"OUTBACK" slammed patina 1959 vw beetle

so,a time bomb waiting to go off no good painting the car when this rust will blow through in a couple of yrs time to the untrained eye it all looked solid but from my past experience with these early cars you know whats going to be under those panels after 50yrs and the edges of the panel not being sealed.



time to start making the inner wheel arch.

start of with a very rough shape.



then time to "jump on the english wheel" and knock out the panel.











still way off the shape but starting to make progress



more work on the english wheel,problem is with this panel it curves 3 ways its harder to make than it looks















all welded in and ground back.i then shot blasted the whole inner 1/4 panel then shot some epoxy primer on it to seal the area from damp.











when body work time comes,some filler and it will be all good.



inside panel primed temporary with normal aerosol as it will need blasting this sid .when welding you will always have a good side and a bad side trying to get both sides perfect is impossible due to the welds and heat most people make the mistake of grinding to much and making the panel really thin and with holes in it,when welded it should hold up to a shot blast if not its to thin or your welds are not penetrated enough no easy task and very time consuming.








shot blasted it and cut out the old bit and sprayed with weld through zinc primer i use this on ALL joining panels







made and welded new piece together then trial fitting up to rear 1/4.





built in a little garage not a fully equiped workshop!!



had a small pitted area behind the panel on the left after blasting i drilled it to see how thick the metal was tbh it was good but best to cut it out which i did and welded in a new piece and cleaned it up



welded and cleaned up.



area was cleaned up back to bare metal and weld through primer sprayed on ready for both panels to be joined











fully welded in.




old body mount bracket was rusted.




i was going to make my own but i knew hookeys had made them before so i asked him how much for a pair they were £25 each so a no brainer for me and got him to knock 2 up for me.i wanted to fettle them a bit before fitting them i.e the overlap of the panels and the spot welds and pressing marks.









weld through zinc primer sprayed on where theres contact from the two panels



welded in






epoxy primed






something i forgot to show was this hole in the body mount section



the factory pressed hole was untidy so i cleaned up and reshaped the hole.





this area has been welded before so I am dealing with someone elses welding and repairs this means the areas have been warped badly from to much heat,its a VERY difficult area to repair especially on the edge of the stud line it is VERY easy to curse word this area/quarter panel up if you do not have the skills or do not know what you are doing and you will have to cut the lot out and replace the whole quarter!!! LOL.I had to slice the quarter in the middle to release the stress and creases and do a lot of panel beating/shrinking/stretching to get this right once welded and warped its so very much harder to repair,those that can do this kind of work know the work/skill involved.



















notice the seal strip edge out of shape? looks like someone removed the tar board tabs and took some of the metal with it! most would leave this or grind it back to level but that's not were are trying to achieve here,we are trying to do the job "RIGHT"

Does that make you a bloke called Andy then?

I remember at least one mag feature for that and looked around it at a show after you'd sold it on. It was lovely

I rather like that, thanks for sharing

When people say 'rat look' this is the sort of thing I think of, and I mean that in a good way. Age has been kept where appropriate and removed where not to make a car that performs mechanically well without compromising a finish only time can give properly. I have the greatest respect for anyone that can restrain themselves with this sort of build, I'd always be itching to clean just one more bit, or add a little bit of rust to balance things out, which is why I'll never successfully build something like this.

i agree totally,back in 2005 i built "the curse word" (pictured above) and my intention was to build a rat look car but which was mechanicaly safe and sound so it looked like a shitter but wasnt one that car changed the vw rat look sceen ever since then people have been doing body off restos where as before they didnt!

So the shocks sit inside the body on the front? . Would you have any photos mate . I'm loving the slam

How do you get the patina back on things like the rear arches? Amazing stuff!

Shame my cars plastic and patina means melting.

Al,what have you started getting me on here ;D