Na, it was stripped. Any contraband would have been confiscated by Scotty B

Today I took a few hours to install the gas tank and to cut out the battery tray. I need to take the camera with me tomorrow as this took time and is boring as hell to read about without pics

I need to go do some work in the garage still. My time-sert kit showed up

Some pics from work completed today.
Work is still being completed, as Mike is out there still...

Evil loves his bus. REALLY loves his bus.


Zach's used car lot...


Theo and the EvilBus.

(this is my new computer background too. )

Zach

Yesterday, I attempted to install my flex plate onto my crank with the 6 special bolts I bought only to find out that one of the bolts was the wrong size. On a Sun, I was SOL. So, I decided to try to install my alternator. This required me to get a socket head bolt as there is no room for a socket on the inboard bolt. Of course, Zach doesnt have any standard hex keys that I could use so I gave up and went to Joe's for some food.

Today I tried to rectify the bolt situation and to get a few odds and ends at the corvair junk yard (Corvair ranch). No problem, I got the right bolt, some intake gaskets that I will need, measured a stock dip stick to mark my aftermarket one correctly, and got a few small free pieces. Feeling triumphant, I head over to Zach's to finally assemble my tranz, torque converter and engine together......or so I thought. I get the flex plate on and go to pick up my TC only to see that one of the three special captive nuts was missing (damnit!). Defeated again. So, I will be going out to the yard again tomorrow.....1 hour there, 1 hour to Zach's, 1 hour to home. Good thing I am unemployed.

So, since I had some newly free time I decided to remove Zach's tranz, clutch and flywheel to install the o-ring on the flywheel Zach forgot. Then I installed the flywheel and clutch, then I installed the squirrel cage, fan belt, tensioned it, installed the front tin, transmission, and then installed the whole works in the car. At least his engine and tranz is out of my way now More room for me to attempt working on mine.

With any luck, we will be attempting to install the engine into the bus this Sat. The next hard part I see is the creation of the special engine tin from the corvair engine to the bus.

Nice work Mike. Keep it up. You will get it done in no time and get to enjoy it finally.

Damn!! I was so tired when I got home from class last night I did not even look.

I took a sick day to day to let allergy meds start working. Yesterday my eyes literally started swelling shut... Guess all the rain last month put my spring allergies off till summer...


I see no reason why not. With the engine in, we can make templates from cardboard, and then either make tin from 24 guage steel, or get fancy and have them made from fiberglass. Pick up a nibbler from Harbor Freight, and we will be able to make nice cuts in 24g all day long. I don't have a flanger, but we can make one easy enough if we keep our flanges to 5 or six inches long. Just weld some steel bars to a pair of vice-grips. Easy!

Zach

I have the stock bus tin we can start with and will be picking up the stock outer tin for the corvair engine today as it looks like a better starting point (all flat).

Tonight we (by we, I mean that I made dinner and solved Evil's engine binding issue while Evil did all the work) got the transmission mated to the engine, got the starter on, the belt on... Sucker is ready to get bolted into the bus!





Zach

Damn that thing looks rad!

Chrome alternator... nice touch. I don't even have that in the Corvette.

I could care less that it is chrome, it is a 100A alt vs the stock 30A unit

I was thinking of getting a Powermaster alternator for the Corvette, thinking that my stereo was depleting the battery... but after I had the starter rebuilt, the battery drain problem went away, so I'm still running the generic auto-parts-store alternator in the Shark.

You gotta admit, though, chrome is cool.

Well, ya. I mean, I dont hate that it is chrome

I get to drive the bus on Saturday right??

or at least Zachs car

is there anything drivable in that yard???

Zachs new riding lawn mower

I really love that fan setup. To bad you couldn't make something like that using a 911 fan alternator setup. Make the engine looks slick as can be. Sure I have seen it done but not sure if anyone makes a kit.

I like the way you used the old George Forman gilles . No really I like the valve covers.

Maybe my car. We will be running the engine for break in of the new cam, and balancing carbs and setting timing.

When that is done, assuming nothing breaks and we have good oil pressure, we should be able to drive the car.


Or, yeah, we can play with my riding mower.
Zach

Corvair engines are cool. I really like the down the middle fan arrangement. The bus will giddy-up and go with a Corvair engine. What induction are you using for the engine?

This one uses triple carbs, I think they are webers. Estimated HP is about 275.

I am using a Holley 4bbl 390 cfm carb on an adapter with a Holley dial-a-mile electrically adjustable jet system I need to get an O2 meter so I can adjust my jets more precisely on the fly

My engine is 3.1L since I used 2.0L Type I p/c from a VW. It will move the bus and did not cost me an arm and a leg.

--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(scotty b @ Apr 9 2008, 06:42 PM) </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
End result will be something along these lines
[/quote]
Well I was right there with you - until I saw this. I still wish I had my '69 camper bus that had that same interior. I guess I'm a bit of a purist when it comes to split-window and bay-window busses. Last night I stumbled upon "Pimp My Ride" and saw what they did to a split-window. I just about puked.

Edit - Oops! I'm late the party as usual and didn't look to see how long this project has been going on. I like the paint. Looks real nice. You mentioned a camper top - it's a long way to Arizona, but I've got a free top from a 77 Westy if you want it!

Thanks, Ernie. I already have a top waiting at Scotty's. As soon as the bus is able to drive to VA on its own, it will be worthy of the extra work needed to put the top on. Scott was smart to stop where he did thus creating that inherent requirement

Today was very productive I had to modify the front mount a little more to get the drive train more forward so the starter would miss the rear cross bar, and my engineering actually worked! Now the engine in where it will live and is ready for the tin and engine bar to be mocked up after the exhaust is hung.

