Entries by giana

Last week, Rob and I re-upholstered the front seats of my 1963 VW Bug.  We did it old school, removing the old parts (torn up upholstery and horsehair pads), and then replacing them with the new.  Often, people simply cover the old stuff with new vinyl.  For those of you who are interested, we did not use hog rings.  We used the spiky things underneath the seat to hold the upholstery in place.  The only difference is that these covers didn't have the wire around the seat hem, which you can twist to tighten the fit.  Instead, they had a string that you pull tight.  I did forget to buy some burlap, so eventually the horsehair pads may begin to shed underneath the seats.  No biggy.  That process will take decades to begin.  One fun thing that happened is that Rob had to do some welding.  The bar at the bottom of both backrests, where the seams get tucked, had both broken off, so he welded them back on, and I got to wear a helmet and watch!  It's been nice driving the Bug this past week without horsehair poking at the back of my legs. 

Of course, air conditioning and CD players and four-wheel drive can be fun.  But nothing in the world can beat driving around in an old car on a lovely summer evening with the vent wings turned just so.  It's the secret to life.  Sure, they don't do you much good at noon when you're stopped at a red light, but you gotta take the good with the bad.  Oh, and the chirping tailpipes aren't bad, either.  Gotta love that sound.

Good VW Bug parts are getting harder and harder to come by these days.  When I bought my first Bug, I remember always having the choice between the good but more expensive German parts or their much cheaper Mexican and Brazilian counterparts.  Lately, only parts from south of the border are available.  This means that quality and aesthetics have suffered greatly.  Ultimately, it's much more important to have mechanical parts that are dependable.  But, at the risk of sounding completely superficial, it's also important to have parts that are pretty.  Take, for instance, my gas gauge.  As you may have read, I've had issues with gas measurement for a long time, whether I didn't have a gauge at all (Bug #3), or it didn't work (#4), or it worked but the needle was broken so I couldn't tell what the stub was pointing at (#5).  #5 was really a shame.  Finally, one that worked, but that darned needle!  I searched for a long time for a German replacement, but I just couldn't get my hands on one.  Finally, I broke down and bought a cheesy Mexican after-market version.  The fact that a VW part says "gasolina" instead of "fuel" says it all.  Anyway, it didn't work right.  Debbie and the gang recalibrated it about four or five times, but the thing had a mind of its own.  So we decided to take it apart, along with the one w/ the broken needle, and create a composite.  Using the intact needle of one and the working body of the other, we could finally achieve success!  That was the idea, anyway, but our plan didn't work, and this Frankengauge is what I ended up with.  The needle is glued together, the backplate is the original worn one -- see scraping beneath the "1/2", and the foreground is obviously after market.  Well, it's ugly, but at least it works.  It also says "Urghhh."  No, not really.  I shouldn't run out of gas anymore, but I'm sure I'll find a way.

The one thing that I can never restore on my Bug, no matter how much effort or money, is the black license plate.  Some ding dong blue-plated it long ago.  (Sigh....)  Oh well.

For some time I've been a fan of early Ford Falcons, ever since I met one that lived on the south end of Ocean in Seal Beach in the early 90s.  For a few years, I even had a subscription to a fan newsletter.  This past weekend I came within a hair of buying a 1960 4-door sedan.  It was almost the most beautiful car I'd ever seen, second only to my former 1963 grey Bug (Beautiful One), but things didn't work out.  After this disappointment, I was moping around feeling a bit depressed, and then my husband cheered me up by pointing out that, since I hadn't bought that car, I now had some money to burn, and what better way to burn it than to restore the 1963 VW Bug that's been begging for that sort of attention since I bought the poor little thing five or six years ago.  Now, why didn't that occur to me?  So the game is on, my friends.  I've been driving around in a crappy car long enough.  Now I'm gonna spend all my money on the Bug.  I hope nobody decides to steal it after I've restored it.  One heartache by stolen Bug is more than one woman should have to endure, but I can't keep living in fear of auto theft, eh?  So I'm goin' for it.  "Before" pictures coming soon.  "After" will be ongoing.  Before and After rides also available to my friends and family by appointment (BYOSB - seat belt).  Hopefully, after the restoration, I can take a road trip in it and even use my incredibly beautiful roof rack, which is currently stored in Rob's garage.  A stock Bug with a stock roof rack is a lovely thing to behold.  Can you picture us now on Route 66 in the high desert?  I can.

