Rocky Mountain "I need a tool or supplier" thread.

[Duck_Pilot]

Originally Posted by norton(kel)

I need to barrow (or buy) a shock spring compressor. Any help? Thanks, Jim

I have a lever-type you can borrow, and can bring it with me to Vern's tomorrow. It's strong enough for a twin-shock motorcycle setup, but not for a mono-shock. The Team Duckie Hooligan Flyer XR-100's shock spring was too stiff, but it worked just fine on my old roadrace bikes. Lemme know before 6:AM if ya want it brought along.

[norton(kel)]

thanks Clark I borrowed one from BikeSDP and new shocks are on:

[pfb]

Does anybody have a tube of Dow Corning 730 sealant??

This stuff is evidently magic in a tube for sealing engine parts... A fluorosilicone RTV sealant that is highly resistant to fuel, oil, and solvents and has a wide temperature range. Very popular in the airplane and Porsche community for sealing up chronically leaking parts (hmmm, can anybody say BMW airhead??).

At any rate, the stuff is Über expensive at ~$90 a 3 oz tube and not easy to find locally. If somebody has a tube, I'd be happy to purchase a partial or sealed tube, or pay pitch in for the little bit I actually need and let you keep it in your toolbox!

[jet123]

Folks,

Need to bend some steel tubes (Yakima rack crossbar specifically). It has an O.D of 1.125" and a wall thickness of 0.0625" - not sure what type of steel it is. I am wanting to try both a 180degree bend on about a 6" radius as well as (2) 90degree bends with a lesser radius (3"?) + a straight section between. Here's the kicker (so it seems) - the O.D. of 1.125" is not common so finding dies is proving hard. The other kicker is some of the benders I have tried will 'twist' the tubing a bit as it is bent (likely due to not having the right dies and/or bender to start with) - not good. I need the bent tube to lie 'flat' when placed on a flat surface.

Before I buy or pay for a run of tubes, I want to test the bent tubing in my application. So I am wanting to find someone who can assist with bending say 8-12 tubes for me to play with.

Does anybody know of a tube bender resource that can bend non-standard O.D.?

Both bends scenarios would end in a similar result that looks like this (upper left)

• Tube 'footprint' is ~ 14" in length x ~ 9" in height
• One straight section is longer than the parallel straight section by ~ 6"

Yes, I have tried numerous resources here in Ft Collins, but those I have checked with can't do it because:

• Don't have the right die (everyone I have tried)
• Can't bend the tube on a single flat plane (i.e. - they put a twist in it, cheap bender / poor skill)
• Can't handle that small of O.D. (say the muffler shops)

[jet123]

Yes, I am working on a CAD mock-up for this - but wanted to get the word out now (hence my awesome technical descriptions )

[pfb]

Need a paint shop in Denver to spray some automotive trim pieces...

Any suggestions?

[pfb]

Still looking for a paint shop...

Read a few favorable reviews for Diamond Auto Body on Evan's. They wanted $500 to paint four fender flares a Ford OEM gray. Wow... Way more than I was expecting!

Called Maaco on Colfax, which I assume is pretty far down the spectrum in both quality and price. They were $250. I don't think I'd trust those guys for quality bodywork and a complete respray, but if you have the right equipment, how hard can it be to paint four plastic fender flares??

[TheMuffinMan]

Originally Posted by pfb

Still looking for a paint shop...

Read a few favorable reviews for Diamond Auto Body on Evan's. They wanted $500 to paint four fender flares a Ford OEM gray. Wow... Way more than I was expecting!

Called Maaco on Colfax, which I assume is pretty far down the spectrum in both quality and price. They were $250. I don't think I'd trust those guys for quality bodywork and a complete respray, but if you have the right equipment, how hard can it be to paint four plastic fender flares??

I'm actually considering renting/buying a paint gun to paint some m/c parts but am interested in price as well for shops. I haven't ever had any painting done in Colorado though so I can't recommend any places.

[terry.mc]

Originally Posted by pfb

Also have a VAG-COM for those looking to tweak their VW/AUDI's... Some pretty cool stuff.

I also have a Yoshimura box for tweaking Suzuki fuel injection mapping (Vstrom surging, in particular)

Hey pfb, do you still have the VAG-COM?

I'm having a bit of trouble programming a key for my car using the normal methods (I can only have 1 active key for some reason) and would like to program it with the VAG-COM, I might also look at my o2 sensors while I'm at it.

[wakewop]

Originally Posted by TheMuffinMan

I'm actually considering renting/buying a paint gun to paint some m/c parts but am interested in price as well for shops. I haven't ever had any painting done in Colorado though so I can't recommend any places.

The paint and flex agent are expensive. Found that out when painting a golf cart.
Flex agent is needed for plastic parts. Crappy flex agent means a crappy paint job that is going to flake off
Or crack. Learned that the hard way. Painting yourself is not hard as long as you have a good spray gun, extremely clean area to do it, perfect prep, and be accurate in mixing the paint, flex, and hardener.

