Learn Me Air-Cooled VW Restoration

[XYZ 2154]

Why would you want a Mexican beetle?

[elfenix 34337]

17 minutes ago, XYZ said:

Why would you want a Mexican beetle?

they use real sugar in theirs. 

Edited August 1, 2018 by elfenix

[RDCanecutter 26475]

12 minutes ago, elfenix said:

an idea occurred to me, so i searched the intertrons for "import beetle from mexico" and the first result was @RDCanecutter's thread on TOS. 

 

should be able to get a 1993 nowadays. 

That was my thought process back when I was in the "avoid having to work on it every weekend" mode. But now, thanks to a side-effect of my unfeeling sociopathic nature, I turned a switch in my head and decided I would enjoy working on one.

Also, it appears that the once-thriving borderland gray-market Mexican VW shops dried up as they doubtless drifted into new things to bring across.

[RDCanecutter 26475]

OK, today I took the morning off and went driving in the rain. Stopped by the nearest VW dealership, a mechanic seemed happy to stop thinking about modern diesel emissions chicanery and talk about old air-cooled bugs.

There are mysterious intersections between where you find bugs, and where you find the dirt-track fans.

The whole bug-search process feels like trying to buy moonshine. You say you like it. He says he likes it. You allow how you wished you could find more. He talks about the weather. You talk about something else. Eventually, on that moonshine/VW thing, maybe he knows a guy who knows a guy. Probably not, but maybe.

So an hour later I found myself following hints to look for a road and on that road to look for a house. This part of Bama might as well be France because every business locked down tight for lunch, but then I saw it.

Wrack and Ruin.

Edited August 1, 2018 by RDCanecutter

[RDCanecutter 26475]

This may have been the only one with an engine:

[RDCanecutter 26475]

Once upon a time this doodad pulled through many a drive-though:

[RDCanecutter 26475]

Dudes in the next shop over said the VW guy had suffered a stroke and might still be in a wheelchair, and that besides the hulks out front, the building was stuffed full of VW parts.

I checked on his website, and it turns out until recently he was running an air-cooled VW dealership out of what must be his house. Shot an email, now ve vait.

[gasman 114]

If that doesn't pan out, find the local air-cooled club and attend their next meeting. There is bound to be someone there with what you are looking for. Usually a good group of enablers there to help you spend your time and money. 

 

[RDCanecutter 26475]

3 hours ago, El Diablo said:

There's them Suzuki Amigos too ya know. They're gonna need some love eventually.

 

[El Diablo 4232]

I guess I got my brands and models mixed up. The Samurais and Sidekicks could be a fallback position. Yeah, I know, watercooled, doomed to failure. 

[RDCanecutter 26475]

4 minutes ago, El Diablo said:

I guess I got my brands and models mixed up. The Samurais and Sidekicks could be a fallback position. Yeah, I know, watercooled, doomed to failure. 

They're all the same glob-o-car. My Geo Tracker is technically a Chevy but you look under the hood and half the things say "Isuzu".

And it's from Canada. I learned this in Mexico one day while I waited for a kid to bicycle back with a tube for the tubeless tire, and I was so stunned-bored that I started reading the specs on the inside of the door.

[El Diablo 4232]

Girl I was banging back around '99 or so had a brand new Tracker she was so proud of it. Said her daddy got a great deal on it, he had used some coupons (her words). It was a Chevy at that point in time but they were initially marketed as being GEO. 

Those Samurais don't look half bad now. 

[ROFL BOX 6649]

22 hours ago, ROFL BOX said:

The property owner says he is in possession of bo he moment.th titles

WTF BBQ LOKO????

"The property owner says he is in possession of both the titles..."

[RDCanecutter 26475]

11 hours ago, ROFL BOX said:

WTF BBQ LOKO????

"The property owner says he is in possession of both the titles..."

I figured it was just a moment of non thought linear.

[RDCanecutter 26475]

And so begins the Age of New Tools, when man did go forth and buy 4 3-ton Torin jack-stands for to elevate an entire vehicle at once, and jack with it.

[XYZ 2154]

What vehicle did you get?

[RDCanecutter 26475]

Still looking. Basically setting up a shop in the garage so I can go after it from day one. Practicing by doing stuff to my Tracker that I would normally have ignored or paid somebody to do.

That's one bone-head way to live but that ain't me no mo'.

Edited August 5, 2018 by RDCanecutter

[Loco 3754]

Basically my first car...  71' cut fenders, light bar, roll bar & 0 fucks...

 

 

Mine din't look so clean... more rust, more bean brown....  way more fucking epic

Kids at my school wanted to go to lunch in my old bug rather than their clean new cars...  bought for $600 sold 3 years later to underclassman for $2800...  fuck yeah!

[Loco 3754]

I've got some old photos somewhere, if I can find em, I'll post'em...  could pass a basketball through my floor pans...good times

 

[RDCanecutter 26475]

Do it. All old VW photos, rise up and live again here.

[RDCanecutter 26475]

Crawling through the Haynes manuals for VWs and Geo Trackers (since I am pretending my Geo Tracker is also a VW, because it's sitting right there in the garage and also needs maintenance), it looks like Old VWs (in red) don't have as much to maintain, but you have to check it twice as often.

[RDCanecutter 26475]

Why not do a pointless tire rotation on a steamy Sunday morning? Mainly wanted to stare at brakes and undercarriage.

[Chuychanga 133]

^^^ I used to give flying lessons to one of the members of the Flametrick Subs.

And my first driving lessons were in my grandmother’s VW Squareback. She also had a Thing but I never saw it run. 

That’s all I got. 

[RDCanecutter 26475]

11 hours ago, Chuychanga said:

^^^ I used to give flying lessons to one of the members of the Flametrick Subs.