Last week, I was driving home from work down Broadway, as I always do, just south of the 105 Fwy.  My sister called me on my cell phone, so I thought I'd be a good girl and pull over instead of driving while holding the phone to my ear (my earpiece broke).  There was a park, so I thought this was an appropriate place to pull over next to the curb.  I'd been there not more than two minutes when a patrol car came by, pulled into the parking lot, then drove onto the sidewalk and grass, and stopped beside where I was parked on the street.  I ignored him at first, but then the officer rolled down his window and started talking to me.  He asked me if I was broken down.  I said no.  Then he asked me what I was doing there.  Mind you, it was 5:30 p.m. in early summer on the northern hemisphere of the globe (hence, perfectly light outside), no suspicious loitering around the park as far as I could tell.  Why should I not be there?  I told him I had pulled over to take a cell phone call.  He advised me to leave because "You shouldn't be here." 

Rob and others have told me about how when they owned VWs they were constantly being harrassed by the cops, something that I always found amusing.  In general, it would seem absurd and paranoid to think that you're being harrassed just for driving an old VW.  But if you're not doing anything illegal, and you're being addressed by the cops anyway, it does make you wonder, eh?  So I wonder if this guy was genuinely concerned for my wellbeing.  I must say that I have never seen any shady activity that would indicate to me that this is a dangerous place.  Or was this my first experience in mild VW discrimination?  How exciting.  Is this in fact a drug park?  Did I strike the cop as a shady type, sitting in my Bug, talking on my phone, arranging that drug deal?  Is this why he drove on the grass and sidewalk to get to me?  I'm amused, either way.  I look forward to future discrimination.  It's about time.

VW Bugs made before late 1961 did not come equipped with a gasoline gauge.  Instead, they have a nifty reserve tank with a lever near the gas pedal that one can turn if one starts to run out of gas.  How does it work?  Here's my oversimplified explanation.  The gas tank has two "straws," if you will.  When the lever is turned to normal, gas is sucked out of one straw.  If you start to run out of gas, you turn the lever and now gas gets sucked out of another straw, drawing from the very bottom of the tank.  This gets you an extra bit of gas, just enough to make it to a gas station.  The lever in my 1961 VW Bug was broken and permanently set to reserve.  As a result, I ran out of gas all the time.  Frequently, I was on the 710 Freeway, on my way to or from work or school between South Gate, East L.A., Long Beach, and Bellflower. 

On one of these occasions, the Metro tow-truck driver that came to my rescue came up to the window and greeted me like an old friend.  I had no idea who he was, at first, but he turned out to be the same tow-truck driver who had rescued me a few months earlier on the same freeway.  He recognized me because, as you may recall, my 1961 Bug was the one with all the ridiculous little pictures painted on it.  Everybody recognized my car!  He was so nice, but I was so embarrassed.  This is the only time I've had a repeat rescuer (thank goodness). 

Another time I was on the shoulder near the connection of the 710 and the 60.  At the time I worked as a TA at Hollenbeck Middle School in Boyle Heights.  I was irritated as hell because I didn't want to be late to work, again.  As I waited for a Metro tow truck to come by, one of the teachers from Hollenbeck passed by, saw me, pulled over, backed up, and then gave me a ride to work!  I was so happy because I wasn't gonna get another red dot on my timesheet.  When the bell rang for Nutrition break after second period, I got a ride from another coworker to pick up some gas and back to the Bug, which I'd left on the 710. 

Other times, Chuck, Rob, Don, and Monica have helped me on the 710 or 605 by either rescuing me during a breakdown or by helping me to tow my car to Long Beach.  Once, I was on the way to Heritage Square Museum in full Victorian garb when I broke down at the 710 and Washington Blvd.  My pal and fellow museum volunteer Saline (also in full Victorian garb) had to rescue me that time.  We must've been quite a sight.  Now I have AAA Plus, which allows me 100 miles of towing at a time.  This is way better than the typical 7 miles, because I've always worked and gone to school more than 7 miles from home.  The AAA Plus payed for itself within a month of signing up, when I broke down in Downtown LA last summer.  Now I just give the order: "Take it to West Coast VW, on 4th!  Debbie and Jose are expecting you."

