Glassed Up

I got the rubber gloves out of storage and had a go at the old fibre-glass patching. After leaving the cab floor to dry and set completely I gave it a bit of hard work with a piece of sandpaper and then dusted off nicely. I have worked once with fibre-glass* before and spent three days itching, stinging and scratching. The tiny little fibres of glass pierce the skin and then stay there, invisible and very irritating. Hence the protective rubber gloves :)

It's pretty easy really, cut pieces of the glass-fibre mat to the required size. Then just add a few drops of catalyst to some of the gooey, translucent resin and stir it up to activate a chemical reaction. This allows the resin to "go off" and set really hard. Too much catalyst and it sets within minutes, too little and it takes days, or never sets at all. I was overcautious and added only half the recommended amount as I wanted plenty of time for my old fingers to work with it. As a result it took over a day to set properly but looks great.

* I believe it's properly called GRP, or Glass Reinforced Plastic

I gave it a quick coat of red oxide primer just to keep the whole area protected and stop any moisture from getting to the recently treated metal areas. I made eight separate patches for all of the different rust-holes that I found in the floor. The largest one behind the accelerator pedal got a double patch - the two layers of matting and the resin combined have made a patch strong enough to support my weight! It's not very well hidden but I'm planning to rubberise and also carpet this area so it's not too important from an aesthetic point of view.

Third Time Lucky

Here we are yet again fitting the engine into place in it's bay. Hopefully the saying proves true - the third time is the charm. The gear linkages are all working correctly now and the gearbox should not need any further work so there shouldn't be any need to take the engine out again.

We fitted all of the correct bolts to the re-greased CV joints and nipped them up tight. They still need to be torqued properly but that is a one-man job that I can do later.

I removed the metal strips from the sliding door by drilling out the rivets and smoothing the protruding heads down with sandpaper. I've removed the plywood panel from the inside of the door, and all of the insulation material so that I can remove the other side of each rivet.

The top one is a support for a shelf made by my dear old Dad. It used to hold cups, glasses, wine boxes etc. The middle one is a support for the original Westfalia table that usually fits to a similar support between the seats inside the bus. The wider, lowest one is to cover up a long dent that was caused at some forgotten moment of miscalculation during the past twenty years or so :)

It's already looking cleaner and tidier without those strips, I expect that I won't be replacing them after I repair the damage.

The building crew was here to extend the height of the wall a bit. It should help to keep the Marigold Project and the project workers dust-free, dry and better protected from whatever Mother Nature can chuck at us.

Once the plaster has dried I can give it a lick of paint and it should look like it always should have.  Now I need to get 5 more roofing sheets and finish the covering over the top. Thanks to Dino once more for all the help.

Cleaning Up A Bit

I scraped off a lot of congealed muck from the protective bash-plate which was mounted beneath the gearbox. I gave it all a good going over with a wire brush to remove the worst of the rust and then slapped on a coat of rust-converter liquid with an old paintbrush.

It looks rather good today, seen here with the  mounting U-bolts that I bought a while back. It's not perfect but with a good coat of primer and a couple of finishing coats of paint it'll be dandy. At least the rust is gone.

I also had a go at tidying up some of the scruffy bodywork and sheet metal today. The back end was gummed up with rotten old stickers, most of which are not even relevant any longer. My kids did a mad turn with some leftover tins of enamel paint a few years ago when we took Marigold to a 3-day music festival on her final trip as a standard Westy. 

I attacked them with a wire brush and a sanding disc attached to an electric drill. Got some reasonable results but will still have to sandpaper, prime and prepare before even thinking about the top coat. This is where I am at the moment, still have some wicked holes in the engine lid to be filled. The authorities keep changing the registration number-plate requirements so we have a good pattern of holes to remove.

The steel floor on the driver's side (now the right-hand side!) is badly rusted and pitted, right through in parts. Oh dear. I gave it a good few strokes with the wire brush and laid a couple of coats of rust converter down on it. 

It's still looking pretty grim but at least I should have arrested the rust a little. I have picked up some glass-fibre matting and 2-part resin to fix these holes. I just don't have the welding skills to weld in a replacement metal part to this thin substrate, although I may rivet one in to add strength before I "glass it".

Getting Into Gear

I've been fiddling and struggling with the new gear linkages for weeks now, on and off. It's been a faff getting the gears to operate fully without the ball of the base of the gearstick popping out of the cup/socket that it's meant to seat within. Here's a pic of the guide plate that is meant to assist with lining this all up (oval plate at bottom of picture).

