Stopping for others. (Or, fweem fweem fweem...BOOM)

Well, I wouldn't be as useful to a water pumper dude. Sure I know Hondas, but late model VWs ... not really.

I would, but there aren't enough ACVW's around here. I never see one on the side of the road, and rarely any driving.

OTOH, when I do pass one driving on the road, we usually both toot horns and exchange smiles and friendly waves. Shucks, even some non-ACVW types will do the same - have even had a couple of New Beetles initiate a wave and/or a toot of the horn.

Malcolm '69 Bug (Gus) '71 SB (Herbie)

vanagon/camper

I have before but its usually too late and the owner has already started "hoofing it". I have been stopped for before too (thank you) . I even got "saved" when going to a major VW show once, the motor was done for in my car but we got it to the next rest stop and I hitched a ride to the show with the guy. We also picked up another person that broke down and took him to the show too! End of the day the guy took us back to our dead rides.

Mark Detro Englewood, FL

I ran out of oil (don't ask!) a few years back on a mountain road waaayyyy in the sticks in coastal Oregon. I held an oil bottle up as cars went by and about 8 out of 10 stopped (10 cars was about 45 minutes!), some turned around and came back, several apologized whole heartedly that they had no oil to give me and two different people (one of the turn-backs) searched their vehicles for several minutes looking for the bottle of oil they thought was there! I was so morally boosted after that experience I almost stayed there after I got enough oil just because it was so uplifting! (None of them drove aircooleds but they were genuine people with hearts of gold)

- Dave

Volkswagen issues?

already started

you) . I even got

done for in my car

to the show with the

took him to the show

rides.

That says something about the people that live in your area, and it's a Good Thing. So, when Molly and I take our trip to Oregon, maybe we should take the '58? But getting there - you see, I can drive for days from here (Minnesota) and never see an ACVW. In fact, on my last trip to Denver and back (including back roads) I never saw one ACVW.

John, this is an issue I had with the T-4 engine in my bus. With an old American engine like I grew up with, whatever goes wrong, you can generally get by with a work-around if you need to. Even a rod bearing or broken rings - if you have to, you drop the pan and take that rod loose - tie a piece of baling wire down through the sparkplug hole and the hole you punched in the piston to keep it out of the way - you get the idea. With our engines, top end stuff is easier, actually, once you get past the cooling tin, but the bottom end is a bear! I almost switched to a T-1 motor for my jaunts down the coast simply because if your T-1 motor breaks down as in major, you wouldn't go but 20 miles tops before you'd find someone you could borrow their shop or borrow their tools or borrow their spare engine! The toughest part is the freeway driving. If you can survive the freeway driving out here (Washington & Oregon) then you'll simply love the rest of it! I drove about 250 miles yesterday in an attempt to find some parts for RAMVA poster Chris Grey for his automatic. I must have seen a couple dozen aircooled beetles and a dozen buses along the way. I also discovered two bay buses in my own neighborhood practically that I'd never seen before. Most of my vacation travels start off with getting into Oregon - at least 2 1/2 hours of balls-to-the-wall freeway driving. That's what killed my aircooleds (My personal driving style had nothing to do with it! :o)) Now I can cruise at 70 and bump it up to 90 just like everyone else and it's so much more relaxing a drive. Of course, if I'd just turned the rear view mirrors so I couldn't see behind me I prolly would have been fine and still be on engine #1! Summer isn't too bad for general driving, but another thing to consider out here is winter "sand" on the roads. Washington was using pea gravel up until about last year. Now they're back to more reasonable stuff, but it still pits badly. Oregon uses some kind of volcanic material that is soft enough it doesn't pit your glass. It smears really bad and makes pink mud, but I much prefer it to the pea gravel up here. Mostly we don't have salt issues.

- Dave

jjs wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@m-0-135.docsis.hbci.com...

mountain

oil

(10

area, and it's a

maybe we should

days from here

trip to Denver and

Thats because you were dumb and didn't stop by my place even tho you were within a couple hundred yards of it.

Randy

My father told me a story of when he and some of his bicycling friends were taking a long multiday self-supporting ride somewhere in the Pacific NW, Oregon, Calif, dunno. Anyway, one (or two) of the riders were on this tandem bicycle, which had a major malfunction (frame broke or sumpin), and their whole small bicycling group stopped and was trying to figure out what to do. Someone suggested trying to flag down a passing car, of which there were few at the time, and someone else in their group tried to nix this idea, pointing out that what was the likelyhood of flagging someone down who could carry a broken tandem bicycle. Someone else pointed out that at least someone could get a ride to go get help, and so they decided this was a good idea, and began hoping to and trying flag down someone.

