Here is a quick update to keep you all in the loop. It’s late and I need to be up early for the transport delivery so ‘ll warn you now that you may find a few typos here.<\/p>\n
I hear that my Tesla was on a truck in Seattle today and is supposed to be delivered tomorrow (Tuesday) morning. I’m excited to get it! Of course I haven’t been completely idle waiting for it to get here. I ordered and received a Tesla Universal Mobile Connector so I can charge it as soon as it arrives. I’m still awaiting the Tesla jacket I ordered but I’m glad they shipped the important things first.\u00a0I also got the extra key and the J1772 adaptor from the previous owner. Thanks Joe!<\/p>\n
I’ve been doing rough planning for the last few months. One of the critical dimensions involves fitting the almost 28″ tall Tesla tires under the Vanagon front end without jacking the van up higher than it already is. I’d prefer it to be lower to match the lost ground clearance. The Stretch had Syncro (4WD) suspension with a low of \u00a09″ of clearance while the Tesla I measured on the “Very High” setting was 6″. I also hope to avoid having the top of the front suspension strut higher than the bottom of the front seats, as that could get rather uncomfortable. I’ve attached an image that I made to check out how it may fit (above). Being low tech at times like this I just printed up scaled photos of the two vehicles, cut the Tesla one in half and put them on a small light box that was handy. So far it looks good, but it’s going to be tight. I’ll take a long look at the rear brakes when the Tesla gets here to see if there is any way to drop the wheel size down to 18″. In that case I might use use a 245\/45-18 like the Conti PureContact<\/a> with an OD of 26.7″ allowing the whole Tesla pan to sit higher in the van. I’m trying to avoid any lower profile sidewalls since even these are pushing it for the rocky dirt roads that the Stretch likes to visit.<\/p>\n Yesterday Tony and Brandon came down from Portland to pull the TDI engine and Porsche transaxle from the Stretch. Tony has plans for them in his own Westfalia and I’m happy to have them out of the way. Since mine was running well before it threw a rod, with all the wiring, intercooler and custom transmission mounts it should give him a good head start on his project. I’ve been preheating the floor of the Garage Mahal just for this event and I’m glad I did since we’ve had record cold and\u00a0snow buildup here in Corvallis. The attached 3 minute video covers about 7 hours of work.<\/p>\n That’s it for now,<\/p>\n -Otmar<\/p>\n