'71 1200 Beetle Dolly ... Page 13. The resurrection shuffle

Hmm. If its at Heritage, then it moves. If it moves, then it drives. If it drives, it has an engine...

Soooo, what's it like?!

Have you parked in a skip? 😂

Adam

Ooops, sorry

So, to recap and save anyone the effort of looking back through a few pages of waffle...

It was broken. Very broken. I nursed it round to Phil, a mechanic friend who basically learned his trade in the REME and on aircooled VWs. He's had them all, and what he doesn't know about VW hairdriers pretty much isn't worth bothering about. In fact, his own rather nice Oval was once cover star of the hallowed pages of Volksworld magazine, an accolade we all dream about. All built by himself in a single garage


Phils Oval cover by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

He also had the ONE YOU WANT, a 23-window Deluxe microbus, which as we all know is also called the Samba. Although, being Phil and having genuinely no ego whatsoever, he used it as a workhorse to haul his curse word when he was a surfing instructor. This was long before VW buses became so inexplicably valuable that people were dragging them out of Swedish swamps and restoring them from a couple of dustpans full of rust. Phil eventually sold on the Samba in favour of a modern van because in his words "it was just a really horrible thing to drive". He found the attention rather baffling on a vehicle with a vague steering box stuck out past the front axle and a wheezy, leaky 24-horse lump pushing it along. Eventually, it sold to an American for over $90 000, which he found even more baffling but was happy to take the cash nonetheless


Phils Samba by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

Anyway, Phil got the knackered mill in Dolly running, and we went out for a test drive. On the way over it had backfired, cut out, refused to start and generally been horrible in every respect. After his ministrations it would at leas run, but as soon as you backed off the throttle it would try to die. Which obviously made junctions quite tricky. If you had the dexterity of a tap dancer on the pedals you could keep it running by tapping the accelerator pump to keep squirting fuel in even though it was slowing down, but this was easy to over-do and drown the engine out. Basically, it wasn't a way of driving you could keep up for long with any degree of predictability. And when you inevitably stalled it, it was almost certainly now flooded and wouldn't re-start


Give it to me straight doc by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

I tried it for myself with Ada as passenger, and he was amazed by how bad it was. And for a while, she ran fine and then... nope. Took us ages to get her to re-start and so when she finally did, we eventually conceded defeat and limped home.

I went through all the options... again, and again, and again... to the point where I'd wake up at five a.m. still thinking round in ever-decreasing circles exactly where I'd been when I fell asleep. For my own sanity, I decided I just needed to damn the torpedoes, go big or go home. There was no point titting around trying to repair or replace a 1200 engine that would only ever be a 1200 engine. But replacing anything meant replacing everything, because the 1200 is physically smaller in every respect than any other engine. I could spent ages trying to accumulate second hand parts or I could go full bok and buy new.

The 2nd hand route was tempting, because in the VW world older is usually considered best and indeed with many components, the ones they were making in the 1950s are some of the best quality stuff ever seen.... certainly much better than anything made in China today and re-branded. Yes, EMPI, I'm looking at you. Of course, this is the stuff everybody wants and so attracts a huge scene tax, plus Dolly being a 70s facelift car, a lot wouldn't work/fit anyway. Plus there's the problem of finding it and/or waiting for the required stuff to pop up on eBay or forums. I got some bits this way, but resolved that for speed and convenience, new was the way forwards.

It was going to cost, but I figured I could sell the RX-7 to pay for it all. I didn't want to, I love the Mazda but I have done a lot to it over the years and sort of run out of things to do other than drive her. It was a sacrifice I was willing to make, start a new chapter and move forward. So with this in mind, I made a trip over to Heritage and basically stood at the parts counter and said "sell me everything I need to make an epic engine"

Several hours later, it seemed we were done. Because the Beryl was off the road with no interior, the faithful li'l RX-7 was pressed into service as a delivery van. Amazingly, it all fit in


very sensible transport by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

....almost


hanging out the window by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

Annoyingly, the only thing that Heritage didn't have in stock was the engine itself. It would be a few weeks on back-order. This meant I would have to store the huge mountain of parts in the house for the time being, as the garage was a) leaking and b) full of broken Beetle and lumps of disassembled Beryl. Oh well, I'm sure Mrs L7 would be understanding about the spare room being full of a massive pile of Beetle bits for the duration I started to unload


Mazda with a bootful of Beetle by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

...and before long the true scale of what I'd taken on was becoming apparent as the pile of stuff mounted up. To be fair, the huge box at the bottom was the carpet kit for the Beryl, but nonetheless, this was a lot of stuff to fit into a tiny car


pile of righteous by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

I thought I'd make a cup of tea before moving the Mazda off the drive and parking her up on the street. I feeling slightly frazzled by the way the morning had gone. This proved to be a mistake because as the kettle was boiling there was a loud bang from outside. I rushed out to find my wife just moving her F*rd forward on the drive in a slightly guilty and flustered fashion. Yep, she'd reversed right into the front of the RX-7


broken glass by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

And because she'd hit the fibreglass bumper at an angle right in the corner, it had pushed the whole lot back and sideways and the wing had nowhere to go but to crimp up like bacofoil


sacrifice for the cause by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

Amazing

Her car has reversing sensors on it, too.

