VWAR Old forum !

Hi,

I've just bought a 73 bay window auto.  After speaking to a fair few parts shops, all who went "An automatic - you sure?" I thought I was on my own, or had bought a botched van.  Nice to know i'm not on my own.  Where can I fing info on VW Automatic buses?  I'm intrigued now!!!

Sculph

Everyone:

Thanks for your posts. I have fixed the problem but probably only for a little while. It functions perfectly. There were actually two problems, one of which you may not have considered before:

     - Tear in the diaphragm was overwhelmingly the biggest cause of this problem. I fixed this with contact cement. Volkenstein has a picture of it on his post. I hope it lasts for a while but I'm skeptical. I still need another one if any of you have one to sell...

     - Incorrect vacum hose type. When I received the car the vacum hoses were rotten. I replaced them with standard 1/4" heater hose. This also contributed to "slamming into gear". When vacum was applied the hose would flatten out (especially when hot) but not close. Once vacum was releived (hand off the shift knob) the hose would rapidly expand. This has the effect of instantly adding more volume to the total vacum space. Replacing the standard heater hose with the wire wound OEM vacum hose made a difference in shifting smoothness.

I have not seen this as a contributing cause to slamming into gear in other posts so I thought I'd pass along my experience.

Tom

It seems feasible to me as well but I'm not that versed in the molding process.

I would think that the mold, if made from an old diaphragm, would only be as good dimensionally as the diaphragm you mold from.  As I understand it, that's been an issue with aftermarket rubber products in other areas of VWs.

If I knew more about blueprinting...I would think that would be the way to go.

Anyway there are almost surely RTV products out there now that could produce a suitable mend on a torn diagphragm.  McMaster's?

Oh and yeah Tom thanks for following up on your original post.  Good data to have.

All,
    this is where (marked in RED) Tom has a tear in the small rubber diaphragm.



Nasty. Anyone have a bright idea to fix while he organises another CV unit?


Regards
Volkenstein

cisco3609,
               Two things I can think of.
1. Dubious quality of the actual rubber/moulding used in the replacement. Hakgun on this forum used a bicycle vulcaniser patch to fix his, try it as it would make that part stronger. Put it on the side facing the engine, not the vacuum spigot so the patch is "drawn in".

2. On re-assembly, make sure the rod/diaphragm assembly touches the back of the servo with the three rubber bungs, then tighten the clamp.

I guess a third tip may be to keep the gearstick "in motion" for as little time as possible and no resting your hand on it when driving (you probably don't but I'll say it anyway....)


HTH
Volkenstein