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May 09, 2004

adventures in auto mechanics!

so i sort of gave in and have devoted most of the day so far to the westy.

i pulled all the paper and books out of the glove box. i knew there was a british shop manual in there; i didn't realize there were service receipts and the original handbooks for the van, refrigerator, and other camping equipment. it all made for a fairly gripping read! especially the service receipts.

the last receipt was dated 2001 and it's the most worrisome. he had a shop fabricate and replace one of the brake lines, but the shop noted that the other line looked bad and could start leaking, and some of the rear brake mechanism looked bad too.

according to the owner's manual, it's a redundant brake system. disc brakes in the front, and a separate system of drum brakes in the rear. if the front brakes go out, you can keep the brake pedal pressed in and the rear brakes will engage. also-- jason, you were right. they do get power assistance.

i think this is something that i will probably call lonny about and discuss the possibility of having the brakes professionally worked on. i might want to take this van to ohio for an art car parade at some point, and no way am i going to cross a mountain range with any part of the brake system being iffy.

it looks like oil is down a very small amount on the dipstick-- but man, i can see oil all over the damn place in the engine compartment and underneath. i can see one hose that is clearly the source of some oil, maybe all of it. it's missing a clamp-- an easy fix. let's hope that goes a long way toward stopping the leak.

the alternator is easy to find if you know what it looks like. after reading up on the electrical system and having a good look at the diagrams, i recognized it right away-- it's visible while checking the oil. and the problem with the alternator was very clear-- the V belt is completely missing. unless the diagram in that shop manual is totally off, i believe i've found my problem. and it's a good damn thing that i got the van home fast-- that same belt drives the water pump. i would have been overheating before too long.

i will still have to partially remove the alternator to install a new belt, but i went through the instructions in the manual while looking at the alternator, and i'm confident i can do it. provided the alternator is actually ok, it should be a cheap fix.

i found the preferred manual for this model year on ebay-- it's out of print, of course. the edition that's currently in print supposedly has errors and emissions for this model year. it appears that another early model year owner may have spotted it as well-- we've got a bit of a bidding war going. i'm still winning but i'm hoping this guy isn't as desperate as i am to get this book-- hope he realizes that if he's got a later model year, he can get one easier and cheaper.

the british shop manual had precious little about the glow plugs-- no diagram. i have no idea where they're located. it looks as if i may have at least one bad glow plug (for the non-diesel inclined who have actually made it this far-- glow plugs heat the fuel before starting, which is important or the car will be difficult or impossible to start. they basically take the place of spark plugs in the diesel ignition system.) the manual did have a procedure for testing each plug, which is good. hopefully that's something i can do.

one of the diesel-vanagon listers has said i should first check to see if i've got a blown fuse for the glow plugs. he said the fuses are located "on the firewall". well, i dunno where the firewall is, and the british shop manual wasn't enlightening. the glow plug fuses appear to be somewhere other than where the fuses for lights and such are, because they're not listed in the fuse diagram in the owner's manual.

seriously, if a single one of my regular readers (except maybe jason) made it this far, you get a cookie the next time i see you.

Posted by lisa at May 09, 2004 03:01 PM | TrackBack

Comments

my guess is that you can access the firewall through the dash... the same place the seller showed you... what did he show you? i forget.

anyway, that's my guess. either that or somewhere by your feet.

Posted by: christa on May 9, 2004 04:57 PM

Hey, so cookie me! At any rate, I'm most impressed at your gumption in dealing with all this stuff. And regarding the notes you found -- wouldn't it be funny if husbands came with such from their first wives?

Posted by: Phil on May 9, 2004 11:11 PM

I'm really impressed that you're doing so much of this work yourself! For reading all the way through, do I get a low carb cookie equivalent?

Posted by: Sarah on May 9, 2004 11:56 PM

cookies all around! or maybe strawberries with whipped cream, sweetened with splenda. since we're all trying to watch our weight :)

Posted by: lisa on May 10, 2004 12:02 AM

No cookie for me?

Often fuses are on the inside of the metal panel that separates the engine compartment from the interior (aka. "the firewall"). It could be anywhere on this, but it's always accessable without tools, and usually under the dash (so it's out of view but not out of reach). In rare cases there are fuses in the engine bay, but that's pretty rare.

Posted by: Jason! on May 10, 2004 10:05 AM

yeah, you can have a cookie too :)

since the engine is in the rear of the car, might the firewall be as well?

i see a metal "wall" at the back of the engine compartment, and there's wiring leading to it, and some small boxes that appear to have an electrical function of some kind attached to it. perhaps that's where i should be looking.

Posted by: lisa on May 10, 2004 10:10 AM

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