Due to arrive soon

Started by 94touring, August 07, 2020, 01:46:39 PM

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94touring

I'll open it if going slow but definitely not at highway speeds.

94touring

Day 2 completed.  Highest temp today was 82.  Went from about 2500 feet up to 7100.  Some areas 55mph was all she had.

MiniDave

So, where are you tonight? Do you hotel it on your travel nights so you can get a shower and a cool night's sleep?
Complete failure at retirement

1989 Cooper Racing Green
2009 Clubman S
2014 Audi Allroad

94touring

Staying in Pinedale Wyoming tonight.  Could have easily made it the whole way to Yellowstone today but didn't want to feel rushed. We can take our time getting up there in the morning. Using hotel points since I collect them at work.

94touring

#479
Just got home after 3500 maintenance free miles!  Well one maintenance item, the left rear driving bulb needed twisted a smidge to make contact.  Today was an ass kicker at about 13 hours driving time with about 9 of that in 100-105 degree weather.  Stopped into Longmont Colorado for a mini door for this one customer car at my shop, then swung down to Aurora to get flares for Dave.  This was the first big trip with accurate cylinder head temp gauge hooked up under #2 plug while the other was left in #3 for comparison purposes.  Engine runs cool, real cool for a bus.  325-335 was it most of the trip loaded up hauling butt.  Today at 105 degrees into wind and rolling hills was the test.  With a tailwind 335-345 was normal. Into the wind 355-365 at 65mph was all she had in her, before oil temps began to run 230ish.  Head temps can run 350-375 all day long so the vw experts say.  I'll probably toss a small oil cooler on for the next trek across the midwest in the summer to keep oil temps under 220-230. What did help was drafting behind semis.  65mph chugging along at 355 degrees on the head, then getting behind a truck passing me, I'd get up to 71-75mph and head temps would come down to 335 again with oil temps hanging in that 230 range.  If the truck took an exit with those headwinds in this heat it was back to 65mph.  I was severely loaded up with gear though too.  Gas mileage wise once I got to the mountains I averaged 20.5mpg.  Headed west to the mountains was an abysmal 13mpg and east 15mpg.

BruceK

Wow, I had no idea aircooled VW head temperatures went that high.  Good quality oil must be a great engine saver.
1988 Austin Mini
2002 MINI Cooper S
1992 Toyota LiteAce (JDM)
1997 Jeep Wrangler Sahara

94touring

Quote from: BruceK on July 14, 2022, 09:02:29 PM
Wow, I had no idea aircooled VW head temperatures went that high.  Good quality oil must be a great engine saver.

They say 400 is peak for minimal spurts and beyond that your valves start to drop. Running vr1 synthetic!  So I wasn't too concerned with 230 temps. 

94touring

#482
Also, the 200ah lithium battery was a real beast!  The routine was wake up relatively early, make coffee with the 1500 watt electric tea kettle, maybe run a toaster depending what I was cooking, charge phones, run interior rope lights if it was still dark, and at 8am when generators were allowed, begin to charge the battery.  Usually charged it for about an hour in the morning before heading out for the day, and then again for 2-3 hours in the evening. Running the fridge with it about 20 hours a day except for when the generator was going. Additional string lights would be going in the evening after 8pm when generators weren't allowed.  So the battery really did a lot of work.  Charge time math revealed most days the battery used 30% of it's capacity.  Occasionally 35% if I got ambitious with the tea kettle.  It ran the fridge for two days on the way home without being charged up. 

94touring

#483
Did a few random things on the bus today.  First on the list was removing the electric signal unit to the electric speedometer.  It picks up it's signal from the mechanical line that runs off the front left wheel.  The problem has been the needle bounces even after changing cables and something funky is up with the sender where I never could get it to read consistently.  One day fast next day slow.  So after much aggravation bought a gps sensor to wire into the electric speedometer.  End result is it works perfectly!  I had 4 wires to choose from on the old sending unit and 3 on the gps unit depending on what pulse per mile you go with.  I managed to guess the right combination on the first attemp so it went quickly. 

Next was remove the old cylinder head temp gauge that wasn't accurate and move the air fuel gauge into it's spot.  After that was move the new accurate cylinder temp gauge from the bottom of the dash to the top, using a gauge holder that sticks to the dash. Now it's right there for me to watch without looking down between the steering wheel and turn indicator.

