hmmmnz

i was thinking of another leaf, i did it to the old velox with great results (mazda bongo spring) i like the idea of the airbag, but they seem to be massively over priced here in the uk, the us site has them listed for under a quarter the price, not that they have them for the merc, but i can adapt something, thats if they'll ship it to the uk,

any way, any reason i couldnt use a coil over?? in replacement for the standard shock?

i have leafs in the rear, coil springs pffft thats strictly new school

as you know i have the old merc camper,

now this old bus must be at its limits for suspension design, having what i can only assume

is the max weight on it at all times,

any way needless to say it rocks around in the back,

there are air bag systems out there, even extra coil springs that sit between the chassis and the leaf,

is the any reason i couldnt use a coil over unit to replace my existing standard dampeners/shocks?

ok fuck knows what the dampening rates would be or the spring rates added to leafs,

but apart from the obvious would it make a difference, worth buy a cheap set the right-ish size and giving it ago,

i did look at the air bellow suspension but they are about $1000, and thats not even fitted, a quarter of my van budget!! no thanks

well, got my ali back panel back,

lurvly

also had the mrs under the van varnishing all the exposed timber and the bottom layer of ply, fun times for her

also started re-framing the back ready for the panel, and also redoing the glue/silicon on the sides,

pics...

panel

the back ready... almost]

the finished step

the back still looks like shit, but its actually all dry now

and thats today,

i really need to lift the rear on the drivers side about an inch to make it level, before i put in the back,

fuck knows how ill do that, was easy on the other side because i had the hole where the door was and all the timber was new, so had strength, not so the other side oh well something to ponder tonight

after the fursty ferret

if you see that blue moon beer about its well worth getting, its a nice oat beer, very similar to a wheat beer but even creamier

well today was spent ripping out the fucked rear fibre glass panel, reinforcing the floor at the rear, and filling the floor with insulation and then popping the top layer of the floor down,

panel

most of the insulation down and me measuring for the floor reinforcments

floor down and re-inforcements in

beers of the day,

lunch

lovely root/ginger beer, very creamy

and endish of the day

quite nice coconut to taste that evolves in to a malty stout,

well id lie t say ive been really productive... but that would be lying,

how ever some progress has been made

i laid down the first layer of ply

and started putting the internal frame in pace

and made and installed what will be the step

the design of the camper in reguardsto the floors is shite, they never even ran timber or steel from the chassis, so when the floor rotted out the whole body of the van dropped as well, about a inch and a half, which was shit, i had to jack the whole body up around the chassis and add a whole lot more timber to hold it there,

any way from underneath

next job before i put the top layer of ply and floor insulation down is :

rip of the completly fucked rear fibre glass part of the van,

ill make/get made a new panel to replace that section made from sheet alloy and bent to suit

and beer of the day,

hey guys, thought i'd say my good byes,

im off to france for the ski season (running a chalet in the 3 valleys with the mrs)

then crusing around europe in out old school mercedes camper

we bought it about 3 months ago and got the mrs father to pick it up from down in england (shes scottish)

a bit of work and she'll be all good,

my vauxhall velox, and the mighty 150 cutdown vespa have gone to a good mate, brendan who's hung out and raced with the velodrome boys in rotorua, so hopefully he'll keep you guys updated with anything that should happen

and hopefully do a write up on his velo bike build,

he can't spell for shit, but he's a wicked welder and general metal worker,

so any way, take it easy kids,

see you maybe in a few years,

laters, logan

sweet, the vespa is pretty agricultural

hey guys, a mate of mine (brendon) met a couple of you guys some where around taupo a couple of weeks back(some one with a sachs rotary engined bike), and told me about dromageddon, what are the prereqresits for the bike to enter?? obviously no 1000cc sports bikes etc, could i enter my vespa?? nothing about it is standard. not a thing actually now that i think about it, its not exactly fast but might be quite fun

edit : yeah matt chucked thos rims on, it would be nice to have that little extra torque of the smaller 8" wheels,

but with the massive expansion chamber it would scrape every where, plus 8" wheels never feel very stable

as for braking ..... well aided with your feet ... it stops you just have to plan ahead and use the gears

right bitches, its been a while since the vespa had any love,

just got back from my mate (the worlds slowest painter)

fmbwXC0n2fI

good ideas

looking like a container might be a good option, i thinking of wiring a solar panel up with an inverter and a dehumidifier, might be a bit of overkill

let the search begin,

shame they don't have a similar thing in the north island,

im probably leaving it a bit late to build a garage on a spare bit of land we have in taupo didnt really think ahead,

mmm container might be the go

if you want to sell, a mate in auckland is looking for a bucket project,

hey guys,

im heading off to france at the end of the year for a season skiing

and then around europe for a couple of years,

im not wanting to sell old velox or my little cut down vespa,

(all other cars and bikes are going to get sold) but i want to keep those 2 if i can,

is there any where about that does cheap storage, preferably that would start up the old girl and take her for a run once in a while??

