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Posted by: Jolteon Dec 29 2013, 02:39 PM

So, people on here who know me, understand my love interest for Volkswagen. And with my driver's license about a month away, my auntie and uncle bought this Bug for me. Well, it's actually for my uncle, who in a few years, will be converting it, via kit, into a Porsche 550 Spider. But in the mean time, it's mine!




So she's a 1970, but running a 1600. She's very pretty on the outside, and is largely free of rust, but I keep finding things that make it seem like the previous owner didn't really care about details... it's missing glove box insert, sun visors, assist straps, rear seatbelts; the whole rear seat seems to be from a different year or something... but it's free for me, so I'm not really complaining.

First proper trip out we took her up a local scenic back road, which is very popular with motorcyclists.



The thing which became most evident from this little excursion is the noise. Yes, it's an old VW; yes, it's never going to be quiet... but this is a special case. I intend to use this as a daily driver for at least a few months, until I can save for my own car, and there's only so much gearbox whine and road noise one can handle.

Posted by: uiui Dec 29 2013, 02:44 PM

Shizz man you are back Nice little car mate I like it and good pics It's cool to see these oldies on road

Posted by: please Dec 29 2013, 02:47 PM

NICE, looks like a very good body to undergo kit car treatment though?

Posted by: JoviBlue Dec 29 2013, 02:47 PM

rad bug!

needs those old skool twin pipes to fill those holes, they're sweet

what's the plan after this?

Posted by: Myca Dec 29 2013, 02:59 PM

Whoa

Which car you looking for? This beetle is amazing, very good condition, but where is bumpers?

Posted by: Jolteon Dec 29 2013, 03:25 PM

Step 1: Soundproofing

A little bit of research into soundproofing cars leads to one destination: dynamat. A great product but quite pricey, and a little beyond my budget. A little more digging, and one reads about the cheap wonders of roof insulation flashing tape. A trip to the local hardware yields unpromising results at first, but eventually settle on this stuff, which is basically like aluminium mesh surrounded by some rubbery stuff with bitumen-based adhesive:


Figured that most of the noise was coming from the back of the car, so first job was to remove seats.




Luckily whoever put the carpet down at the back didn't glue it down, and just placed it over some crappy heat insulation, which did nothing for the sound. But removing some of the carpet revealed a big source of the gearbox noise: whatever plate that covered the gear linkage was missing!


I fabricating a new plate to go over it, but I forgot to take a picture.

Removing the battery revealed a few little bits and pieces, including some money!



Lots of gunk on the back wall, where the stock insulation was crumbling.



Took quite a while, but eventually got off the remaining glue:



It was at about this point that the sun started to set, so set up some lights:


The carpet that was in the back made for a nice template for cutting the flashing tape to shape, then it's simply a matter of bashing it into shape with a rubber hammer






And so after about 5 hours; the finished result:

Posted by: Jolteon Dec 29 2013, 03:28 PM

That's what I thought, too, but the only rust-free floor pans already have good bodies on them.

Posted by: Madset. Dec 30 2013, 08:57 AM

Shiit that was a quick update


are you gonna slam it and make it hectic

Posted by: Jolteon Dec 30 2013, 04:18 PM

It's already been lowered a few inches, and it ain't going no further. At least not yet...

Thinking of doing something with the wheels... Don't really want to spend much/if anything on new rims, although that would be sexy. Might paint either the steelies or the hubcaps(if I can figure out how to paint the stainless steel?) in checkerboard pattern.

Did anyone ever put Work Equip 03s on a Beetle?

Posted by: please Dec 30 2013, 04:54 PM

oh, i love the way the rims look right now already, the color of the body and the cop-like wheel and tire setup looks awwweeesomeee, only thing it needs is a narrowed beam and couple more inch drop in front but yeah, work equips sound good, i recently saw a pic of a bug with some jdm rims, gotta look up


//edit/
http://lejup.lv/f/52c1a5e8dbc74lhtivqc1388422632.jpg
http://lejup.lv/f/52c1a5e8dbc74bgblhib1388422632.jpg

Posted by: prorider Dec 30 2013, 06:11 PM

well i hate post 1967 beetles but yours look good with that color, no bumpers and that rims
just keep it like that

Posted by: Madset. Dec 30 2013, 11:02 PM

i also like the eyelid things very cool

Posted by: Sir Cub Dec 30 2013, 11:37 PM

oohhh this painted red, dropped, with white walls, re-done interior. = sex

Posted by: Daniel. Dec 31 2013, 10:57 PM

NICK! <3

Nice to see you're back!

Congrats with your car mate, it's perfect for you!

Posted by: Jolteon Jan 1 2014, 02:43 PM

The paint on one of the wheels was a bit dodgy, with the paint flaking and some metal/some rust was showing through, so decided to repaint it. The black I had is slightly more matte than the others, but you don't really notice unless you put them right next to each other, so I'll probably just leave it at this point.









Next thing I'm planning is to change the steering wheel, as its current one is quite ugly, and probably set up a stereo.

Still not sure if I want the expense of buying new rims, and I suspect I'd need to get a bolt-pattern conversion or something if I wanted to go for JDM wheels... (which I really do ) If it were actually my car, I'd have already ordered new rims.