Final thing for the day was went ahead and installed the extra small oil cooler. Took some looking around for the best location and ended up beside the other oil cooler, which meant it was at least easy to run lines between the two.  It was 101 degrees on the way home.  It took me doing 80mph into wind, camping gear still on the roof rack for next months trip, for a period of time before it would start to come up on 220 degrees. 

jeff10049

What a great trip the head and oil temps make me think (you too I'm sure) of small airplanes either waiting on it to get hot enough or pulling power/richen mixture and waiting on it to get cool.
What was your favorite part of Yellowstone? Its such a cool place with so much to see it takes more than one trip I think.  I really like the grand canyon of Yellowstone and I think it's the mammoth area where the minerals look like a staircase. And of course, the wildlife is great.

94touring

Mammoth was really cool.  My favorite spot was grand prismatic springs. We hit the entire place hard for a whole week and saw what felt like 500 geysers and springs.  With the floods the previous few weeks closing it down, and then days before we were scheduled to stay there they opened it all back up.  Which meant a lot less tourist, easy parking, short lines, little traffic.  I did see a number of vw vanagons and one split window bus.  They all waved and were excited to see another bus on the road.  In the afternoon drives back to camp when it was hot outside, I'd open the safari front baywindow.  Doing 45-50mph with wind in the face felt pretty good.

94touring

Well sad day in VW bus world. Left Tulsa this morning around 5am headed to our annual camping trip in Estes Colorado and the transaxle cut loose in Burlington Colorado.  Locked up pretty good.  Was able to probably burn my clutch up getting it off the road where I'm waiting for a tow to Hays Kansas to get a rental car to then go get my truck and trailer. 

gr8kornholio

That blows and that's a long tow.  I know that route well.  Driving from Winfield Ks to colo springs in college.
I am the GR8KORNHOLIO! Are you threatening me?

Saussie Aussie 1965 Australian MK1 Mini.
"Beavis" - 07 MY/MY MCS, B/MY Konig Daylites, JCW sideskirts, TSW springs, TSW lower rear control arms -- Exploring the country with new friends since 11/09.

94touring

Rental cars seems to be scarce.  And since we're in BFE no sign of the tow driver either.  Jen took a pic of me looking things over, but really I was just down there lightly sobbing.

cstudep

#489
I have family in the Goodland area. I could hit them up and see if they have any suggestions maybe? There used to be a dealership in Goodland you could rent a car at, not sure if its still there or not.

94touring

Right now I'm offering 500 bucks plus gas to anyone that can get me to Tulsa.  The tow fell through and there aren't rental cars here.

cstudep

I'll hit up my cousin and see if he has any suggestions.  Is there a way to get a uhaul truck and tow dolly or something maybe?

94touring

We found a person to come get us. I looked at a u haul but it's a little on the pricey side.  Just a triple A tow 175 miles was going to be over 1k, and that's with the first 100 miles free!  Then I still have to get a hotel and a rental car.  Yeah so this sucks. 

Meanwhile this is where we're at and we found this bowling alley.  Looks pretty sketchy from the outside!

cstudep

Dang that is high! So you have someone coming to get you to take you back to Tulsa? That is a whole lot of driving and that totally sucks for sure.

I have a cousin in Colby that has a few small planes although I think most of them are crop dusters so that doesn't help much either LOL.

They put in a prison there in Burlington a few years back, that town was always a little sketchy when I was growing up and my cousin says it's not gotten better with the addition of the prison.

He did say there is a place called The Dish Room, good food and cold beer.

94touring

Yeah the prison closed down. They went from a population of 4500ndown to 2500. 

I reached out to a friend with a plane but he's out in his RV somewhere out west.

cstudep

From what I understand from my cousin most of the boost in population was due to prisoner family members moving in, so it wasn't exactly an ideal growth model. But I am sure a lot of it was jobs being lost too which always sucks.

Just wish I was close enough I could help you out more. But it's probably about as far from me to you as it is from you to Tulsa. Only familiar with the area since I spent most of the summers of my youth at my grandparents place in Goodland. I don't get out that way much anymore.

MiniDave

Man, this sucks.......old cars are just no damn good, as Clancy says!  ::)
Complete failure at retirement

1989 Cooper Racing Green
2009 Clubman S
2014 Audi Allroad

BruceK

Geez. That sucks. Sorry that happened.
1988 Austin Mini
2002 MINI Cooper S
1992 Toyota LiteAce (JDM)
1997 Jeep Wrangler Sahara

94touring

I'm going to log 30 hours of driving in the past 48 hours.

MiniDave

BTDT, got the T-shirt............ and it is not fun!

You'll feel better once it's back at the shop tho.....
Complete failure at retirement

1989 Cooper Racing Green
2009 Clubman S
2014 Audi Allroad