Das Volks Vintage Volkswagen Gruppe

Anyone who is versed in setting timing available on Sunday? My bus doesn't seem to be giving it's all. Anytime I touch timing, I usually tend to mess it up more.

Mike, I'll be around the house this afternoon if you want to stop by, otherwise we could do it Wednesday night if you are coming to the meeting. PM me if you need my address.

So, after the big brake debacle of 2015, a set of new axles, and a set of rear brake adjusters that just won't hold an adjustment I noticed the bus didn't sound right. It wouldn't accelerate like usual, and would behave oddly under power. I struggled to get it over 45 and it felt very weak below that.
I had assumed it was a timing issue, as these symptoms seemed oddly reminiscent of the condenser catastrophe of 2012. So, today Jim Bowen offered up his driveway to diagnose the issues.
We started by replacing the points, condenser, cap and rotor. The points were badly pitted, and the cap had green crusty contacts inside it. This seemed promising given the findings but after timing the bus and setting the dwell it still was very weak and sounded like it was missing.
Then, we moved on to the plugs. Gapped four fresh spark plugs and given that all had a good color, one had some oil under it's click on boot (but not in the electrode) this seemed to be the issue, or so we thought. Still, the bus didn't sound healthy. It continued to misfire and seemed too frequent for the relatively small issues we had been finding.
Next, we hunted down some vacuum leaks. Fought with the hose to the auxiliary air regulator, buttoned up some clamps and cleaned some connectors. But, no go.
After everything, we were almost stumped and started pulling connectors to see where the issues were isolated to. We knew it wasn't ignition, and we doubled checked to see that we had good spark - and it was good. Then we pulled the fuel injector plugs, and there we had it. The injector on cylinder 1 was intermittent, the injector on cylinder 2 was entirely dead. We removed the fuel rail, and disconnected both injectors. Jim had a fancy home built injector cleaner made from a stereo transistor plug with a reducer, a momentary switch, a syringe, and a spray can tube. The plug with reducer had two alligator clips on the end which went in the injector plug. The red spray can tube was held in the tip of the syringe which slipped snug over the fuel hose connected to the injector, carb cleaner was pressurized into the fuel hose/syringe from a can of carb cleaner and releasing the momentary switch activated the injector to pulse.



About 10 minutes after, the injectors were clean. There was ALOT of sediment that came out. I presume that seeing as the bus had been leaking fuel most of the winter, those times when I did have to move the bus I definitely ran it low or near dry on fuel. I clearly sucked something up into the injectors and clogged two of them. Funny thing, 3 and 4 were in great shape.
After, we took the bus for a spin, and rechecked the idle and timing.
Bus did great driving home, felt like its old self. Was pulling hard and passing at 65-70MPH no problem. Felt confident, sounded smoother than I've heard in a LONG time and held a very healthy sounding, steady idle.

Campbelltown, here we come!

I love home brewed solutions that work like this. Great job guys!

Charlie, that harness you sent up almost went on the bus today! Lol

Did the old plugs on 1 and 2 look lean to you? you would think running with almost no fuel they would have gotten real toasty.

and also, how specifically did you check the injectors? just run the engine with the pulled injector spraying into a cup?

Markus, the color on the plugs was actually really good. All of them had nice color which leads me to believe this hasn't been occurring for long. certainly the bus hasn't been run very much since the holiday parade in December.
We pulled the fuel rail and disconnected the coil from the cap. Cranked the engine to check the injector spray, into two plastic cups. Each one pissed out barely enough to make the cup seem wet.
Did all 4 injectors while we were in there.

Do you have a picture of Jim's homemade injector cleaner setup ?

See above.

The syringe fits over the fuel hose which is already attached to a fuel injector, the red straw is from a can of carb cleaner which is used to provide pressurized cleaner into the injector. The transistor plug is from an old stereo, and has a reducer to ~3.5V (I think) the reducer is wired to a momentary switch. Which has two alligator clips on the far end. By tapping the momentary switch the injector pulses and sprays carb cleaner.it was great to see how poor the spray pattern was at the beginning, compared to how perfect the spray pattern was after cleaning the injectors. It was super easy, the hardest part was having the extra hands to hold. The syringe over the fuel line.

Glad it worked out for ya mike. I cleaned the injectors on my boat last Year, thank jesus for you tube, I had a 12volt power supply, a big syringe, piece of hose and carb cleaner, I think a 9 volt will open a single injector. Kinda is a two person job, very satisfying when u see them start spraying nice again ain't it!
Rob

I wonder if Glenn could use it to get "spraying nice again"

wow.... nice save Jimbo! kudos to you both for getting this done with your own blood sweat and tears. makes it feel that mush better... doesnt it?

Kudos on Jim's masterpiece. Scary looking but got the job done. How does one think of these things?

ObnoxiousBlue wrote:See above.

The syringe fits over the fuel hose which is already attached to a fuel injector, the red straw is from a can of carb cleaner which is used to provide pressurized cleaner into the injector. The transistor plug is from an old stereo, and has a reducer to ~3.5V (I think) the reducer is wired to a momentary switch. Which has two alligator clips on the far end. By tapping the momentary switch the injector pulses and sprays carb cleaner.it was great to see how poor the spray pattern was at the beginning, compared to how perfect the spray pattern was after cleaning the injectors. It was super easy, the hardest part was having the extra hands to hold. The syringe over the fuel line.

