Blue Meanie, World; Plus More!

Finally, pictures of the Blue Meanie!

The underbody cover had come loose again, so I brought it over to Dusty and Gary's to resolve the problem. I put the car on ramps and added some oversize washers so the plastic would have a more difficult time stretching around the retaining screws. While I was at it I snapped some pictures to send off to Terry Frost, the man who sold me the cover and the TDIheater (a ZeroStart with custom bracket and pre-bent hoses).

The cars have been running like champs lately. The Blue Meanie is due for an oil change, and while I'm at it I'll check the manual's service schedule and see what else there is for me to do.

Lately, I have been going over the interior electrical system in Casper (the Audi 200TQ). So far I've fixed one of the rear speakers (loose solder joint on the cone) and a rear seat bench heating element (contact pulled loose on the embedded switch).

Since I've been pulling out much of the interior for the headliner replacement, I have an opportunity to thoroughly clean every piece of trim. It is time-consuming, but rewarding!

While in the car, you never really get a clear picture of how filthy things become over time. Once you get a piece of the car in the same lighting under which you live, it is very difficult to ignore its filth. I sure hope things don't gradually end up this way in the Blue Meanie!

Battles Won and Battles Pending

Today I was able to remove the "C" pillar coverings, the rear seatbelt fixture coverings, and the "shelf" where the speakers are mounted. I went ahead and removed the speakers for testing, as some of them do not presently work. I began ripping out the headliner, and am about 50% done with that particular task, if I exclude the work involved in cleaning up all the sticky orange foam.

Now I'm held up. It is not inherently obvious how to remove the "A", "B", and "D" pillar coverings. I can get by with just the "A" and "B" coverings removed, but there are some electronics behind the "D" coverings that I would like to test. I would also like to be able to thoroughly clean all of them.

Additionally, I have not yet been able to figure out how to remove the sun visors. The Bentley has been completely useless in this matter. I may be looking in the wrong section, though... It's so much information, I'm never sure if I'm in the right spot.

I decided to quit removing things for the day and then retired to the apartment. Once inside, I began cleaning some items I had removed, namely the rear headrests and the "C" pillar coverings. Afterwards, I began testing the rear speakers.

One of the speakers worked great, but the other had not been putting out sound at all. I put a AA battery to the non-working speaker, and was still getting nothing. I made contact closer and closer to where the speaker wires disappeared into a pile of hot glue-ish goo, but with no success. I was beginning to think it may be the time to post on the Audi World forums to request a replacement speaker, but then I got to thinking...

What if I just melt this stuff off? I can't ruin the speaker any more than it's ruined already, right? I took my soldering iron to the wires running into the glob, gently pulling on them while heating until they slid out. I took a hair dryer to the globs and slowly worked them off with my Leatherman. The soldering joints which lead to the speakers internal wiring were fully exposed. I took my battery to them and hooray! Sound! It took some "precision" work, or at least "precision" for me to get things resoldered, but now that everything is put back together the speaker is working great.

Victory!

Heated Seats?!

I am in the process of removing the necessary interior trim on Casper to be able to remove the headliner. I figured that, while I'm at it, I may as well tackle some electrical issues that have been bothering me, as well as get some cleaning done.

So I ended up removing the back seat. Entirely. I'll be cleaning it indoors, which will allow me to get every nook and cranny.

When I pulled the seat I noticed something I have not noticed before. There is electrical wiring running directly into the bench and the backrest! Now, I've noticed the electrical wiring lashed to the bench, but I had never noticed it went into the bench. I experienced a moment of exhilaration. Could this be?! You see, Casper has a heated front seats. Well, they don't presently work but they are there. Could it be we have heated rear seats, too?

I ran inside and grabbed my trusty Bentley Publishers Audi 100, 200 Official Factory Repair Manual: Volume 3 which contains every electrical wiring diagram. Right there on page 719: the wiring schematic for the heated rear seats. Woohoo!

Now I've really got my work cut out for me!

TODO:
Remove/replace headliner
Clean/condition the leather interior
Fix short on relay #10 (interior lighting, locks, lighters, stereo, etc...)
Fix non-functional speakers
Fix/replace all seat heating elements

The Lawn Mower

Hooray, I have a new problem! Err...

The lawnmower has been dying on me, which gives me a small engine to troubleshoot! Could this day be any better?

Yes. It could be. You see, it's almost 4AM, which means it is night time. As such, I can't work on the lawnmower. This day could be better by being daytime.

Down Time

Since things have been working well lately, I've taken to listening to Car Talk on NPR. It's a fun show, and gives good insight into how a mechanic would systematically deduce the source of car problems.

http://www.cartalk.com

Headlights #2

After much research, I have decided not to go HID in the Blue Meanie. There are some electrical issues which would very likely crop up further down the road. It just doesn't seem worth it.

I was able to find a distributor selling Osram H1 Long Life (64150L) bulbs in the US. These bulbs are rated for a life span of 500+ hours and cost just under $7 per bulb when purchased as a 10-pack. In the long run this is just as good a deal as HID, but without the future electrical issues.

The Blue Meanie Gets A New Fuel Filter

The Beetle up and quit one day while Linnea was out. It simply refused to start for her. It would crank, but there was no combustion. Sometimes you could hear combustion on the first crank, but that would be it.

I stopped by the same night to get a feel for what was happening. My first guess was the fuel filter might be full of moisture. As it was past 10PM, I knew there was no way the car would be running in time to head to church in the morning. Thankfully, the Audi was ready for the Sunday morning trip.

Following church, my friend Brett used his mad connections from his former job to score a new fuel filter for $20. Brett also helped me swap out the fuel filter, which only took 10-15 minutes. On a New Beetle TDI the fuel filter is located to the left of the plastic engine cover, and the only tools you need are a large screwdriver to loosen the bracket and pliers to un-clamp the hoses.

Replacement is straight-forward enough, you shouldn't need any directions.

Now, a few lessons learned:

1. Replacement of the fuel filter should happen at every oil change for diesels (10k miles for TDIs). If you're cheap you can get by with draining at 10k and replacing at 20k, but you must do something about the moisture build-up.
2. Oh what I would have given for some diesel to pour into the new filter! I had to crank the engine for some time while the filter filled back up with fuel. The poor car sounded terrible, and spewed a small cloud of black smoke upon the first successful start. Do yourself a favor and prime the filter prior to installing.
3. That was quite painless. There's no reason anyone couldn't do this on their own.

We drained the old filter into a glass jar for an idea of how much moisture was in there. There was definitely enough to fill the filter to the brim. What this meant was that initially diesel would be delivered to the engine, but as more fuel flooded into the filter it would stir up water which simply won't combust.

I of all people am surprised I got this one right on the first try.