China News Service, May 10. According to the US "World Journal" report, Sun Yu, a Chinese resident who lives in Van Nuys, Los Angeles, had a whim in October 2020 and planned to refurbish an antique beetle by himself. car).
He started looking for second-hand cars on the Internet, "I wanted to convert it into a tram, so I thought that as long as it was a complete one", he finally bought one for $1,700.
In the next year or so, Sun Yu, who had no knowledge of auto repair, began an amateur life in the garage of studying and beating.
I don’t know where to start.
“I didn’t know where to start the repair at first, so if I wanted to, I would take it all down.” Sun Yu said. He originally planned to take it down and replace it with the parts that need to be replaced, or remove it, polish and rust, and then install it, but Because there is no foundation, so I thought of where to remove it, and if I couldn't remove it, I watched the video on the Internet.
But this also brings some problems, "I was very happy when I took it apart, I forgot all about it when I installed it, and I don't remember how to put it back."
He laughed and said, so he had to learn how to assemble it again.
Halfway through the disassembly, he found that it would cost a lot to convert into a tram. A battery pack cost 10,000 US dollars, an engine cost 4,000 US dollars, in addition to assembling circuits, which were all knowledge that he didn't understand at all, so he decided to keep it. The existing structure of the car is just fine.
However, when I dismantled the car, I discovered that the car’s situation was worse than expected. First of all, the iron sheet on the "floor" inside the car was actually rusted through. "People in the back seat can reach their feet on the ground."
The inside of the engine also exploded. Sun Yu removed all the other parts of the engine and found that it was still usable, so he bought a new cylinder block and installed it.
Almost everything is renewed from the inside out
In addition, the chassis was scraped with a grinding wheel, repainted with anti-rust paint, and the bearings, shock absorbers, and universal joint ball joints were all replaced with new ones.
The interior has been refurbished, bought second-hand seats and replaced them with new leathers.
"Every part and screw have been removed, and every wire has been reinstalled. The good ones are removed, polished, polished and repainted, and the bad ones are replaced." He said that the diagrams on the circuit description are not understandable at all, because " It's for the insider to see, but the outsider catches the blind." After studying for a few days, he even succeeded in guessing.
"From the ground up, now I have understood the principle of the engine." Sun Yu also taught himself electric welding. In addition to watching videos online to check data, he also bought several books, including official maintenance manuals, civil engine maintenance manuals, and painting books. Wait.
The only thing that needs to be sent outside to do is really unable to complete, is the sandblasting and rust removal of the shell, and then take it back and paint it yourself.
However, he also learned a "class of blood" because he painted yellow paint without sanding after spraying the primer, so the paint could be scraped off with his hands, and it was particularly uneven, so he had to re-blast the sand and buy the paint again. Repainting, "painting cost thousands of dollars."
A sense of accomplishment when the engine is started
When the engine ran for the first time, he had a sense of accomplishment, because he assembled the engine entirely by watching videos and manuals. "In the beginning, he didn't know where to connect the electricity."
Because the car has a dual-intake cylinder block, I bought a new one but it has a single air intake, so I changed it and made some modifications, "I don’t know if it is feasible at all," and finally I got a car repairer to borrow it. Professional torque wrench.
I didn't expect the engine to work normally, so I was super happy.
Although enjoying the fun of repairing the car, Sun Yu said that he does not recommend that everyone try it, because before the implementation, he read the Internet and said that the refurbishment only cost four to five thousand US dollars. As a result, he spent a total of 15 thousand US dollars. "If you really know that it will cost I wouldn't be able to do it with so much money", "and after the money was spent, I found that I usually didn't dare to open the door."
There are still many problems with the car installed by amateurs. One day, when he was driving two blocks away, the steering wheel suddenly failed.
Fortunately, there was no car on the road at the time. He hurriedly stopped to check on the roadside and found that one of the screws had broken. He could only walk home to take the screw back and start repairing the car on the street.
After this incident, he was also very worried. He could only drive once in the community, and he felt that the car was very noisy, "like a tractor."
But "it is a miracle that the car I installed can run", he still has a sense of accomplishment.
In addition, he also took the entire car repair process into a short video and put it on the Internet. The most one was played 180,000 times and it gained thousands of fans.
But what makes him dumbfounded is that there are always netizens who come to ask questions about the car, and he can only show that he is actually a "xiaobai".
But of course I still learned some car repair knowledge, "but only for cars before 1975."
“It’s enough to play it again, to satisfy curiosity, it’s a super big toy”, but having said that, he still didn’t live idle, who likes to do it. During the epidemic, he reinstalled his toilet at home, but he said : "After installation, I don't want to decorate anymore."
But he did not shy away: "Every once in a while, I will do things that I couldn't do before and challenge myself." Therefore, his family has a lot of his "weird ideas", for example, his wife raised two in the backyard. Chicken, he installed a door that can be opened and closed remotely by a mobile phone APP in the chicken coop. Recently, he is studying electronic engineering and wants to add new songs to a Taiko Master game console at home. (Li Xue)