[VW1302RSi]

Well this weekend I had my second failure (read break down) since doing my conversion, the first failure was caused by brain fade in the design of my fuel system, I concluded as Subaru only have a fuel filter at the engine and not at the tank I would do the same, 1- I forgot that Subaru have a strainer sock at the tank and 2- After steam cleaning the tank to clean it before welding the fuel pick up in, may just cause it to rust if I refit the tank and don’t fill it up for 6 months, so my first major break down was with in 2 weeks and cost me a new fuel pump.

So a few weeks ago we decided to go over to Martinborough in the Wairarapa for a night away somewhere nice,,,,,,,,, ok I had nothing to do with it- my wife decided, how ever I managed to convince my mate and his wife to join us as well. Well we went over Saturday just gone the trip over the hill was ok, managed to leave my mate behind in his beetle, not his fault, I managed to jump a few more cars than him , including the slowest car on the road that day, so after a few stops to check out the craft shops yawn, have coffee, find lunch it was time to check in to the motel, very nice girls were happy, more coffee and after noon reading yawn the boys were bored so of we went for a drive in my car.

We headed off towards the cost in search of some nice driving roads, were we in luck, after 2 minutes we were flat out in four and I mean flat out, she would not go any faster, typical VW you say well, in her defence there was a head wind and it was slightly up hill, I couldn’t quite get the Speedo needle to touch the back of the needle stop, it just sat over the generator light.

That is were it all went wrong I suggested that on the way back my mate could take a video of the Speedo etc, well a few miles up the road during some lovely hills and turns we found out that the car was too low, thru a series of “S”sss
I was hard on the brakes turning slightly to the right getting ready to turn in, as I crossed over the centreline and the camber of the road and started to turn in then there was this awful scraping noise as we bottomed out, After a quick look in the mirror I could see a cloud of blue smoke,
A quick look at the gauges and I still had oil pressure?,
It was like tyre smoke?, but then I hadn’t locked a wheel?,
Then there was a bit of white smoke?,
All very confusing until another check in the mirror showed this dark line following us up the road, we quickly pulled over and found that we hadn’t holed the sump but we had ground the right hand side cooling pipe and hose on the road, the blue smoke was the rubber hose skidding along the ground, the white smoke was the coolant on the exhaust. From the time we touched the road to we stopped it must have been less than 20 seconds, and 70 meters.

After some cursing and then thanking the gods it wasn’t the sump, or that we hadn’t spun in the coolant, we cobbled up a repair and toped her up with the 1L water I carried for such an emergency, it dawned on me later that this was a waste of time as she holds over 10Ls of coolant and there was at least 6L of that on the road.
So off we coasted down hill looking for a farm or a puddle, we passed a few puddles but I wasn’t quite prepared just then to fill her with that ****e, I’d rather drink it than put it in my car, then a farm and we were saved, well after convincing the farmer I wasn’t taking the piss and did need water for my old Volkswagen Beetle. We filled her to the brim with this brownish rain water that was only slightly cleaner than the puddles, well at least it didn’t have lumps in it, we bleed her up it was back to the motel to explain why we took so long, effect a less cobbled up repair and try and get the smell of coolant off me, so we could have a nice dinner with the girls, So after all it wasn’t the sump that was the problem, well so far it wasn’t. It’s now time to repair it correctly and build a front skid tray that will keep me out from under the wife’s feet for a few days.

Scott