First is the plate I made to utilize the newer stock front mount on my bus. The mount setup originally had the spacers shown. They turned out to be to big and I had to shorten everything up so the starter would clear the cross bar. Arrows depict the space I shortened.
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Engine on approach
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Engine under bus
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Under bus 2
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Engine rising using my patent pending cinder block engine elevation system
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Here is a pic of the starter clearance issue. You can see the nose cone of the solenoid on the left where it can interfere with the cross bar.
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Here is the front mount mounted after I modified it for the last time
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Engine up under driver side
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More under pics
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Engine in! Sort of
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Ta da! This is where it will stay as it can not go any further up as the bell housing hits the rear frame bar.
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Bell housing bar interference.
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I may attempt to modify the front mount one more time to place the mount higher on the plate and lower the front so the engine may be able to sit a little higher. I need to compare with the pics I have of other conversions.

It looks like I can flip the front mount and gain some wiggle room. Tomorrow.

Engine height looks to be about right, though, compared to this excellent example.

SWEEEEEET !! Nice to see this. Soon you and Zaychk will be scooting around Pa in both your rides

I Forsee a problem...

What, you did not actually think we would drive it do you? This is just another installment of my redneck yard art.

Zach

Reverse entropy does not require that it move under its own power, only that all parts eventually be assembled in one lump

We can always put rollers under the cinder blocks

seems like there must be a better starter motor solution.
Given all the conversions that must have happened back in the day, I bet someone figured out how to clock the starter motor to lean the solenoid down at 7 oclock instead of its current position at 11 oclock.

Rich

The starter is a non-issue now. The limiting factor is the contact of the bell housing with the cross brace. There are mini starters for the corvair, but they are like $700, which is fricken ridiculous. By lowering the nose of the tranny, I can raise the rear of the engine a little more.

I kinda doubt that it is going to be an issue either way. Its not going to be an off road vehicle. The rear suspension may need to get beefed up a little though.

Zach

Do you really need that whole cross member?
Could it be modified and beefed up with thicker steel?

This was my thought was well.

Run square tube under the chassis and drop down to weld into the wall. Cut out what does not fit. Bet we could find another inch or so.

Zach

I'll be by later most likely to mess with it. We will see how much more room I can get and what options are available

Anyone can build a stock van, it takes a real man to cut one up.

I have been stuck indoors doing homework, but I heard cutting outside. I suppose I should go take a look-see.

Zach

Bring a camera!

Yup, I flipped the front mount to lower the front of the drive train, cut the eye off of the bell housing (like I am ever going to use a cherry picker with this), and cut the offending metal after determining it was not a structural part of the bus so much as it was a part for the original tranz to hang from. It worked well See for yourself.
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Flipped front mount.
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Yellow arrow is where the eye was for the picker, orange is where the offending metal was removed. It was hard to cut (emotionally), but it had to be done.
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Here is one of the headers mounted.
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I love it when a plan comes together.

Why do you have your headers bolted on facing forward? Don't you want them facing aft? Or does the rest of the exhust go forward and then loop back?

Zach

Ding ding, give that guy a cigar! If I face them aft the opening of the collector is at the same level as my bumper. LOUD. It has to have a 180 U installed. I forgot when talking about the O2 sensor placement. This will make it easier.

Anyway, I just had the most amazing thing happen.

I am eating dinner with the fam, and there is a knock on the door. I see a red shirt and figure it is either Mike coming over to work on the bus, or the Pizza guy forgot something when he dropped off dinner.

I really could not have been more wrong.

Elvis was at my door. No, really. Complete with a pink silk shirt with big collar, unbuttoned to mid chest showing off thick gold chains. His sideburns were superb, though his pompadore was a little long at the back. I went to shake his hand, and Elvis swung his hips and thrust out his arm, practiced to the point of being natural. I was a little thrown by the slightly too tight dockers, but even Elvis wears dockers, right?!

Elvis was REALLY excited. He wanted to buy the bus. He wanted to buy the Evil Bus - RIGHT NOW. He was driving down the road in his beat up pickup (complete with a plywood billboard bolted to the back that stated the he bought property - even Elvis has to work...). Any way, Elvis was driving down the road, a road he said he does not usually travel by, when he saw the Jeep and the Bus. He had to stop. He had to have the bus.

I would like to say that Elvis is also a cat guy. He was thrilled to see two of my cats meowing at him through the window, and went to great lengths to tell me about how he loves cats. It makes sense, really. Elvis always got a lot of pussy.

Anyhow, I gave Elvis the bus tour. He tried to tell me that is name was really Bob Neal, that he would trade his services as a plumber for the bus, but I know its just Elvis's cover.

Elvis then asked if I would be taking the bus to Bug Out in Virginia next month. Sadly, I said I did not think it would be ready yet. Elvis was impressed with the engine swap, but admitted he was not a mechanical guy.

Elvis was also really interested in guys making tricycles out of VWs, but I did not know of any off the top of my head.

I said I needed to get back to dinner with my family, and Elvis understood. He swung his hips, gave me the double finger guns and a hearty "Thank you, thank you very much for taking time to tell me about the bus. God Bless." Elvis got back into his pickup, and drove of into the sunset.

This may be the most amazing encounter that I have had on account of the vehicles in my driveway.

Zach

PS - I really hope the Bus is still here tomorrow morning...

Cliff notes - Elvis stopped by to buy Mikes Bus.