Sorry, when I am at work I can't see pictures, they are blocked.

Tom, the only thing you have to apologize for is not taking me on vacation with you...

It was a fun day for sure!

So, my bus has been behaving odd lately. We set the timing, points, plugs, cap, rotor, and condensor. Cleaned out my injectors and the bus was running great. In PA, it sounded "off" and felt tired, so we checked it and the timing had changed.
Again the other day, after the show it felt weak and would seem to "top out" too soon (not like it used to)
So, I checked the timing and it had moved again. I adjusted it back to the mark and it seemed to have the right advance when I held the throttle open.
But, it still felt a little weak. So, I checked the points and VOILA they were bent! The contacts were barely touching! So, I replaced them and gapped them, and checked the timing again. Put my dwell meter on and it was right at 42.3. The Bentley says idle speed should be about 850 +/- 50. But my bus "sounded" right at 950. It felt great yesterday. Was ripping around town, idle sounded perfect and it behaved great at around town speed. Today, I had it out on the parkway and again it felt weak. It made it to 65, but didn't have then American "excitement" it did before.
What gives?!
What am I doing wrong?

Not doing well... 2 of the 3 are not right.

Cryptic much?

What's not right?
My Bentley says dwell is spot on.
it stumbles at lower idle. Can you explain a bit more, or should I try to read smoke signals?

Timing Set At:: 7.5deg BTDC @ 850-950 rpm (Man Trans) w/strobe, vacuum hose connected

Dwell should be 49*.

What brand points are you using? I've had problems with Bosch lately and are using Bremi with no reported problems.

Glenn, there is conflicting data on TS about hose on or hose off. Book says on, TS changes their mind hourly. You're sure its on?
My engine doesn't like to sit steady at any RPM, which makes this a bit complicated. It hops a bit, +/-50 rpm.
My dwell is DEFINITELY low then. Odd that Bentley would say otherwise, thanks though.
So, to increase dwell I increase the point gap? Or close it?
I have Bosch Mexi's in it now, had been running Bosch (yellow box) from Bus Depot. The contacts weren't aligned! They were only barely touching edges! I just bought them from Bus Depot two weeks before I left for PA!

I thought you set the timing to between 28 and 31 at full advance with the vacuum hose off ?

Some photos to show the front floors, seat damage, Westy floor and camping equipment, as well as the under-body.

Drivers door panel
New Bus Depot panels installed summer of 2014
Window tracks, locks and door release mechanisms were all gone through and lubricated at the same time.


Passenger door panel


Coach battery - Optima Yellow top with charge relay and auxilliary 3 fuse panel to run two 12 V accessory plugs, the stereo, an underbody step light and a CB radio which is installed in the front of the bus.


The underbody of the bus. You can see the accessory oil cooler, and the LED step light. A switch inside the bus, mounted on the bed frame activates the light which is handy for those late night runs to the bathroom when in a dark camp ground.


Westy floor. At one time, the switch on the seat pedestal was to operate a previous inncarnation of the underbody light. It is a momentary switch, which was not convenient. So, when the light burned out it along with the switch were replaced with a "bump switch" (a heavy duty rocker used on Pierce fire trucks) along with the white under-body light also from fire trucks.


Both the drivers and passenger seats are due to be reupholsered - maybe overdue. I had withheld the repairs because as of last fall I was debating the upgrade to Vanagon seats (or the Go Westy plaid upgrades) IF the bus doesn't sell, these are the next project.


2.0 FI engine. Factory heat works. One of the jackets on the F pipe is loose, and rattles a little But doesn't effect the engine. It is a pitfall of not being able to get new F pipes.


BN4 gasoline heater. It was restored two winters ago, and just got new fuel lines.
It works great, and puts out some fantastic heat. Details on the restoration are further back in this same thread.

Front passenger floor


Front drivers floor


Dashboard. The tach is currently disconnected. The stereo is a CD set up with two 6.6" speakers in the kick panels. The white cable is just my AUX in cable for my ipod. The only flaws in the dash are a 2" disk that a previous owner glued to the padded dash top for a hula girl, and some screw holes that were put in the dash face under the radio. I used two of the holes for a CB Mic clip, the others to the right (above the cup holder) seem to be for a light that had previously been connected to the under-body light. (Like a warning light that it was still on) and the ones to the right look like they were for a GPS holder.

Tom wrote:I thought you set the timing to between 28 and 31 at full advance with the vacuum hose off ?

yeah, thats what you should do rather than time it at idle only. you can time it at idle hoses on. at advance hoses off.

Heard from Tony today. Resurfaced one drum and replaced one drum which was apparently warped. They think that's where the squeal was coming from. They also readjusted the rear brakes, hopefully they hold (I'm not entirely hopeful).
Apparently my miss/weak feeling was coming from the #1 injector which wasn't pulsing regularly. I'm hoping this solves the issue.
Don't have the bus back yet, maybe tomorrow.