My 70 Bus!! Wes

[justcruzin]

I finally found a source for 5 x 5 birch. Thanks to Wes's older brother, I went and picked a sheet up last week!

I now have to patch a hole in his headliner that I accidentally put in it when loading the sheet. Oh well, not like it doesn't already have a bunch of patches. LOL

I will be using the opposite side, it looks a bit better then the side in the pic.

I'm not sure when I will get to making the headliner, but sometime this winter for sure. I think I will wait for it to start raining, that way I won't want to drive Wes anyway. LOL It will be a good rainy day project!

I pulled Wes into the garage yesterday so I could adjust the drivers side heater cable the next day. It seemed like I was getting pretty decent air out of the passenger defroster but not the driver side. Today I crawled under and adjusted the cable. It was pretty loose, but a lot tighter now.

Hubby found me a blower fan and I decided to install that today too.

For now I only hooked up one of the fresh air tubes. I used soft plugs to plug the extra hole on the blower and also on the fan shroud.

The wiring is only temporary. Hubby wanted me to make sure I was going to like it and to see if it will even work, before I run the wires from the back to the front. So for now the switch is just taped to the wires in the engine compartment. After turning it on and going up front to feel how it blows, I have decided I already like it! LOL So I will be running wires next weekend most likely. For now though I can just switch it on before I take off and turn it off when I get to where I'm going. I have to remove my "slow moving vehicle" sign anyway, so it won't be hard to remember the fan. Probably only be a week of doing that anyway. LOL I'm kind of excited about getting it all done properly. I think it is going to nice to have actual blown in heat.

Next project will be figuring out why it seems like I get air out of both inner defrost vents but not the ones closest to the doors. Guess I will try blowing air down them to see if they are clogged.

 

[justcruzin]

Today I went to PnP and scored a few pieces and parts for the bus.

I finally found the picture thingy's for the switches. I now know where my headlights and dome light switches are! LOL

Before,

After,

I found one hubcap, so I replaced the chrome one that I had tried to paint to look old.

Before,

After, looks like it was on my bus the whole time!!!

I also thought I had scored when I found some visor holders. They didin't fit my visors though. I broke this one trying to get it on. I may be able to glue it to try to make it work till I find the right ones.

This is the other one I found. It is a bit different then the first pic. No slit cut into it. I can't get that one to work at all with my bus. The visor won't go in all the way. Maybe I should have grabbed the visors out of the PnP bus too, the holders were holding them.

This is one that I actually found in our VW parts box at home. It is obviously the wrong one, but it holds the visor for now.

I am at a loss one what my holders are supposed to look like? The imprint on the bus looks like the holders I found and they also fit into the holes in the bus. The visors just don't fit into them. I do know that my drivers side is original to the bus ( I do have a replacement for it but haven't switched it yet). The passenger side one is a replacement one, that matches the drivers side I haven't put on yet. I can see it (the replacement passenger side) is a bit different then my original. I believe it came out of a 69 bus.

When I tired to install the driver side holder, I broke it because I put to much pressure on it while trying to get the screwdriver to get to the screw. The visors "rod" sticks to far into the hole to get to the screw easily. The same thing happens with the passenger side. I can't get to the screws once I get the visor in the holder. I can't put the holder in first then push the visor in because the holder breaks. Did that with the first holder I scored some time back.

Here are some pics of the visors.

Driver side

Passenger side. This one is out of the 69 bus. I will be putting the drivers side out of the 69 on my bus later on.

Here you can really see the difference in them.

So the question is, what holders do my visors take? I should say, what style does that passenger side visor take? Can I even use that visor in a 70 bus and still find holders to fit it and the bus?

Ok, I was previewing my post when I noticed the passenger side visor looks like it will come down and block the rear view mirror. That means the driver side will probably be the same, so it appears I won't be able to use these visors. Good thing I saved the original passenger side out of my bus. LOL That's a bummer though because the wrong passenger side one has a mirror and my original doesn't! LOL

 

[ib-bus]

The visor on the right is for a '68 or early '69 bus and will block your view , '68 and early '69 buses had a longer neck mirror.