The gearstick passes through the squarish hole in the centre of this plate. The raised section at the right of the centre hole is intended to restrict you from shifting accidentally into reverse. By deliberately pressing down firmly on the gearstick you can then manipulate the stick past this point and into reverse gear.

Examination of the diagrammes in the my various user service manuals seem to show that this plate should have a second raised section on the other side. With the aid of the ever-helpful Dino we managed to make and weld on a similar raised bit so that it looks like the one in the diagramme.

Hard to believe but this simple fix has made all the difference! Wahey! Now all of the gears are easily selected, and exactly where they should be. It's not popping out of the socket and it all feels pretty smooth too. What a relief! Thanks again Dino.

Next challenges are the cable and hydraulic linkages for the brakes, clutch, handbrake, accelerator and electrical components. No problem!

Here's a bonus pic - I went to help Marius last night to get "Flossie" bump-started after a long rest. What a great motivator for me to be able to ride around the suburbs in this lovely old bus.

Two Times Twenty-One

I wrote a short Happy Birthday message last month when Marigold officially became 42 years old. It got me remembering that we had a much bigger celebration the FIRST time that she completed 21 years. VW South Africa used to run a fantastic monthly magazine called Volksie Family that had regular features and interviews of local "Volksies" and their owners. I made inquiries recently with the dealership about getting hold of a back-copy but the current bunch of imbeciles knows nothing of the magazine (although one guy conceded that such a magazine was a great idea). Anyway I digress, at the approximate time they actually ran an article of the birthday party that was held. They took a few photos of the celebrations and held a brief interview with my dear Dad.

Dad managed to have a Marigold cake made and we cracked a bottle or two of bubbly to celebrate the occasion. He used to celebrate the birthday in July until I did some research on the VIN and the M-Plate and learned to calculate the exact date. The article also mistakenly states that Dad bought Marigold in 1992, which must be a misprint as I have the original bill of sale showing that he bought her in 1976.

Marius came over to help on the project yesterday, as he so often does, but we spent a bit of time on my other air-cooled project and got the entire back axle fitted with new gasket, clean seals and re-assembled.

I'll get back to the Marigold Project shortly - I've had a fiddle and made some more adjustments on the front end of the gear linkage but it still pops out of the socket now and again. Frustrating, but it'll have to be sorted out soon, I'll keep on it in my spare time.

Still a long way to go on this project too - Fred Flintstone here trying out the adjustable seat :)

Now repeat the mantra after me: 4 wheels - good, 2 wheels - great, 3 wheels - MENTAL!

Slide, slide, slide

I was very happy this week to welcome Dino back to the project for a brief visit. Both of my regular readers will remember him as the multi-talented welder/panel-beater/metal magician that did so much to help in the earlier stages of the Marigold Project. (See The Big Stick Up and Weld, Weld, Weld)

He has suggested that the problems with the gear linkages are that the entire linkage is slightly mis-aligned and slightly too long. After a short period spent beneath the beast, accompanied by a light cacophony of cursing, hammering, drilling and groaning, we seem to have some success. All four forward gears and (hooray) reverse can now be found with the gear-stick, although the current blocking plate does not seem to fit correctly so the stick pops out of it's slot sometimes when engaging reverse gear. No matter, if a search fails to turn up the original then I suspect a replacement should not be too hard to find.

We also put our turning, drilling and welding skills to the test and managed to fashion a crude slide-hammer from some retired, left over steel bits that were trying to rust in peace before we disturbed them. This tool should be just the trick to pull out the huge dents in the front of the project. The steel air ducting that is welded to the inside of the front panel make it impossible to push these dents out from the inside.

We tried first with a glued-on disc that was applied with hot-melt glue but it just wasn't strong enough. So we made a new fitting with a threaded screw on the end and made some holes in the steel panel. It works! The hammer just seems to pull the dents out beautifully. Pity about the holes but they shall be filled easily enough when the time comes. So ends a day of varied successes - thanks again Dino!

Happy Birthday!

Well the progress on the restoration has been slow but Father Time just keeps marching on! Today marks exactly 42 years since Marigold came off the production line in Germany.

I had some cake and beer to celebrate, not too much, I promise :)

I'm still struggling with the new gear linkage that we made - it's just not working properly to select all of the gears correctly. I might have to get a third opinion on this problem...