Thursday about 8:30 AM, I received the call that the van was ready. I picked up the van, had breakfast at a cafe, filled the tank and headed East. Within 16 miles of leaving the dealership I turned onto my first unpaved road with the van. Two lightly muddy pick-ups pulling travel trailers were at th...

Wednesday morning I woke, somewhat rested, just before the dealer opened and moved the van to the staging area outside of the service bay doors. Their shuttle driver dropped me off in the downtown area and I spent my time hiking the greenbelt along the Snake River. Around 2 PM I received notice that...

Tuesday morning he dropped me off at the Temple Square to catch the bus to Idaho Falls. Warren, the sales rep working with me, met me at the station in the van and I drove us back to the dealership. Driving back the van's ABS and Brake lights lit up, didn't seem to affect anything, but he agreed to ...

It was fun going to get this van. I set off on Sunday with a backpack and some camping gear, walking to the Elgin Metra stop, riding it to Chicago, walking around the downtown area for an hour, then catching Amtrak's California Zephyr to Salt Lake City. Monday's scenery on the train was much better ...

Call your LAPS and ask for the numbers of guys with home shops. I ran deliveries for Advance and was often delivering to guys with lifts in their garages.

Yep, I've done it again. I take a train out to Salt Lake City, UT tomorrow and a bus to Idaho Falls, ID on Tuesday to get this. http://www.cars.com/vehicledetail/detail/643263512/overview/ 2005 Chevrolet Astro AWD 128k miles 02_002.jpg While my wife and I were on vacation through the PNW, I had her ...

Might be that a cheap fuel pump was used and it's gotten too weak to keep up with the engine. OEM fuel pumps only in these things, aftermarket ones have a history of dying early deaths. Another thing, the ignition control module on the distributor, those things like to heat fail with age. Van will w...

Like the disk/drum pre-install painting. I always mean to do that, but usually don't have the time when the brakes are being done.

AstroWill wrote:Of course if we had a tach we could see that everything there was just fine.

ScanGaugeII, UltraGauge, Bluetooth adapter and Torque app, all great ways to gain a tach.

2007 and later Wranglers have the same bolt pattern, but the back spacing is wrong. You can often fine Wrangler guys selling used aftermarket rims with back spacing that will work on the 1985-2002 vans.

It's been done. I seem to recall bad angles and bump steer being a problem with it.

I was under a Chevy Avalanche recently, much beefier idler arm set up. Wonder what it would take to get that set up under an Astro.

Yes, interesting.

Wonder what causes them to fail, as I've yet to have that happen in any of my vans.

So, you chopped the back off yourself and built up the body?

Body shop told me the best thing to do is pull the head liner and use and induction heater on the riv-nuts. Supposedly the bolts will then come out like butter.

That Astro motorhome I haven't seen before and I've been around these vans a very long time. Can we get more details and pics?

Most Astros in my possession at once has been three so far, currently looking to purchase my 8th one though.