My friend Brian is a writer, sometimes. He loves this story about my gas tank, and plans to incorporate it into one of his stories one of these days. My 1961 VW Bug was missing a critical car part that we all take for granted: it did not have a gas gauge. Apparently, 1961 is the year they put one in for the first time. Specifically, late 1961. My car was from early '61. Instead, it had a reserve tank with a lever above the center hump near the gas pedal. If you started to run out of gas, you could turn the lever and get a couple more miles out of the tank, giving you an opportunity to make it to a gas station. The problem is that my lever was broken and permanently set to reserve. So, while others may have had a second chance, when I ran out of gas I really ran out of gas. So I developed a system that I like to call "Splash and go" or "Stop and splash." Both names work. I would start the car, gently accelerate, then, while still rolling, I'd kill the engine. Once there was silence, I would slam on the brakes and hear the splash of gasoline in the tank. Small splash, go get gas. Big splash, go for a scenic drive! Theoretically, this trick should've kept me out of trouble. Unfortunately, the system is flawed because the sound of the splash can be deceiving. Many a time, I ran out of gas, most frequently on the 710 Freeway.

It happened often enough for me to lose all fear of freeway shoulders. My friends would listen in horror to my reason for being late. What they found most disturbing was my nonchalance about it. "Oh, yeah, I was on the freeway. It's okay, I had my homework with me." I always had homework with me. I was bound to either run out of gas or have a regular breakdown at any moment. Gotta be prepared (not with tools and VW parts, but with homework).

The sad thing is that the gas gauges in both of my 1963 Bugs haven't worked right, including the current VW Bug gas gauge, which is made in Mexico and says "gasolina" instead of "fuel." So even though I have a gas gauge now, I still have to do the Splash and Go!

Don't you hate when all the TV stations preempt their programming to bring us a high speed chase? Usually, I turn off the set. But last month there was a chase with a stolen VW Bug! It was so good because it was so bad. And the guy was pretty nearby, too! I could see the helicopters within a quarter mile of my house, following the little thing. He was driving all around my neighborhood, and although I don't for a moment condone that sort of activity, I must admit that I was, for once, amused and hoping it would go on just a little bit longer (so long as he didn't hit anything). I don't remember how it ended, but the Bug couldn't have been in good shape. I'm sure the owner had to replace a lot of burned out VW parts.

... 168 little hours. And some new VW Bug parts! I just picked up my car from the shop with a new windshield, new seals around it, new breaks and tires, and a voltage regulator to control the wiper motor! It rained again today, and I did not end up in any dangerous situations. Well, the v regulator didn't completely solve the problem, but there is a huge improvement. Some ideas have been thrown my way, but they all involve buying more new parts, so the Bug might have to wait a few weeks or months. One idea is to add another regulator and connect them in a series (rather than parallel). Another idea is to buy a special part that they used to sell at a VW bug parts place called Wolfsburg West that actually changes the wiper to 12v. And I'm also gonna look into a 2 speeder, like Frank had in the Beautiful One. But those probably cost a million bucks, so I'm not gonna hold my breath. The point, though, is that I can now make it to work in relative safety, even when it's raining.

It bugs me when people stop me in the road to offer me money for my 1963 VW Bug. They'll pull up next to me in the street or in a parking lot and start making offers. The first few times it was surprising and even exciting. It’s nice to know that others admire my little Bug. But sometimes I get people who persist, even after I say, "Thank you, but no." Instead of backing down, they offer more money. "C’mon!" Yes, they sometimes beg. Other times they don't offer more money, but they keep begging anyway. They give me cards with their phone numbers.  It’s truly amazing to me! "I said no, in case you didn’t hear me," is what I'm thinking. Or, "N-O spells no!" What on earth makes these people think that the more money they offer or the longer they beg, the more likely I’ll be to change my mind on the spot, hand over the keys, and walk home? Does that really work for some people?  And, if my car and/or its parts are sooooo valuable, then why didn’t they offer the higher price in the first place? Not that it would make any difference to me. Just curious. It happens way more often than you’d think. As a result, I’ve become very cynical about it. At the first sign of an offer, I find myself rolling my eyes. What I’d really like to say, but have never had the nerve, is "Do you see a For Sale sign in the window? No? Go figure." Then, in my fantasy, I'd peel out... (uh, yeah, right).

Rob says that the only thing my last Bug was good for was VW parts. This is true.