EDIT: Doing some research into wheels, and apparently wheel adapters aren't legal in Australia, so I'd have to get blank brakes and get them drilled with the right pattern.

Posted by: EE8Kev Jan 2 2014, 04:40 AM

Don't waste money on the wheels,like you said just save up so you can purchase your own vehicle. As for painting stuff on chrome I think you need a product like adhesion promotor or something like that to make the paint stick even better, oh and sanding/scuffing it up will let the paint grab onto it more.

Posted by: duncan Jan 2 2014, 06:14 AM

Nice beetle! It's hard to find a super beetle virtually rust free.
I don't think you can narrow the beam on super beetles, but people have been able to go pretty low without narrowing theirs.
There are also lots of cool VW/ Porsche rims that's are already the right bolt pattern.
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=342274
Good reading ^

Posted by: please Jan 2 2014, 11:46 PM

oh, my bad

Posted by: duncan Jan 3 2014, 01:29 AM

I may be wrong tho

Posted by: Jolteon Jan 3 2014, 04:24 AM

You're not wrong, but this ain't a Super Beetle.

Posted by: duncan Jan 6 2014, 04:13 PM

Whoops, my bad lol. Still a nice beetle tho

Posted by: Faяaп. Jan 6 2014, 06:08 PM

Who's going to know you have a wheel adapter? Just put stocks on whenever you need to get something tested.

Posted by: _Kevin_ Jan 6 2014, 07:30 PM

this is too cool
congrats bud awesome car

Posted by: Jolteon Jan 17 2014, 11:17 AM

Wheel whores stickers (and cherry-scented air fresheners) arrived in the post today.


And attached




Feel like a bit of a prat having these but standard wheels.

Posted by: JoviBlue Jan 17 2014, 11:22 AM

Race bug


the next herbie

wall ride tha ts**t

Posted by: Jolteon Jan 25 2014, 04:22 AM

Mighty Car Mods stickers arrived this week




Also mid-way through stereo install, had some complications with mounting speakers and the head unit, but should get it finished by tomorrow.

Posted by: Noodles Jan 25 2014, 04:31 AM

very cool, i love the chopped sticker haha

Posted by: N.Ozols Jan 25 2014, 09:58 PM

ah, chopped!, best thing in land down under......


anyway,

Posted by: Faяaп. Jan 26 2014, 04:32 AM

Put some vintage stickers on there

Posted by: _Kevin_ Jan 26 2014, 05:50 AM

I bet wiring that thing will be fun I'm driving speaker-less too right not...

so what are you using for the sound proofing? There's a lot of noise coming into my car too and might snag your cheaper trick haha

Posted by: Jolteon Jan 27 2014, 12:06 PM

Wiring would've been tricky, but lucky my dad's got an electrical engineering degree. Got a pretty sexy sound system now.

For sound proofing, If you've got money to burn, it's probably worth having a look at getting Dynamat, as that's like the proper stuff. Otherwise, people tend to talk about flashing tape. The exact recommendation I had was a product called http://www.cofair.com/roof.aspx but I couldn't find it here (apparently it comes from Home Depot in the US), so had to compromise with something a bit different. The stuff I got hasn't made a super difference - like it's still pretty noisy - but it's at least driveable now.

I should be getting my provisional license this week, so I can actually drive on my own! So I've got to sort out a few more little things to really make the car more useable, most importantly being sun visors. I've had to drive it into direct sun a few times now, and it's pretty much impossible to see (to the point where's it's actually dangerous).

Posted by: Jolteon Feb 23 2014, 06:14 AM

So having moved into, as the Americans would call it, college; I've been using the Beetle as a daily for the last month or so, and she's been serving me well, for the most part. But in the first week after I moved out, the gearbox started playing up, and it wasn't selecting gears. At first, thought it was just in need of a clutch adjustment (if you own an aircooled VW, learn how to do this!), but when that didn't fix it, we found that the coupler which connects the shifter to the gearbox was in a state of slight disrepair. This part was accessible by the inspection hole, the same panel for which we found was missing when doing the sound proofing. (reason for the panel being missing??)

Basically, the coupler should look something like this; with the rod thing from the shifter being bolted in the middle:

And on mine, the red urethane mounts were, quite literally, nothing more than a pile of red dust in the bottom of the transmission tunnel. My dad managed to fabricate a replacement out of some rubbery engine mount material he had lying around, and it's been swish up until this week; when similar symptoms started occurring. We did the clutch adjustment again and found that the wingnut which adjusts the clutch is either from the wrong year or maybe even from a different car completely, as it doesn't quite function how it should do. My dad managed to, ingeniously, use some cable-ties and tape to hopefully stop it from coming loose so quickly again.

Oh, the joys of an old car!

Posted by: Big Daddy Andy Feb 23 2014, 07:12 AM

nice

question: how do asutralians call college

Posted by: Jolteon Feb 23 2014, 01:55 PM

We call it university (uni for short); though sometimes people call the part where the students can live on-campus the college.

Posted by: Jolteon Mar 12 2014, 12:28 PM

How the Bug currently sits:



Hopefully the clutch problems will soon be remedied!