Autopendium :: stuff about old cars

Tags: bus volkswagen vw

So my major problem on the Shasta Snow Trip was my distributor. For one reason or another, the spark was just not advancing at all. And when spark does not advance, well, everything is just a bit retarded.

In the tiny town (and town is being generous) of Kettenpom, CA, we swapped the stock distributor for a 009 (mechanical advance) distributor and timed it as best we could. It definitely improved the performance of the bus for the rest of the trip.

But what exactly was the problem? Well, initial inspection on the road showed that the vacuum line was a little cracked and it's certainly possible that we were losing vacuum pressure. Once I got home and into a cozy driveway with lots of tools and light, I took apart the stock distributor and found that the vacuum bits work just fine, but everything was dirty, worn, and generally in need of replacing. So my dad and I replaced the bits and bobs, reinstalled the original distributor, set the timing and everything seemed just fine! Hooray, we're good to go!

And things were good...for a couple days. This past Monday, I am driving home from Amber's new apartment and making a very gentle grade up a hill and I swear I had to downshift to second and pull over to let traffic by!

Holy crap! It's like I was back to square one with everything. I figured the dizzy was bad and I should swap in a spare 009 that we had in my dad's garage. So I headed over and we pulled the stock dizzy again, put new parts in the 009, installed it, set and reset the timing at least three times, and man-oh-man the powerband was back in force!

But something was a little different. The distributor clamp sat a little differently. And we deduced that there really wasn't anything wrong with the distributor, but with how we installed it last. We suspect that the distributor was only seated enough to just engage the cam shaft (or whatever it engages) but loose enough that over time it would come out of adjustment and start running like crap again.

My reaction was this: "Well, the 009 is in now. I really don't feel like taking it out...again!...and messing with it, so the vacuum advance one is the spare!"

And so far the bus seems to be doing fine. I still have that exhaust leak, but another tightening of the clamp or a new clamp should fix it.

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