I’ve had five VWs, all Bugs. The first was a 1969. I bought this car before I knew any better. There was nothing at all wrong with it. On the contrary, it ran beautifully, and unlike my current 1963 Bug, there were no mickey-moused or missing parts. But during the year that I owned it I learned a bit about the evolution of Bugs and henceforth became a Bug Snob.  1963 is my cutoff.  Anything "younger" than a '63 does not appeal to me. In 1964 the first set of intolerable changes occur: the wider rear license plate light (eek!) and the loss of the half moon horn ring. From then on, the Bug develops increasingly larger/grotesque head and tail lights, overall changes in body shape, windows, seats, deck lid, hub caps, and the unforgivable straight bumpers. Why oh why would they get rid of the lovely plumbing?  By the time we reach the 70s... oh, the horror!  I could go on, but I’ll stop.  That first bug was totaled on my way home from a U2 stakeout at the Sunset Marquis in West Hollywood back in 1992. Some jerk made a left hand turn, right in front of me, from the far right lane. I smashed into him. His defense: "I had my blinkers on."  People sure are silly.

My second Bug is the only car I’ve ever loved. I never understood the love for a car until I owned this one. It was a 1963, owned by the same nice man since its birth, and garaged for just as long. The man’s name was Frank. He loved that '63 Bug, and he had kept it in absolutely perfect condition. I swear, this car was so perfect that I thought I’d gone back in time to 1963 and was looking at a brand new Bug. Although Frank loved the car, it was no longer practical (he was middle-aged, and he had a Mercedes that he drove regularly). He wanted to keep it in the family, but his three grown children weren’t interested. For these reasons, he put it on the market. It had steering lock, an impeccable interior, 2-speed wipers, working wiper spray (none of my other bugs have ever had one in working condition), beautiful shiny paint, full-sized spare, etc. Everything worked! I bought it for the bargain price of $2000, a total and complete steal. Frank wasn’t selling the car for the money. He didn’t need it. He just wanted the car to go to someone who would love it and use it. Naturally, people stopped me ALL THE TIME to offer me money for it, or compliments. I had no interest in selling the car, ever. In fact, I had this lame idea that they could use the car as my coffin when I died and bury me in it (how selfish of me). Fast forward to my birthday a year later: I came out of my house, and the car was gone. Yes, on my birthday! But, of course. With a car like that, what did I expect?

My third Bug I had to buy in haste. After Beautiful One was stolen, I needed to find a car quickly to get to work and school. I didn’t have the luxury of shopping around. I had to grab the Recycler and pick the first Bug that I could find that wasn’t lowered, and pre-1964. It was just alright. It was a 1961, with glass tail lights. It had some problems, and Mr. Bill from the body shop told me it wasn’t worth restoring, but okay as a daily driver for now. So I drove that one around for a while and learned how popular indeed those lovely glass taillights were. They were stolen twice. They were probably the most expensive single part on a ’61 Bug, at over $100. By the way, I love that a gas filter for a VW Bug is less than a $1, or at least used to be the last time I bought one a couple of years ago. Now my mechanics take care of all that. Anyway, I figured I’d just drive it around until I finished school, got a real job, and could afford to buy a nicer Bug. But then another driver cut in front of me on my way to work one morning and I smashed into her. Totaled that one, too.

My fourth VW Bug, again, was purchased in haste. I don’t even remember from whom. It was ugly! It was another 1961, and it was primered gray with white on the doors. It could’ve been worse, I suppose (although others might disagree). This is the one that Rob says was only good for parts, but I drove that ugly thing around for at least three years. I couldn’t stand the plain and ugly primer job, so I decided to take it a step further. Why just ugly? Lets go for ugly and ridiculous. I had a paint party in Rob’s driveway, with his wife Trish and a few of their neighbors. We bought several cans of primary colors, and got a bunch of cups for mixing and distributing and brushes of different sizes. We painted all kinds of stuff all over the car: fish, mysterious gold boxes, flowers (the car was accosted by bees on more than one occasion), waves, flames on the hood, hand prints, rainbows, etc. My husband (boyfriend at the time) absolutely hated riding around with me. He thought that everyone was looking at us. He was right, of course, but I’d stopped noticing long ago. This car had also been in some accident sometime before I owned it, so it was not worth saving for a future restoration project. Eventually, and I’m not sure how, I managed to save enough money to buy the fifth Bug, so I sold Cartoon Bug.

