Little tweaks make a big difference

Iadmit that I’m always a little reluctant to fit performance upgrades or modern equipment unless I know for certain it’s going to make a noticeable and worthwhile difference, so I’ve pondered over improving the braking and handling of my VW campervan for several years and asked many specialists for advice and recommendations. I’ve concluded that standard equipment is in many cases perfectly adequate, providing it’s in good working order. Consequently, I’ve replaced all of the tyres, routinely serviced the brakes, but realised that some components such as the telescopic dampers cannot be checked. So I’ve changed them for a full set of standardspec units from KYB ( kyb

europe.com). The difference in ride quality was immediately noticeable, perhaps suggesting my old dampers were worn.

My local VW specialist, Herbie Hospital ( Herbiehospital.com), recommended uprating the front anti-roll bar and fitting a rear one (not fitted as standard) to help reduce body roll under cornering. I’m aware that there is quite a lot of body roll due to the height and shape of the vehicle, although I’ve tried to limit this by mounting heavy objects such as the fridge in the centre of the vehicle to help balance weight distribution, and not fit anything heavy in the roof area. I’ve also ensured the kitchen with all its pots, pans and food is stored low down and close to the centre of the vehicle to help keep the vehicle’s centre of gravity low – not an easy task when you add two adults and two children to the interior.

Keen to reduce that body roll further, I turned to Heritage Parts Centre

( heritagepartscentre.com) for a pair of EMPI uprated ARBs complete with polyurethane bushes. I’ve removed and fitted ARBs on a number of cars, but have never had to make new mounts or use clamps instead of drop links, so I asked Herbie Hospital to help. I’m glad I did because they knew exactly where to mount the rear ARB, which involves drilling holes into the chassis legs and trimming some excess metal.

At the front, the clamps are a little stiff to pull together, so I now know how to do this job armed with a pair of pliers and a hammer. And have the ARBs made a difference? Definitely, especially under cornering where there appears to be less body roll and more controllability. This isn’t a cheap upgrade at around £320 for the two ARBs with fittings, but there’s a price to pay for sprung steel and a fitting kit that actually fits and makes a difference. What with the new dampers and tyres, there’s a

noticeable improvement in ride quality and handling. All three components probably work together, so I’m unsure whether one of them stands out from the rest. One conclusion I’ve definitely drawn from all of this is that serviceable items such as dampers and tyres used to be renewed at regular intervals (50,000 miles for dampers and six years for tyres), and it pays to follow these guidelines.

Feeling confident I could continue making improvements and haven’t wasted any money yet, I turned my attention to something that has been concerning me – its brakes. Although they are in good order and work as well as can be expected (they pass the

MoT every year), I wanted a more responsive setup that didn’t require me to stand on the brake pedal should I need to stop quickly. A brake servo seemed to be the sensible solution here. I did look at upgrades such as bigger brakes and later single piston calipers, but decided to start with the servo. I realise that a servo doesn’t improve braking performance, but it does reduce braking effort.

A servo upgrade kit was sourced from Heritage Parts Centre – at present supply is a little limited, but hopefully this will improve soon. This consists of a Varga vacuumoperated brake servo with dual- circuit master cylinder and all the necessary vacuum pipes and a one-way valve. The servo is an inline unit, so it is mounted between the two front suspension beams and requires a mounting plate to be welded in position. The vacuum pipework needs routing from it to the engine’s inlet manifold. I returned to Herbie Hospital to ask them to help with this job. They’ve fitted plenty of them before, so knew what to do, including drilling a hole into the inlet manifold. I had to source a length of M14 threaded bar to connect between the servo and brake pedal, but otherwise all the parts were supplied by Heritage. The first length of threaded bar I bought didn’t last too long before it had visibly started to bend, so I replaced it with a stronger high tensile bar, and that has survived to date.

Once fitted and after checking it was working, I was a little nervous of the results, hoping that the servo had been money well spent. Happily, it had. The difference is amazing, requiring much less effort on the brake pedal. I can now rattle all the pots and pans inside my campervan if I conduct an emergency stop, so I realise I need to ensure everything is securely bolted down.

“A servo doesn’t improve braking performance, but it does reduce braking effort”

Rob decided to fit standardspec KYB dampers to his VW. They made a noticeable difference, suggesting the old dampers were probably worn.

Front and rear EMPI anti-roll bars and fitting kit for the VW Bay Window are not cheap at around £320, but Rob found they made a noticeable difference to the handling and in reducing bodyroll.

The rear anti-roll bar is secured to the bottom damper mounts, plus additional mounts need to be fitted to the chassis legs. Once again, Rob enlisted help from Herbie Hospital.

Richard at Herbie Hospital prepares the space between the front beams for mounting the brake servo.

Old dual-circuit master cylinder in the bottom half of the photo has been replaced with a vacuum-operated servo and new master cylinder. Braking effort has been noticeably reduced.

Rob admits that he’s worked on ARBs with drop links, but he’s never worked with a clamp like this on the front.