Bus is looking good 8)

Juan.

 

[justcruzin]

The visor on the right is for a '68 or early '69 bus and will block your view , '68 and early '69 buses had a longer neck mirror.

Bus is looking good 8)

Juan.

Yah, I didn't even put the 2 together till I put the pics in the post and previewed it. Just shows that I never have tried to put the passenger side down since I installed it. LOL

Bummer too though because now I loose that cool little mirror. :? Oh well, I would rather see out the rear view then to see myself. LOL I don't plan on being on that side too often anyway. I'm the bus driver! LOL Guess I will have to go clean my original visor.

Does anyone have a picture of the correct holders for the visors for a 70 bus?

 

[justcruzin]

One more thing got checked off my list of things I want done to the bus.

Today the step kid came over and changed the rear quarter window. That was no fun at all! Oh, and the beloved Bentley didn't help on taking the wing window apart. LOL Luckily we had a friend over that knew how to get them apart and explained how to do it.

Here is my old one.

I had a good donor one, but my lovely 8 megapixel iPhone camera took another lousy pic. Actually, after proof reading, I noticed the camera focused on the glass and the reflection in it. You can can make out part of the license plate. LOL

We reinstalled the wing window and couldn't figure out why the bottom had such a big gap. Played with it for a while and finally gave up and started to reinstall the big glass.

Kind of hard to see in the pics, but there is a gap in the corner.

After fighting with the big glass for about an hour, taking breaks, then going back at it, we finally got it in. Now there is no gap in the wing window.

We fought and fought that darn window. Everyone's hands were hurting from smacking it and pulling and pushing. Hubby finally found the tool to get it in. LOL

:shock: Yah, I was shocked. Even told him he was brave to be using it. It did get the job done so I can't complain. I wasn't to worried about breaking the glass though, I knew I had a spare. LOL

We get it all done and the step kid was trying to make the wing window open and close a bit easier and pulled on the knob to try to close the window. That was a mistake and I knew it was going to happen before it did, but couldn't get the words out of my mouth fast enough, it pulled right off. What made this really bad was we had just rebuilt it's frame because it had the good latch with the knob, so it was kind of a disappointment when he pulled and broke it. He ended up taking it apart and figuring out how to fix it. So a little JB weld later, it is now back on. Just letting the JB weld set up, then I will put the cap back on.

So that is one less window rubber to have to change! Next will be the windshield. Just need to have get hubby convinced into tackling that. I'm sure there is going to be some rust issues. This is an old pic., but you can see how bad the rubber is and see some of the rust.

I'm hoping to get the windshield done in the next month or so. I really want to be able to drive it on non sunny days too. LOL

 

[creationblue]

Hi

I have just rebuilt my 1/4 window, its a pain in the ass :lol: still, glad to see that the hard bit is still to come in fitting the damn thing!!!!! Think i'll get myself a sledge and a spare pane of glass..... :lol:

Good work

Just

 

[madness]

hi its al from the 1970 bus that needs the lower screen repair.....cool bus kim......cant believe you was moving it about with a fork lift lol.....looks like its coming back to life....i could do with anew indicator arm how much did they rush for that.....spk soon al

 

[dubscum]

great progress on a lovely bus, plus a large hammer is the best tool for fixing

 

[justcruzin]

Thanks you guy's!!

Actually that was the forklift that was at the scrapyard that I found the bus at. I was really worried about it tipping into the lift,, but luckily it didn't. Even though it did do some damage to the lower part of the bus, but not to bad.

I asked our glass person to order the windshield so hopefully we will be tackling that project soon. Then I should be able to drive it in the rain too!