My fifth and current Bug is a 1963, again. It has a few fender dents, but it has not been in any serious accidents. I bought it from a really nice couple in Pasadena who even had a name for it. As I drove it home that first night, I discovered a charm bracelet with a VW Bug charm in the glove compartment, wrapped, with a name tag that read "To my new owner, from the Gopher." I changed his name to Guppy.  Guppy is Seafoam Green, which I think is really nice, but the original exterior paint has been covered with a coat of darker green paint and then another layer of Seafoam ontop. I know this because it's peeling in places.  The inside is still the original coat, but it has many small rust spots. The poor little thing has a lot of mechanical issues, and it's in constant need of new VW parts which are getting increasingly hard to find, but I manage to get by.  I had the engine rebuilt two years ago, and the tranny has been "going out" since I bought it, but it's still going.  It is my hope to someday restore it.  It’s in pretty original condition (which means kind of crappy), but I prefer a crappy original VW to a lame altered one any day!  By altered and lame I mean lowered, Porche alloys, offset deck lids, "eye brows" (which would be more aptly named "eye lids" ), boom boxes, even those Euro VW bumpers, and every other sort of imaginable part that does not belong on a 1963 Volkswagen Bug originally sold in the USA. Don’t get me wrong. There’s a line that even I must draw for the sake of practicality. For instance, I did have Guppy changed from a 6v to a 12v. My lights were so dim, and I could never get a jump start from a regular car without fear. And the rebuilt engine is a 1600.  But just about everything else is either original or a reproduction of the original (like the seat covers that I need to install). Someday…  But first, let’s take care of that windshield seal, eh?

There are several things wrong with my 1963 VW Bug. On this rainy morning, many of the problems ganged up on me to create one very dangerous, and yet hilarious, situation.

My list of car problems related to this day: (1) My windshield gets super fogged when it’s particularly cold out. This usually means that I have to drive with my windows open, even though it’s cold, and I also have to continuously wipe the inside of the windows, while I’m driving, to keep them clear. (2) When my mechanics changed my electrical system from a 6v to a 12v, they didn’t adapt my radio or wipers. As a result, my original Motorola Solid State AM radio no longer works, and my wipers wipe at a frenzied pace when the car is in motion, only slowing down to a normal pace when I’m at a complete stop. I don’t want the motor to blow, so I manually turn them off and on, as needed, never leaving them on for more than five seconds at a time. (3) The seal around my windshield has a gap (it wasn’t there two winters ago, but it’s there now) at the center top. Rain drips in through this gap. Fortunately, it doesn’t rain much in the LA basin. (4) My heating system is missing some parts, so my mechanics rigged it so that it's permanently on. In the spring, they disconnect it, and at the beginning of winter they reconnect it. Usually, this works for me.

This morning the rain really came down on my way to work, twenty miles away in Downtown LA. It figures that it would start to rain only two minutes after I left my Long Beach home. Anyway, as I zigzagged my way to Broadway, it started to pour, and my windows became fogged, so I started wiping both the outside (with the wipers) and the inside (with some tissue). But as the rain fell harder, it became necessary to leave the wipers running for longer periods of time, even though the car was in motion, which meant that they were going nuts back and forth. I thought surely, at any moment, the poor things would die and leave me stranded in zero visibility, unable to continue my drive altogether. Holding the steering wheel with my left hand, my right hand frantically switched between turning the wipers on and off, and then wiping the inside with the Kleenex, then back to the on/off knob. This frantic activity on the part of my right hand does not take into account any gear changes. But the rain was coming down too fast, and every second that the wipers weren’t on meant blind driving. And the fog simply wasn’t clearing enough, so truthfully I was just blind. At the same time, the rain started to leak through the gap at the top of the seal, and then I notice that the seal, as it turns out, is also failing at both bottom corners, so that water is now slowly seeping in and down into the heater vents, creating even more steam on my windows. So now I have both vent wings open (and now I'm cold), water is dripping in through each of them, water is dripping down the center of the windshield from the gap in the seal and onto my busy hand, water is dripping into the heater vents and subsequently steam is shooting out onto the windshield, the wipers are about to fly away, and I can’t see a damned thing out the back window or any of the passenger side windows of my VW Bug.

There's no way I could've driven any faster than 20mph under these conditions. I shouldn't've been driving at all, really. I somehow got into a rhythm with the wiping, and I had to choose one lane for the whole 15 mile drive up Broadway. The fewer the lane changes I attempted, the better off the citizens of Los Angeles might be. I somehow made it to work. I was so happy at 5:00 p.m. because it wasn’t raining and I thought I would have a better drive home. But ten minutes into my drive, it started to rain…