And my first driving lessons were in my grandmother’s VW Squareback. She also had a Thing but I never saw it run. 

That’s all I got. 

Aviation: You ever do the flour drop, or as I called it, the bombing run?

[Loco 3754]

On 8/4/2018 at 9:52 PM, RDCanecutter said:

Do it. All old VW photos, rise up and live again here.

This is when I first bought it, no stinger, no lights, no roll bar...  just bean brown and rust (check out the floor pans suspiciously bulging down)  It did have a big Weber carb, a Hurst shifter, split e-brake handles and a moronic panorama rear view mirror....  I spent part of my summer screwing aluminium flashing from rail to tunnel to sure up the floor.  so stupid...

 

When parallel parking  I could snug the back into a spot and my buddy and I could pick up the front of the car by the bull bar and walk it in. 

[El Diablo 4232]

The VW I learned to drive a stick on belonged to a HS buddy. He went to the parking lot one day and didn't realize some wiseguys had lifted it up and put the wheels down on top of watermelon halves. Said the tires was just a spinning in place.

[RDCanecutter 26475]

My first bug was bought from a High School buddy, pretty sure he still had a key. There was hijinks at the mall where I'd go inside, they'd spot it in the parking lot, then I'd go back out and it'd be 50 yards away somewhere else.

We made our own fun back then, kids.

 

Also, about 2 years later I checked under "the smuggler's panel" and found a mummified joint from who knows when.

Edited August 6, 2018 by RDCanecutter

[ROFL BOX 6649]

I'd like to say it was being overly busy, but I'll admit to halfway being forgetful for not uploading the pics that I'm going to email as a link.

 

Give me a bit, @RDCanecutter... pics are being internettted to the site & a link will go out after awhile.

& For those reading, it's actually 3 bugs.  (1) in blue, prob. mid 80's, 1,303 cc.   The other 2 are white, maybe an early 70's & the other a late 70's.

[RPM 26359]

On 8/3/2018 at 6:18 PM, RDCanecutter said:

And so begins the Age of New Tools, when man did go forth and buy 4 3-ton Torin jack-stands for to elevate an entire vehicle at once, and jack with it.

You run out of cinder blocks?

[RDCanecutter 26475]

9 hours ago, RPM said:

You run out of cinder blocks?

Using all those to hold the roof on the house.

[RDCanecutter 26475]

14 hours ago, ROFL BOX said:

I'd like to say it was being overly busy, but I'll admit to halfway being forgetful for not uploading the pics that I'm going to email as a link.

 

Give me a bit, @RDCanecutter... pics are being internettted to the site & a link will go out after awhile.

& For those reading, it's actually 3 bugs.  (1) in blue, prob. mid 80's, 1,303 cc.   The other 2 are white, maybe an early 70's & the other a late 70's.

Ain't no rush, be happy to see them when you get a chance.

[ROFL BOX 6649]

Email sent, pics should be there in a public file.

[RDCanecutter 26475]

7 hours ago, ROFL BOX said:

Email sent, pics should be there in a public file.

Thanks man!

[RDCanecutter 26475]

Tome of Auncient Magick, we owns it now, yessss:

One way to appreciate the cutting-edge modernity of VW's 1930's air-cooled heritage, is to study cars even older than that.

This book puts you in an English mechanic's shed in the 1920s, with his dad who once worked on steam engines watching and smoking a pipe. Advice on the proper sort of hearty wallop to give a bolt with a block of wood, general assumption that you'd just as soon make new parts as buy them. You'll be tearing the engine apart every month because that's just what one does to check things. The 1920's engine should go a good 25,000-30,000 miles before a rebore. Granted, that might be 10 years of driving from Froghoppington to the Dog And Stoat, because of course you ride your bicycle for almost everything, and the train's the thing for going up to London.

[Loco 3754]

Do you know why the English like warm beer?

 

Spoiler

Because they have Lucas refrigerators

 

[Fuck Tim Beck 3834]

Do you know why the English don't build their own computers? 

 

Spoiler

Because they haven't found a way to make them leak oil yet. 

 

[El Diablo 4232]

15 hours ago, RDCanecutter said:

Tome of Auncient Magick, we owns it now, yessss:

One way to appreciate the cutting-edge modernity of VW's 1930's air-cooled heritage, is to study cars even older than that.

This book puts you in an English mechanic's shed in the 1920s, with his dad who once worked on steam engines watching and smoking a pipe. Advice on the proper sort of hearty wallop to give a bolt with a block of wood, general assumption that you'd just as soon make new parts as buy them. You'll be tearing the engine apart every month because that's just what one does to check things. The 1920's engine should go a good 25,000-30,000 miles before a rebore. Granted, that might be 10 years of driving from Froghoppington to the Dog And Stoat, because of course you ride your bicycle for almost everything, and the train's the thing for going up to London.

TC's and TD's are my favorites among the MG's. When cars were cars and men were men. Men with oil on their sleeves.

[RDCanecutter 26475]

1 hour ago, El Diablo said:

TC's and TD's are my favorites among the MG's. When cars were cars and men were men. Men with oil on their sleeves.

I read that the man in the cover photo was Reg Harris, who served in tanks in the Western Desert in WW2, got blowed up, then became a bicycle-racing champion. He also raced the car in the photo.

[El Diablo 4232]

Any car where you can drop your arm out of the window and touch the ground is probably pretty fun to drive.

[RDCanecutter 26475]

My dad possessed an Austin-Healey Sprite for about long enough for us to go through the McDonald's drive-through once. I remember hearing "don't drag your knuckles on the pavement," and having the McDonald's people lower the food from the window to us.