I've been dreaming for a long time about driving a vehicle from USA to South America (I'm from Argentina). I wanted to ask three questions:
1) Do you know of any books, travel logs, etc. about this trip? The only book I know of is "Road Fever". I know that many people have done this before, but I haven't been able to find any travel logs about their experiences.
2) If I decided to try this trip on a VW bus, what model year(s) do you think would be most appropriate? I need a vehicle that will be very reliable, that can stand up to hot weather, easy to repair, etc.
3) Is there any other aircooled VW message board where I should also ask these questions?
The simple answer is that you can't. The Pan-American Highway isn't quite as 'pan' as the politicians would like us to believe since there is no road through the Darian Gap (ie, between Panama and Columbia). Even worse, as of two years ago the vehicle ferry is no longer running.
Thanks Bob for the reply. I wasn't planning on putting the car on a ferry, but rather to ship it in a container from Panama to Ecuador. I wouldn't want to drive through Colombia anyway.
Hey Bob, I wasn't sure you were still posting to Newsgroups. Anyway I lost your notes on how to convert a VW 1600 SP engine to run on 2 and compress air on the other two. I'm also interested in how to regulate the air pressure.
Harbor Freight sells a belt driven 10KW generator head that I would like to run off the same engine. The idea is to be able to weld and run air tools wherever I need to. Do you think 2 cylinders of a single port
1600 would be able to compress air and have enough power left to run the generator?
CONTROL of the modified VW air compressor (or that based on any othe engine) has nothing to do with the conversion. Indeed, I didn't bother to address that issue when I explained how to do the conversion since I assumed everyone would use one of the several standard methods.
On the supply side you don't regulate the air pressure, you simply turn the delivery of compressed air on or off. A pressure sensor (which you adjust) determines when. The system can be purely mechanical (which is the most common), pneumatic or even electric, but they all work on the same principle.
The basic idea is that when the pressure reaches the HIGH set-point it trips an actuator that closes the throttle AND opens an un-loader valve. When that happens the engine drops back to an idle and the air being compressed by cylinders 2 & 4 is allowed to escape rather than being pumped into the receiver, which is fitted with a non-return valve.
As the pressure in the receiver falls it will eventually hit the LOW set-point, causing the actuator to open the throttle and close the unloader valve, causing the output of the pumping cylinders to be delivered to the receiver.
As complicated as all that may sound, in purely mechanical systems the task is usually accomplished with a single, fairly inexpensive valve. Since this sort of thing has been in common use since before the turn of the LAST century, the valves, solenoids, actuators or what-have-you
-- depending on which method you want to use -- are commonly available. Check your Yellow Pages for air compressor repair shops and give them a call. (Or just tear into any gasoline-powered air compressor and examine the control mechanism.)
Regulation on the demand side is the same as with any other air compressor. The air in the receiver is fed to a manually adjustable pressure regulator.
The realistic output of half of a 1600 engine is only 12 to 16hp running on gasoline and as much as 25% less when running on natural gas or propane. (And don't even ask about this political 'E85' shit they're pushing nowadays. [I wonder how long it will take the dummies to figure out that the biggest producer of alcohol is owned by Exxon :-)] )
No generator is 100% efficient; you gotta put in more hp in torque than you can take out in electricity. An honest 10kW will need 16 to 20hp, depending on the ambient temp and method of coupling (ie, belts vs gears, etc.). However, if you read the fine print you'll probably find your "10kW" isn't, except for momentary peaks.
Even though your engine is only producing power on two cylinders it still has all the 'overhead' of a four-banger. That is, the engine is still pumping cooling air and delivering pressurized oil, probably generating enough electricity for its own igntion, and so on. Even at an idle that overhead amounts to about 3hp... and about twice that at full throttle.
(Ideally, with that amount of overhead and only two cylinders, the flywheel mass should be about 4x greater than stock.)
A VW engine makes a dandy high-output air compressor. Cheap, too, assuming you have a shop full of junked VW engines and know how to twirl a wrench. But don't be mislead by the advertising hype regarding the VW's power. Read the specs closely. The most powerful carburetted Type I developed only 57hp @ 4400 rpm... and then only for a couple of minutes under 'Standard Day' conditions. After that, thermal limitations take over, leaving you with a sturdy, reliable 45bhp or thereabouts. Exceed those thermal limitations and you'll be giving the thing a valve job every couple of months.
-Bob Hoover
PS -- My little Hobart migger runs just fine behind a 1.5kW generator.
I tried googling it last night and I couldn't find it. I'll try again and juggle the search terms.
I didn't think it was going to be so easy as buying a regulator.
Thanx that's all good info. I have a 220v 150 amp welder. I know the
10k generator is more than I need but it's also the only generator unit that I've found so far that's sold ready to bolt up and use. I may scrap this project for an electric compressor and a used gas powered generator.
I have all the parts to build a 1600 single port engine less a few bearings. I'm sure I'll find a use for it eventually.
You wouldnt want to drive it alone through Ecuador and Peru either. Once you get to central Peru you can drive it all the way to souther Chile, then cross over to argentina, go to the southermost cities and get back up to uruguay, paraguay and brazil...
Be sure to say hi when in Santiago, thats were I live.
A couple of years ago an English couple did a trip in a VW van they bought in Chile for around US$3000. They had 16 visits to different mechanics on the 3 month trip, with me doing as translator and fedexing them parts to remote citites, but they made it back to Santiago and sold the van for US$2000 to another crazy couple that did it again....
Search google for messages in this group whith 'John Reid' for the story.
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