out right away. The distributor was the one from the junk engine, as it was the correct type to match this engines carburetor. The points were filed and set of course. My favourite old gas tank came into use again. This was attached via a convenient hole someone previously drilled in the shroud for some reason. The carburetor top was removed and revealed the float bowl to be full of old dry sediment. This was removed, the leaking accelerator pump diaphragm was replaced as well and the pump discharge nozzle cleaned out. The electric choke was installed incorrectly, and the choke flap and linkage needed some tweekage... After a long search, I found my old early bay bus transmission bell housing. And a mystery starter came from the shed as well. You can see that at some time this engine's securing bolts came loose and a chunk is missing out of the engine case by the starter bolt hole. This won't be a problem, but the lower mounting stud hole has dodgy threads... Hopefully this will be OK. Then I added some wiring to make it possible to start. Whenever I do something like this, I ALWAYS rig up an oil pressure light to verify the engine has some. That is the old Project Pootina/ZomBeetle's speedometer that happened to by lying around... And I also changed the engine oil, even though it looked very clean... So was it a success??? Yes! Doing all the preliminary checks and repairs paid off. It started instantly, and seemed to run just fine. Only problem is I watched this very short video and realized I am an old, fat bastard!!! So what is the plan for this engine? It's destiny will be my suffering '66 Beetle, and we will start a new thread for that... Should be more fun...
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Post by tony on Jun 25, 2018 11:11:16 GMT -8
Thing of beauty......you deserve a piece of cake and a donut for that!
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Post by Volktales on May 31, 2019 19:42:09 GMT -8
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Post by owdlvr on Jun 2, 2019 17:15:57 GMT -8
so...what did everyone score today at the swap?
I managed to get an owners manual for a project I hope to buy in the coming weeks, and apparently the booth vendor has a full set of Factory manuals for it as well. Outside of that, didn't walk away with anything else....
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Post by PICTUP on Jun 2, 2019 18:55:08 GMT -8
A crap load of toys I didn't need, but apparently wanted because the money magically flew out of my wallet! However, MUCH cheaper than eBay and no waiting! Pics later, maybe tomorrow. C'mon now, do tell...what project??? "Enquiring" minds want to know....
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Post by Volktales on Jun 2, 2019 20:38:04 GMT -8
So it was up bright and early, and off to the swap meet! First thing to do was to see what might be in the parking lot on the way in... First up was this Econoline van. Brent has a thing for these, so thought he would like this picture... They are kind of neat. And they are NOT cheap anymore... And in the vehicles for sale section... another one! Fully camperized and for sale too. Yours for only $27,000! Holy crapola! My hot rod friend, Terry, would probably want something like this nasty old Dodge... And no, there were no VWs for sale outside... Once inside, one of the first things spotted was this old 1/32 scale Corvair model. Despite the poor proportions, I had to have it. Why? The guy selling this had LOTS of model cars for dirt cheap. Try get 3 cars for 5 bucks for the big ones, and 3 for a buck for the small Matchbox cars. At those prices I dragged home several things I didn't really need... Like this somewhat crude Porsche 356. But I couldn't just leave it there, could I??? I did like the J-spec turbo Celica, and the guy threw in a bunch of extra stuff for free including a Lambo that I didn't really want... I did want this die-cast French made Solido brand Audi Quatrro from 1983, however. Only $3. Because Reagh and Rob arrived first, all the VW's were gone. Or were they??? You will have to check out Don's pictures to see what he went home with... A different seller had this... Yup, it is an early Chevrolet Corvair in 1/42 scale by Dinky/Meccano. This is an older repainted version, so was not too expensive. Really feeling the Corvair thing lately, so this might pacify me for now... Yes, the air-cooled flat six is in the back... I also spotted two other Corvair toys there, but both were four doors, and were on the expensive side. One was mint in the box for $100, but that was too rich for me... And finally a couple of interesting old Mercedes. The grey one is an Italian made Politoys 230 SL with wire wheels and opening everything. This was a reasonable $3. The gold one is an Italian made Mebetoys 250 SE, and represents the real Mercedes model that I like this most. It cost a bit more than $3, but I liked it. If you are wondering why I didn't buy any VW models, because there wasn't much there this time. Peter, the owner of the red 1964 Beetle, did take home a Dinky oval window in decent shape, but otherwise few VWs were spotted. Parts wise, there were a few items including fenders and some other sheet metal for Beetles, and a few hubcaps and engine tin. One guy had quite a selection of VERY optimistically priced bus speedos and fuel gauges. Very few manuals were spotted this year, (perhaps I bought them all last year???) The event was packed with people, and many were carrying out treasure with them... Once we were ready to leave, some more interesting cars in the parking lot. My kid would love the "stance" on this Civic... Split single cab with pressed bumpers was out in the parking lot and looking good. So was this slightly newer split bus... And finally, this Beetle that was formerly owned by one of our old customers. Now a new life in advertising... So overall, another decent swap meet, and a nice kick off to this years car events. Now bring on our own show next week!!!
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