So pretty soon, along came a vehicle, so they tried to get their attention, and the guy pulls over... in an old aircooled VW Bus!

Not only was he able to fit the broken tandem bike and it's riders into his vehicle, he *voluntarily* took them to a bicycle repair shop he knew of in the area, where they got their tandem bike fixed! And thus were able to continue their bike trek!

My father's group was quite amazed by the generosity of the guy driving the VW Bus, and he then explained to them that his son (me) drove old VWs, and it was sort of a weird cult of people (this was mid 80's?), and that a great many were pretty darned nice people!

John Kuthe...

We took the northern route across Nebraska. Do you live near Clarkson?

Theres a northern route thru Nebraska ?

Randy

"ekoman" wrote

vanagon/camper

I will stop for any aircooled VW I see broken down ... but in the 13.5 years I've been driving a VW, I've only seen one and it was, of all things, a trike ... so I guess that still counts .... and it was just last fall that I saw it. I was on the way to a show/race/swapmeet at the Farmington dragstrip here in NC and he was on the side of interstate 40. I also usually stop for any woman I see broken down, though it's mostly been for flat tires. I also offer help to any broken down boats I see while on the water.

-- Scott

I always stop for aircooled VW's. And during daytime, I just about always stop for others too. Rarely, if ever, at night.

Once I towed a 67 beetle off the freeway into the city some 15 miles, with my 67 beetle :) I even helped them determine what had happened. The accelerator pump nozzle in the carburator had come loose and it got sucked in the engine. Was making a rattling, ticking noise as it got banged around in the combustion chamber.

Jan

Sorta off topic, but this is accurate as near as I can tell. Within the past ten years I've moved across the country 4 times, into areas with totally different people and totally different mindsets.

Two of my years were spent in the Portland region, and the folks in that area are about the frendliest I've come across. Literally everyone I knew wouldn't think twice about going out of their way to help me if I ever needed it. Plenty of people I didn't know would do their darndest to try and be a help too.

Not just for emergencies either, the folks there just generally seem to know what it means to treat people well.

With a favorable climate (if you can tolerate rain;), a hefty aircooled population, good people, and more outdoor activity opportunities than is fair for a single state to have, it's hard to imagine a better place to live.

vanagon/camper

It is all about poseurs and people with more money than the sprit of air-wheeling. We found the same thing happened in motorcycling when the YUPPIES took over the Harley world. A friend of mine broke down on his old Harley on the road to Sturgis. Literally _hundreds_ of "bikers" rode past because they are clueless fuckwits with no clue, no soul, no class.

All mexican beetles that come to this island are fuel injected 1600's.

Karls

................I towed a dead '70 'vert with my vanagon for almost an hour(?) from The Delaware Water Gap area in eastern Pa. to Danville, Pa. about three years ago. The owner and his buddy were stranded on the center median of I-80 and they were about to call the owner's wife to come get them from Danville. I just happened to have brought my towbar in case there were any really good deals for a bug at the Englishtown, NJ show. Several months later, the president of the local club here in the Binghamton area called me up and asked whether it had been me that had given them a tow. It seems that they had put something in the club news letter down in the Danville area about what I had done but they had forgotten my name and could only identify me as being from Binghamton, NY. I never saw what was written but it was nice of them to write something about it.

I generally stop for people who are broken down, and always for an air-cooled, though you don't see too many of them these days.

Once back in R.I. I was walking down the road and saw some kids in an out-of-state Beetle break down right in front of my house. I came up to them, and they asked where the nearest gas station was. I hmmphed and said, Let's take a look at this first. Upon discovering their generator belt had busted, I said, There's a gas station about a mile and a half from here, but I don't want you driving anywhere. I resisted the urge to tell them how lucky they were to have broken down where they did, and silently ambled to the garage to fetch my tool kit and a new belt. They just stood there wide-eyed and with their mouths open. In a few minutes I had them back in business, and they asked how much they owed me. I told them 4 bucks, which they were about to part with gladly, but I said, Take the money down to the gas station and buy a spare belt for yourselves and one for me. And so in fact they did.