dont really want to pay $100 a month if i can avoid it,

fair enough,

as far spacers, just buy nylon as a long rod from most engineering suppliers (or use 50mm square tube steel)

cut appropiate size, drill hole, get 50mm longer bolts,

undo body bolts, undo steering from box,

then lift the body up, away from the chassis, making sure you dont catch any wires etc,

insert spacers, bolts etc,

and do up,

you may need to extend the steering part,

but not always, i didnt have to on a safari i lifted,

even if you do its not a major,

remove the steering from the 2 universal joints, cut in half and weld in a small section, re-connect,

all in its quite an easy job, but you'll need a couple of mates and a few hours, have a search on youtube there must be some vids on there

the body lift is the only way to go on a wagon with torsion bars,

(obviously not the only way) but by far and away the least hassle with the least amount of repercussions, i did a 3 inch lift on my delica, that didn't have the ability to do a body lift, so it was torsion bars, arm spacers, ball joint spacers, gear box and engine spacers, longer shackles, longer shocks, modified leafs,

compared to 6 or 8 nylon blocks, its a no brainer, plus spacers don't fuck with the ride at all,

if it was me personally, i'd ditch the wellside, and make a wooden flat deck.

flat decks are awesome

its a complete guess, but i'd say you can,

you'd obviously have to remove the cams etc to get to it,

and undo the vibration damper thing,

well you can on motorbikes any way (where most of my mechanical knowledge really lies)

edit: went for a look for timing chain images... looks very different

yeah, i got it off matt, great guy, certainly knows his stuff

the exhaust was a bodge-together special,

so loud its obnoxious it does come on the pipe but not untill quite high up the rev range, doesnt help with the 10" wheels either,

in its former cut down life, it was by far and away the dodgiest 2 wheeled thing i have ever ridden, frame used to flex like you wouldnt believe, and the dampener is buggered so dives under braking

still pretty funny on the motorway cruising past cars,

paint is done....

dun dun dun

tomorrow ill put all the cabling in place, along with the wiring, ande hopefully fit the front end, and if all goes well ill pop the engine back in after i strip down the top end.

here is the almost finished result

]stage 3,

primer down, and i think i have picked up most of the little chips and nicks etc, so should be good to lay down the first layer of colour tonight

heres the pics

as you can see the under side of the vespa is black,

ive used a hard wearing but flexible chassis paint that hopfully will do the job of protecting the exposed areas from chips etc, it dents but doesnt chip or flake

the rest is just filled and primed

i have cut a new floor and welded it in place

i also re-inforced the floor

its mostlty just spoted in place

on both sides,

except for the very front where its welded right the way down the seam

ok ill post all in 1 big hit, and follow up in the next few weeks,

a mate borrowed it for a bit, and dinged up the old girl so she has had a panel beat and is away getting repainted by a pro.... not me and my rattle can glory,

as you can see, its had a pretty rough life and has been cut down,

a bit of a fad in the late 80's,

so thats the bad, the good is the engine has had extensive work done, porting, the the crank intake has been modified, and she runs pretty damn well breathing through the 200cc carb,

its also been fitted with a custom expansion chamber, and 10" wheels to give her a bit of clearance,

any way, the wee vespa will never be an original scoot again, so there is no point even trying to make it so,

but i will give her a complete strip down and try and give it a bit of normalcy again,

strip down, take 1

some one has cut of the side panel, so the engine is always exposed now

engine out (less than 30mins)

what they had to do to fit the larger engine in.

its to push the shock back wards so it doesnt hit the engine, ill come up with a better method

and front end off

all the cables out

and done!!

so thats stage 1

beaten to it, but sounds like a sticky acellerator pump inside the carb,

never had to work on su carbs before so don't even know if they have internal pumps

undo the bar that links the glow plugs together and test the resistance with your multi meter, it should only be 3-5 ohms between terminal and earth, if its infinity then your glow plug is buggered, it only takes 1 dodgy plug to make em hard to start

both those links were over priced,

you hardly need the controller, set the flow rate with a pot or run full noise,(all sorts of motor controllers out there, even a plc is cheaper than that fan controller unit)

have a electric fan running on a thermostat,