Sir Sam

Yup, this isn't anything new. Pressure and heat - likes what happens beneath the surface of the earth. Plastics, yup, you can break em down and form new polymer chains if you want, or you can crack em back down and reform new things, still lots of energy in all those chains! A couple of places also do similar things with animal waste, took all the leftover stuff from the tyson chicken plant, put it in what is akin to a large pressure cooker, and break down all the bones, feathers, beaks, etc into a light oil, and a sludge that was dried for animal feed. Now, don't expect it to be like Mr. Fusion, more like Mr. Huge Smelly Refinery that is a cross between a petroleum refinery and a rendering plant.

If you left the 2000 RKE in the 2000 overhead console then you NEED to use the 99+ remotes.

I just got back from that area. A little ways up the road from prince rupert is stewart BC and Hyder alaska. If you take the road through hyder you go on up to a really pretty road by a glacier and then up to some BIG older gold mines.

Well since I was stealth taking them with an iphone I didn't manage to get all the ones I thought(there is a noticeable delay between when you push the button and when the photo is taken), but I'll post what I got.

Currently in Puyallup. Heading to rainier national park. Got dome fish and vegetables at the pike place market. Then got happy hour and beer looking over the water there. Went to napa to get yet another fuel filter(been getting lots of water in fuel problems. Damm canuckian gas) and air filter. Noticed they had wild blackberries growing so we stopped and picked a bunch. Planning to make some jungle juice with them. Oh and I grabbed a few pics of the cute Asian girl who served us at the bar for you guys.

Ok so I'm out in the parking lot next to the Carabou Artic Inn. $125 per person per night, ya right, ill sleep in the van for free. Otherwise I went and dipped my feet in the arctic ocean and took pics. Last night we made the arctic circle at 10pm local time, cooked a few steaks and drank more beers than I count and headed further north, about 2 hours later when the sun set we stopped for the night. Didn't see any Carabou or bears, but did see a muskox. Lots of hunters are returning south with many carabou racks stacked on top of their trucks. Lots of hunters camped north of attigan pass along the tundra. The tundra is weird stuff, its like walking on a giant memory foam bed. Weird little tree's too. Foot after stepping in Arctic ocean:

Left colorado late last night and got about an hour north of Cheyenne, little ways out side of great falls MT now heading towards Canadia, hopefully they let us in. Still got 2769 miles to goto to hit prudhoe bay!

one bed in the pop up, one in the backseat that folds down.

Because of the....odd....design of the vehicle some things come together to make a great package. This van is rear engine, RWD, this means that without the need for a drive shaft tunnel, and an integrated unibody, the main deck area sits very low(like minivan low). This is in contrast to an american van where the frame hides high from the ground, with a body on top of it, this makes it pretty good step up. This may not seem like much, but when camping like this you really want to go in and out all the time. The engine sucks, the trans is ok(think about 50-75% of the way between a peugot and a ax-15. The engine sucks because it is such an old design of layout, its somewhat archaic and cobbled together. On the flip side subaru licensed the rights to the boxer engine design in the late 60's, subi ran with it and developed some GOOD motors. 3.3 flat 6 making 222 hp and 220 ft-lbs torque, that was in 1992. So subi motors are a popular swap, and the complete kit runs about $1500 to do it. with the stock engine, mileage sucks 18-22mpg, subaru engine, about the same(but with 2-3-4x as much horsepower as stock(93hp)), diesel engines are popular and routinely get 30+ mpg. (not sure if I believe them, the liberty CRD struggles to break 30mpg). Let me dig up some more pics, haven't really spent much time camping in it, since my dad lives in it most of the time.

Wow, long time no updates, getting ready to goto alaska to drive up the dalton highway: New fridge is installed, watching the freezer temps: Second deep cycle battery installed down on the left, new outlet wired to 800W inverter, two 12V outlets crammed into the old breaker box. New propane regulator hooked up with 1lb bottle adapter. The stock westy's have a much larger tank that mounts on the outside down low, this was used for both the stove and the old dometic fridge, since all I will be using for is the stove the 1lb bottle should work just fine. So I used some 3/4" angle iron doubled up to make a ledge for the swivel seat: Then I once all the welding was done I realized that I welded it in backwards.........YARG After some correction. The seat swivels: fridge sticks out a little further than the stock one did, but it doesn't mess up the interior space or anything:

No, I like the black, gives nice contrast. Having some black to give contrast works really nicely with lighter colors, white, yellow, etc.

It would have had just as much torque if it had a CRD in it.......and gotten great mileage.

I considered selling it without working AC, but with it being the summer that would just kill my resale value. Really didn't have any choice but to fix it.

You forgot the sawsall.

