Author Topic: 1975 Orange Bus Project  (Read 1532 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline kinggeorge13

  • Full Member
  • Posts: 272
  • Karma: 2
  • Whaddya mean I can't buy more buses?
1975 Orange Bus Project
« on: May 27, 2016, 08:51:10 AM »
So as we (mostly my daughter Jennifer) cut out all the very damaged/dented/torn bus side panels, rockers, etc from the accident, we got to the back left corner and we needed to remove the rear bumper to get at the body area we had to cut out.  I had just put that bumper on 2 years ago.   Well, one of the left side two bolts was super-tough to turn and even though I kept blasting penetrating oil off all types up there, it kept making that terrible squeeeeeeeek noise each time as the threads resisted every turn.   It was all I could to with just my largest ratchet handle to get it to turn and I just knew I was putting huge strain on those rusted parts. 

Sure enough all of a sudden something bad gave and the bolt began to turn super-freely.  Only it was not out, it was just spinning in place.   Basically, the strain I was putting on it tore the internal welded nut inside the frame off from it's very rusty welds.    Damn.   Damn.   The last time I had this happen on the yellow bus, I just gave up for a while and it's still hanging there waiting for me to do something with it.   Only with the orange bus, we want to get it done now so it had to be resolved.    We looked at it lots, pried and poked but there is no way to get at that nut to get a hold of it.   So we had to start cutting out part of the frame back there to get this bolt and it's free nut out of there.  No way on earth to just force or pull it through the hole.    We could not get in there with a cutting wheel or sawzall to cut the bolt, there's just not enough room.   So we did it: we cut open the bottom of the metal beam at that end to get it out.  Even at that, we did 75% cutting and 25% tearing with a 4' pry bar.   

But we got it out (and now I know what I have to do to get the same situation resolved on the yellow bus sometime down the road.   Two years ago this would have been awful for me.   Now, with my certified welder-daughter, she can just clean up that metal back there and weld in a new piece with a new nut welded in place when we are ready to remount the bumper.   Not looking forward to measuring exactly where that bolt has to go exactly to line up with the bumper bracket but that's just a lot of careful measuring and remeasuring.

The first picture below is the bumper bracket with the bolt and it's broken-free nut still on it.  The second picture is the area we cut/tore open to get the nut out (along with its semi-seized bolt still in place).    Oh the fun.......
1975 Westy, Serenity
1975 Westy, Jack Sparrow
1979 Kombi, Pistachio
1979 Kombi, Oliver
1977 Tin top camper, Cosmos
1974 Westy, Garfield
1973 Tin top camper, Bart (now thinking he's 1976)
1974 gutted Riviera, Casper
1975 Westy, Stella
1979 Super Beetle, Penelope
1967 Fastback, Green Hornet