Hi All,
On Saturday, my friend Eric and I flew down to Vancouver BC and drove a 74 super SunBug home to Edmonton Alberta. The trip went very well, mostly due to our "overpreparedness". You can never be prepared enough for something like this, and all the tools and stuff we brought really paid off. The car had been parked for a year and a half, the owner started it up recently, but when we got there, it was in no shape to drive.
We used almost all of the extra parts and tools we brought, including:
Carburator, coil, points, fuel hoses, filter, oil strainer and gaskets, valve cover gaskets, changed the oil (it was black and gummy), bought an air filter and oil when we were there.
We had to drive through the mountains for about 75% of the trip, and the old
1600DP did really well. Didn't burn or leak a drop of oil for the first 4.5 hours, and it was driven pretty hard. Got 30mpg too!. That was without a thermostat, the extra one I brought didn't fit, and no VW shop in town had one.The next day, we had about 9 hours of driving to do, and for some reason, it started to leak a little bit of oil, so by the time we got home, it needed about a litre of oil.
The only real problem we had on the trip, is when we got to our day one destination (Kamloops) the car wouldn't start. I figured the wire came off the starter, and sure enough, that is exactly what it was. Managed to get the sunroof working (didn't work for years) and the weather was so good, we had it open most of the time.
That trip was a lot of fun, I would do it all over again in a second. It really pays to be prepared, and to cover all the bases before you do something like this. I also never would have been able to accomplish this ALONE, if my friend Eric didn't come along, it would have been difficult to pull this off. If anyone ever does this, bring someone with you.