I flip vehicles(Jeeps mainly), and the latest one I got has been fighting me on the AC system. When I get the vehicle it is a collision repair, no big deal, I buy the vehicle sight unseen knowing exactly what to expect out of it. Seen so many before I can counts all the expected variables. What I got that I was counting on was the AC system not working prior to the accident. I fix the collision, that all goes smoothly and takes a few days of work, spray new paint and buff, fairly straight forward. The accident left the condensor intact(saves me a few bucks), but the system was discharged when I got it. So I pull a vacuum, it holds fine, I fill it with one can of refridgerant. Compressor kicks on and off a few times like it should and then stops. After switching out the various pressure switches with known good units I decide its time to test the clutch. Test power lead to AC clutch, its getting power, jump 12V directly to clutch, still not working. Call it a night. Next morning get going on compressor replacement, replace compressor with a used unit(luckily I had a spare here), pull vacuum, seems to hold fine. Fill it up, blows cold, get 48*F out of the vents when ambient temp is 95*F. Week later I finally get title and plates done, go to drive the vehicle around, no AC. Replace compressor to lines o-rings(most likely suspect). Pull vacuum, lt sit for a couple of hours, check vacuum again, seems to be holding fine. Evacuate and recharge with UV dye and stop leak. 4 days later drive the vehicle to visit family 2 hours away. On the drive home I notice AC doesn't seem as cold as it should be, get home and check pressure, dropped to half of what it should be. Evacuate system again, remove header panel etc to replace condensor with known good unit. Replace every o-rings I can get to. Buy bottle of UV dye and refill with dye and another charge. After trying to get the AC to drip some condensate(very dry here), I finally get some to leak out, I blot it up with a paper towel and go inside to a darkend garage to check, sure enough I see faint traces of the UV dripping from the evaporator. Great it needs a evaporator replacement, this means a dash pull. So I go get a new used unit from a parts vehicle of mine(located at a friends house an hour away), fight the waps and weeds, pull that dash, and get the box out. Go home get my dash pulled, old one out, and new one in, start putting dash back in, at some point laying on my back on the floor reaching up fighting some random bits of wiring I accidently touched the power door locks while trying to gain leverage. They just make an annoying click. That was at 6pm. I spent the next 3 hours trying to track down what wiring I might have inadvertently damaged during the pull. Finally at 9pm after checking every loom and connector I could think up I give up when 2 attempts to lock the door result in the hazard lights flashing. The second two attempts(separated by mere seconds) result in the horn honking. Needless to say I ended the day very frustrated. Next morning I get back out at it and start checking for continuity between every pin that I can find, everything checked out. I then notice that on this plastic dash assembly all grounds are attached to a metal substructure which grounds out through the two main dash support bolts. So on a hunch I put everything back together(again) tighten down the main bolts, and viola, everything works. So because I hit the door locks part way through the procedure when the dash wasn't completely grounded I ended up wasting many many hours of time trying to find an issue which didn't exist. But at least now it seems like the AC system is holding a charge and not leaking......I hope.

that your going to herculine the inner fender wells?

I'm guessing from a first generation caravan.

I keep a copy hidden in my rectum. :oops:

Ya I've driven those before, pedals were WAY too close, ended up stepping all over my own feet trying to drive.

BAM! You hit the nail on the head. Steady paycheck and medical insurance. This is fickle, you might sell something, you might not. Plus, you gotta always keep on top of it, run out of a pot of cash to play with, and you can't afford to do this kind of repair. You have to invest a fair amount of money to get anything back out. Then on top of it if you don't have medical insurance(and there's a good chance one of these days the car is gonna fall on you or something that requires it) your boned. And paying for insurance out of pocket eats up any money you make real quick. At the end of the day it may seem like easy money, but its a hard way to earn a living. Thankfully I am still covered through my mothers family insurance untill I'm 27. Which is interesting because we have two family bluecross plans, one through my fathers employer(NASA) and the other through my mothers(Aerospace corporation). The plans are almost identical, expect the family plan through my mothers work lets me stay on longer. We actually sat down and looked at it, and it was cheaper to get a whole second family plan through my mothers work than it was for me to get it on my own.

Listed at $4100. No, no job. Hence the problem, gotta have some money coming in. So I bought this one and the other one to flip. I was doing this with my dad in middle school, I'm 24, a college graduate with a ME degree, and I'm doing the same thing I was doing in 7th grade. :doh: Oh well, its nice to be your own boss, and I don't hate doing this, so its hard to complain too much.

Shampooed the interior so its nice and clean now. Took pics to get it on CL for sale. Still need to install passenger side fender flare, drivers splash shield, and those little black trim pieces on the fenders.

The price is accurate. Others including myself have taken the plunge already with a different supplier for the parts.