1968 Campervan conversion

[joaonar]

so... here're some more pictures :mrgreen:

After cleaning almost everything underneath the bus, I decided it was time to remove both suspensions... so, I pushed the bus to the garage and started removing them:

the plan was to remove all these screws....

loosen a few more screws...

fortunately all the screws came out easily ....

 

[joaonar]

then it was time to loosen the screws that hold the suspension...

and to remove the dampers ...

.... and also time to remove all cables that were passing through the middle and bottom of the suspension.
First I had to remove the hand brake cables:

 

[joaonar]

and some pictures from underneath the bus, for my reference (at the end, I want to know how to assemble them again)

.. and to remove the front suspension I also had to disconnect all the links from the front brakes....

and finally...

also from the opposite side...

 

[joaonar]

After having removed all the cables and have loosened the screws a bit, I mounted the wheels again ....

Time for the rear suspensions.
First, I removed both dampers...

... and all rear brakes pipes:

 

[joaonar]

and once more I pulled the bus outside and in the same place as before, I started removing the fron suspension completely:

... and with the help of a pair of hydraulic jacks, we removed it:

 

[joaonar]

and once I removed the front suspension, I started cleaning it again:

I decided to remove all the putty because there was some rust underneath it....

and I was cleaning the bus untill it started raining. I had to pull the bus into a second garage still under constructions as fast as I could...

but I needed to mount the front suspension again as fast as possible...

while the rain was accumulating on the plastic.....

 

[joaonar]

so after a while I managed to pull the bus inside the second garage:

and protected from the rain that was still falling, I began to remove the front and rear suspensions. I had never done this before and in a day or two, this was already the second time....

 

[joaonar]

Once the bus was ready, I pulled all my stuff inside too....
I was ready to start cleaning again:

... while outside was still raining

But inside the second garage and underneath the bus was too much dark to do this kind of job, so I used a lamp and a very old window to protect the lamp from the falling sand:

this old putty was still a headache...

 

[joaonar]

meanwhile, some pieces from the sandblaster eventually wear out...
Taps, ceramic nozzle and some other parts wear out quickly... and can take the most unprepared and inexperienced user to despair.
I know what I'm talking about..... and I can tell you.

First, the looks of my last ceramic nozzle (there were 4 inside the sandblaster box)

and as it was in a pretty miserable condition, I decided to get back to scraping the anti-stonechip whit a chisel.

with the nozzle is this condition, the job of removing the anti-stoneship was impossible but removing the paint with it was still an option...

 

[joaonar]

Even with only one nozzle left (because the second and the third ones I used, wear out too quickly), the job was being done....

... but I needed to protect the bus interior....

untill finally the last nozzle wear out completely... and another piece also:

the taps that came with this machine, wear out also...

after some hours, changing taps it's just something you got to do ...

 

[joaonar]

so I went to a turner to make me some new pieces....

and while I was waiting for some new nozzles from Lisbon I asked him to make me a couple nozzles....

I asked him to make me a pair quickly.... and he did... in brass.
Lasted 5 minutes each... maybe even less.....

 

[joaonar]

the second and third wear out really quickly because there was an rubber o-ring between the nozzle and the piece I'm holding.

... and it was used to keep the nozzle in the right position....

... but the o-ring wear out also and so, the airflow inside the piece and nozzle became erratic instead of straight forward, resulting in this:

So the best option was:

With a straight forward airflow, the nozzle wears out more slowly

Live and learn.....

 

[joaonar]

while I was waiting for the new nozzles, I took some time to disassemble some more parts from the bus:

... and some more brake pipes...

... and a look from the fuel tank area:

... and there were some more areas to clean:

I took out the engine compartment isolation:

 

[joaonar]

I then decided to get back to sanding the lugagge part of the poptop... there was still a lot of sanding to do:

until finally my new nozzles arrived....

and I went back to sandblasting underneath the bus...

... and during the night to recover some lost time...

 

[joaonar]

next day, a few more...

and with all these new nozzles I was prepared to go all the way and sandblast all the bus and parts...

... but meanwhile, the sand did show some rust problems that were hidden....

... and some larger holes that were hidden under a lot of putty.
All my fathers in law work ....

 

[joaonar]

an always helpful tool to clean the sand....

.... and some more areas to clean....

... and finally I decided that the job was done!

 

[joaonar]

Once I had finish cleaning the bus I then started to clean all the suspension parts...

However I decided to get some more sand....

and some cleaning in the front suspension for an easier install....

if there was any doubts about how powerful this machine was....

.... as you can see the sand opened small grooves in the cement!

 

[joaonar]

before using the new sand, some cleaning in the smallest parts:

... because of the rain, all the new sand needed to dry out before I could use it:

I borrowed again the high pressure water machine to clean the bus from all dust:

... but before I could use it, I had to clean it all from the sand. So I used the machine only with air to remove the sand from the bus:

 

[joaonar]

after some hours of using the machine with air only, I mounted the front suspension again....

... to cross these few meters....

... but first I had to mount the rear suspension also:

The distance was very short so I didn't mind with the suspension height...

... but at the end, she was lower than originally....

so I guess she will stay like this.... unless the water tanks get too low:

 

[Guest]

brilliant!!, i love the detail, it could nearly go into the tech section as a sicky under "how to sand blast"