 

[justcruzin]

I finally have a small update. I have been driving the bus back and forth to work for the last two nights. I leave for work at 11pm. So it is dark and cold. Because I have no headliner in my bus yet, I have no dome light. Makes it kind of hard to put my stuff in the bus in the dark and do other pre flight stuff. So today I decided to try to hook up a temporary dome light. I pilfered through my VW parts boxes and found a dome light. Only problem is, it only has 2 hook ups and I have 3 wires hanging down from the roof. I hooked it up and got it to come on, but I thought I broke it in the process. It kind of rotated when I tried to plug the wire in. Figured out that it is how it turns off and on. Never saw one like this before. LOL Anyway, I couldn't seem to get it to work with the doors. So I took the door switch apart and bingo that was the problem. One the wires had fallen off. Got all that cleaned up and reconnected and I am good to go. I now have a dome light!!

I also decided to try adding the other fresh air tube to the blower fan. Previously I only had one side hooked up, but it just doesn't seem like it is heating the inside up to well.

If it works I plan on cleaning it up a bit by switching how it is connected so I can kind of hide the seam!

I also tackled the doors today. The passenger had to roll down the window to get out. So I took the panel off and lubed everything. That did the trick. Passenger can now exit via pulling the inside door handle. The windows are all nice and lubed now too so that is another project checked off the list.

I still need to put the door panels back on so I can't test my heater out tonight. I will put it all back together tomorrow and hopefully I will have better heat and easier windows to roll up and down. That and my passenger can get out on their own.

 

[gninnam]

Looking good 8)

What blower are you using for heat??

 

[justcruzin]

Looking good 8)

What blower are you using for heat??

Thanks.

The blower fan is just a little one that my hubby found. We thought it would fit nicely in the engine bay. It does, but I'm not sure if it is going to be strong enough to heat the bus how I would like it too. Time will tell.

Here's a better pic of it.

It has a high and low, but I have it rigged to be on high only right now and it just doesn't seem to blow as much as I would like it too. It may be do to plugged air ducts though. That is going to be my next thing to tackle. That and make sure all the connections on the air ducts are air tight.

It's weird that I can get pretty decent air out of the two center defrost holes in the dash, but I don't get very much out of the 2 side vents. When I flip the lever to make the air go out the "foot" vents, it seems I barely get any air at all. Strange since you would think that because the air has less to travel in, it would be more then the defrost vents.

I had a lot of rat crap and shells in the bus when I first got it and I never even thought of checking the air ducting. Well except for I did check both of the corner areas of the metal duct under the dash. There was very little debri in those spots. I don't have any nasty smells from the heater air so I don't think this is any kind of major issue, but I better check just in case.

 

[madness]

hi have you fitted idicator arm yet badly need a pic of the wiring close up my wires have come off and dont no were abouts they need fixing back on

 

[justcruzin]

Ok, not sure how much help this is going to be but here it goes!

My brown wires look to be soldered to the copper thing, The solid brown is soldered to the top of it and the brown with white strip is soldered to the inside side of it, looking at the back of the switch holding the arm in your hand, it is on the left hand side.

I have a black white and green wire that is soldered right behind the black and red wire.

Hope that helped!!

 

[madness]

thats great many thanks dude

 

[justcruzin]

Yesterday I finally got my original parking lamps back on the sides of the bus.

Went from this,

To this,

I also put my belly pan back on and thanks to Bentley, got my horn working!! There was about 4 inches of the hot wire missing, that was the problem.

I'm pushing to get the windshield done now. Keep throwing the hints to hubby about it. I also told my glass person I was ready for the windshield, so once we get that I think it will be easier to persuade him to get started on it. The glass will be in the way! LOL Once that is done I am hoping it will be leak proof and I can drive it in rainy weather too.

Slowly but surely it is getting there!!

 

[madness]

your doing a cracking job keep up the good work..

 

[gninnam]

^^WHS^^

Thinking of crating my bus up and shipping it over to you to get mine finished :mrgreen:

Keep up the good work

 

[justcruzin]

thats great many thanks dude

Your welcome and that Dudette! LOL

 

[justcruzin]

^^WHS^^

Thinking of crating my bus up and shipping it over to you to get mine finished :mrgreen:

Keep up the good work

LOL, Thanks for the compliments! I have to admit, I do love working on my bus. Sad thing is, I got it second. Got my new to me 66 bug first and kind of slacked off on it when I got the bus. Maybe I can ship my bug to you and I can do your bus! LOL