Armrest resto

I started slowly today with the upholstery. I will make covers for the chairs but the arm rests are pretty worn so I will replace the fabric. I found out that one of the two I have is broken. Not good, but in one way it doesn't matter, two are missing and now when one is cut open I can copy it by some  reverse engineering.
Once again, here are the colours I'll use. Not really correct with this lousy camera but you'll get the idea.

Interior rework

Finally time to work on my own bus!
There are a bunch of major upgrades coming this spring. New red paint, roof rails, new trans and a long term plan to rework the entire interior. There's really nothing that is worn or bad but I miss that 'how nice' feeling. I have the sewing stuff, been doing upholstery before so I'll do it my own this time as well. On top of that I'll be in the house and not the workshop when doing it so the family will see me more often. I hope for some sunny evenings soon so I can do the work on the teracce. :-)
These are the colours, might not be correct with a smart phone camera but you'll get the idea. They are extremely tough fabrics and will stay fresh for years to come.

I really like "French stiches", which is a triple seam. Looks good, easy made and super strong. I will use this seam on all exposed areas, and then a straight double seam on all other places.
The thread itself is a heavy duty polyester thread that is impossible to break by hand.

Done - again! :-)

Took the camper out today and had it running real hard for more than an hour. The new transmission is not super different but noticable better. The gears are tighter and the top RPM is about 170 rev's lower. The only thing I noticed afterwards was a tiny coolant leak at the oil cooler pump. The clamp was sitting bad so a realignment was enough to fix it.

Next week the adapter for my Passat trans will arrive. Time to start the gearbox swap! At last!

Fuel line reinforcement

If you have an air leak in the fuel lines you can't clamp it. The vinyl hose will shrink because of the force. The solution is simple, get a plumbers copper pipe 'end pipe'. They are pushed into the copper pipe for the same reason, to avoid leaks because if clamping to hard. Guess what... ...they work in the vinyl hose too. :-)

The starter mod

If you're going to use an old vanagon starter to a TDI, you need to grind off the nose. Otherwise it will hit the flywheel.

Worn out clutch bearing?

The understatement of today...

mTDI IDI hybrid

Runs really well!

EDIT: Important note to others. The engine was pretty noisy, and my own mTDI is pretty noisy as well. I decided to retard the pump a bit more. My own setup that is a copy of the Land Rover spec is 1.4 mm, and now I backed the pump to 1.32 - 1.35-ish.
Maybe, but very much maybe, I noticed a slightly slower acceleration. But the torque is still equally crazy and the engine is less noisy. It's actually a uge difference regarding the noise.
If you go the Landy-pump route, try a lower setup which seems to fit the VW engine better.

Gearbox makeover

Jespers camper is back and the blown head gasket is replaced. I'll swap the transmission at the same time. The slave cylinder bracket is loose and needs a better support and the other box has a little bit better gear ratio.