Topic of the Day...

[dustymojave]

There are a lot of different ways to reinforce the door hinges.Which you choose depends 1st on what is done in the area.

Cutting away the front 1/4 panel for a 1-piece Baja kit nose DOES weaken the door pillar greatly. Especially weakened is the upper door hinge mounting area.

If you have no roll cage in the area, you can brace the hinge to the front upper edge of the foot box. This can be done with strap stock or tube. If you use tube, weld a piece of plate to the end to bolt to the sheet metal. Use a doubler plate on the other side of the body sheet metal. As Ol' Fogey said, make the plates on the opposite sides of the sheet metal different sizes. Beware that there is very little room for plates between the door jamb and the edge of the door.

If you have a roll cage, you can brace from the A pillar of the cage to the body at the side of the dash board. Again, put a doubler on the other side of the body sheet metal.

If your cage extends above the foot box down to the front suspension, there are a number of options for bracing the body near the upper hinge from the upper rail

[Ol'fogasaurus]

Where we are staying there is a lot of things going on. This weekend they are raising money for Cancer awareness, something they do every year here. They had 8 hot air balloons in a couple of parking lots and they lit them up after it got dark. Two pictures of the balloons. The first one and the second one show the front and back of one balloon that I think is taller than 60'; it is a magician on one side with a cat in his backpack on the other side.

Thought you might enjoy this. By the way, it was darker out than the pictures show.

[Piledriver]

Also note for the plates that round is stronger than square, and creates less stress.

[Leatherneck]

Good Morning, who wants some Coffee?

[CentralWAbaja]

Good Morning, who wants some Coffee?

What took you so long Marine? I had my coffee gone and was in the shop by the time you posted this. I just dropped in for lunch.

Get to work!

[Leatherneck]

Good Morning, who wants some Coffee?

What took you so long Marine? I had my coffee gone and was in the shop by the time you posted this. I just dropped in for lunch.

Get to work!

How about a Soda, a beer maybe?

[dustymojave]

At Thanksgiving, my brother and his wife were sharing pictures they took at Santa Fe N.M. of hot air balloons. They had taken their autistic son to see them. There were apparently some wild and wonderful balloons. I hear that rally in Santa Fe is supposed to be the world's largest hot air balloon rally.

There are occasionally hot air balloon rallies that end across the road from our home. They land there at about 8-9:00AM. We haven't seen one here since last Spring though. They seem to be less often lately. None of the balloons around here are fancy shapes. And there are a lot fewer balloons than there used to be. Fun stuff is when the weather is low heavy clouds and the balloonists explore the canyons on the sides of the buttes in the neighborhood. Some are REALLY good at tracking real close to the sides of the hills. Like arm's reach to the side of a cliff close. And there are no straight lines in those hills either, especially not in line with the flow of the wind.

I can share some crappy pics from my wife's cell phone from a local balloon rally a few years ago. Most of the better pics I had were wiped from my hard drive by a Microsoft virus a few years ago.

Here's a cluster. This hill is above my home. The very steep west face (in shadow in this morning pic) is one of their favorite play spots.


This fuzzy one shows how close they land. For reference, the F100 with camper and Falcon station wagon are mine.


After a pass along the face of the hill


Coming in for a landing

[Leatherneck]

Cool pics, I just see myself getting in trouble with one of those. Cool watching them though.

[turbobaja]

She's been gathering dust lately. Just wanted to let you guys know I still check in from time to time.

[CentralWAbaja]

Well lets plan on knocking the dust off Karl. Or at least when/where is the first show that I can go get dirty looks from all the purest at?

[Leatherneck]

Would love to make a run with you two one day.

[turbobaja]

Well lets plan on knocking the dust off Karl. Or at least when/where is the first show that I can go get dirty looks from all the purest at?

I'd love to, just have to finish this Van I'm building now first . I think the "show season" basically starts with a cruise in to the XXX in Issaquah, it usually rains, good variety of VWs and folks though.

I still have lots of things I need/want to do to my baja. Mostly just to make it more enjoyable to drive slowly, on or off-road . It's just too much of a high rpm animal with the current setup...

How's JT's baja doing? Haven't heard much about it in a while. I'm sure He's got a full plate now with his house, business and life. Hope all is going well!

[TimS]

https://www.thesamba.com/vw/archives/ma ... _Leaks.pdf

might be handy for daily driver crowd.

[Leatherneck]

Saved that one, might even be useful in a upcoming project.

[bikesndbugs]

im reading it and its talking about these seals and im like yup dont have that or that or that.