[RalphyDo]

Originally Posted by jet123

Folks,

Need to bend some steel tubes (Yakima rack crossbar specifically). It has an O.D of 1.125" and a wall thickness of 0.0625" - not sure what type of steel it is. I am wanting to try both a 180degree bend on about a 6" radius as well as (2) 90degree bends with a lesser radius (3"?) + a straight section between. Here's the kicker (so it seems) - the O.D. of 1.125" is not common so finding dies is proving hard. The other kicker is some of the benders I have tried will 'twist' the tubing a bit as it is bent (likely due to not having the right dies and/or bender to start with) - not good. I need the bent tube to lie 'flat' when placed on a flat surface.

Before I buy or pay for a run of tubes, I want to test the bent tubing in my application. So I am wanting to find someone who can assist with bending say 8-12 tubes for me to play with.

Does anybody know of a tube bender resource that can bend non-standard O.D.?

Both bends scenarios would end in a similar result that looks like this (upper left)

• Tube 'footprint' is ~ 14" in length x ~ 9" in height
• One straight section is longer than the parallel straight section by ~ 6"

Yes, I have tried numerous resources here in Ft Collins, but those I have checked with can't do it because:

• Don't have the right die (everyone I have tried)
• Can't bend the tube on a single flat plane (i.e. - they put a twist in it, cheap bender / poor skill)
• Can't handle that small of O.D. (say the muffler shops)

I know Hanksville Hot Rods off of south Sante Fe in Littleton can do that stuff. Give them a try. You might end up having to have a set of custome dies made. Not hugely expensive but not cheap. The Hanks, the least they can say is "No"

[pfb]

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Originally Posted by terry.mc

Hey pfb, do you still have the VAG-COM?

I'm having a bit of trouble programming a key for my car using the normal methods (I can only have 1 active key for some reason) and would like to program it with the VAG-COM, I might also look at my o2 sensors while I'm at it.

Still have a vag-com setup, although I need to make sure the PC laptop I have the software on still boots. I had it running on my MacBook Pro under emulation, but when I swapped to an air with only a 256K ram disk, I needed the space the emulation partition was taking up so it was back to an ancient Toshiba laptop for the VAGCOM system.

No problem looking at the O2 data, but I don't think you can program a modern VW key with the VAGCOM. I think the dealer needs to read codes from the immobilizer and use a secure interface with VWUSA to get the program codes. I know it was not possible with my Touareg,(which also had the added cost/complication of the KESSY ignition/keyless entry). It was quite expensive to get an additional key for twargzilla...

You're welcome to borrow the laptop and cable for a while, no VW or Audi these days. I can run through how to get it going with you as well. Very finicky hardware. It's all designed around ancient RS-232 protocols. Add the USB serial bus emulation layer, emulated serial port settings, and the Windows emulation (when I was running it under vmware on my mac) and it was a chore to get everything dialed in on a new computer.

If you want to figure out more about VW key programming, check out VWVortex.com or the ross-tech.com web site.

[pfb]

...and on the 02 sensors, are you getting fuel trim check engine codes (P0170)?

Usually it is the MAF sensor drifting out of spec rather than the O2 sensors, easily swapped out.

With the VAGCOM, you can read the O2 trim values (measuring block 032) and see how far the trim adjustment has drifted, even if not far enough to trip the CEL.

[jet123]

Originally Posted by RalphyDo

I know Hanksville Hot Rods off of south Sante Fe in Littleton can do that stuff. Give them a try. You might end up having to have a set of custome dies made. Not hugely expensive but not cheap. The Hanks, the least they can say is "No"

I actually called them, nice folks but couldn't do it. I have since bought my own manual tube bender and I am working on getting it mounted into my shop floor. So far the few test bends look good and dies are pretty cheap for it too (albeit they are aluminum - just have to be careful).

Thanks for the suggestion!

[terry.mc]

Originally Posted by pfb

...and on the 02 sensors, are you getting fuel trim check engine codes (P0170)?

Usually it is the MAF sensor drifting out of spec rather than the O2 sensors, easily swapped out.

With the VAGCOM, you can read the O2 trim values (measuring block 032) and see how far the trim adjustment has drifted, even if not far enough to trip the CEL.

Cool!

I can load the software on a laptop if needed, I think I still have the iso. I have non official cable that I've done some work with, but it won't enable the functions I need without a real cable.

I think I'm good for the keys, I have an 01 Audi, and iirc key programming can be done as its per-immobilizer.

Are you around and would it be convenient tomorrow if I picked up the cable?

Thanks!

Edit: I just read the vag com programming guide and that made me realize what I had wrong just programming it from the door (each key holds a place, I kept programming keys for place 1overwriting he previous key.) I have two working keys now, and that was the big thing. I can catch up anytime to check o2/maf etc...