Oh well, I was happy. For the time it took to boil a kettle

lol

So that was the idea of selling the Rex to pay for the Beetle blown right out of the water then. There's no structural damage, but the bumper and wing will both need rectification and then re-spraying, and trying to colour-match 34 year old faded metallic paint wasn't likely to be cheap. I reckoned there was a good grand or more there, and was that money I wanted to spend on a car I was going to sell? But if I didn't spend it I'd be taking a rinsing on the asking price. But it was throwing good money after bad. But if I didn't no-one would buy it. Did I spend a grand to make eight? Or save it and risk getting five?

Argggh! I was caught in an endless loop of questions with no answers! In the end my brain just froze up, refused to accept the enormity of the problem and I did nothing. And still haven't. And I'm still no closer to knowing what to do.

On the plus side, her F*rd didn't have a scratch on it. Not a goddamned scratch

Anyway, I consoled myself temporarily by unwrapping some of my new goodies and stroking them inappropriately


vintage speed by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

Vintage Speed full stainless exhaust. Might be made in Taiwan, but dayam! it's lovely. I'd decided to risk the EMPI version of Weber IDF 40mm twin-choke carbs. Thing is, EMPI has a reputation for awful quality nowadays because they outsource all their manufacturing to China. But some things aren't as bad as they may seem. All the wisdom I'd gleaned on the subject said that so long as you make sure the carbs are properly cleaned out before running them, they're fine. Seems the Chinese sweatshop they're made in aren't the most scrupulous about cleaning out swarf and grime. BUT... Wever stopped developing their carbs a couple of decades back. EMPI took the Weber design and refined it and fiddled with it and the HPMX might look the same but in all meaningful ways is a much more modern and refined version


big box o carbs by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

I'd had to buy a compete set of new tinware as well, since the old 1200 stuff wouldn't fit with a larger engine. This was in eezzee-scratch transport black paint, and so I packed it all up and took it to a semi-tame powdwercoater hidden in the wild woods of the Sussex Weald. Jeff is a lovely old boy who owns and loves a Triumph Stag he's made better in every regard than when it was new. He quite likes getting automotive packages to coat because he's a true petrolhead and it makes a nice change from doing far gates and posh pergolas. I sprayed up a surplus light bucket to give and idea of the colour we were going for


tinware colour sample by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

Which was a nice tan/buff kind of colour. Actually Ford Sierra beige, it was a great midway point between the cream of Dolly's upholstery and paint and the oatmeal brown of the carpet. Jeff got out a load of swatch books and we chose one that looked a perfect match. Of course, he'd have to buy it in specially as mostly all he does is industrial black or silver, but even so to do all the tinware, fan shroud, manifolds, spare petrol tank I'd bought and alternator stand it came to under £300 which I felt was very reasonable.

Meanwhile, I kept on accumulating parts. Every time I turned around there seemed to be something else I'd forgotten I needed. The Volkswold show came and went (and we went in the Beryl) and I scored a lovely AAC tachometer as it seemed I'd be needing one


AAC tach by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

and realising I'd left all the tinware with Jeff except for the alternator/fan closing plate and it was too late to add one in now, I blagged a chrome EMPI one from one of the Volksworld vendors for a mere £11 all in! Let's hope that's not indicative of it's quality. The alternator itself came secondhand from a dude on VZi, so I had to cross my fingers and hope it would actually work. I ordered a serpentine pulley setup from SB Performance in the States because a) they're bloody gorgeous and b) the stock fanbelt is a legendarily fickle piece of utter buggeration. having the cooling and thus survival of your engine dependent on a piece of stretchy, snap-prone knicker elastic that has no means of adjustment other than splitting and shimming the pulleys might have been acceptable in the days of black and white, but we've moved on since then


Serpentine pulleys by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

I thought I was being clever by not buying from a UK importer like Limebug and ordering direct from the USA. And it was undeniably a lot cheaper. and then the tax and delivery kicked in and it came in at a whole fiver less than buying it from Limebug... only with the aggravation of dealing with Parcel Farce and a massive time delay thrown in. lesson learned there, then.

Another quality CB Performance item was the breather tower setup that lets you not only run crankcase ventilation, but heads too should you want and has the added bonus of giving you somewhere to fill the oil without needing a funnel about a foot long and still dribbling it all over the place. Would have been nice, for the price, if they gave you enough unions or blanking plugs to fill all the holes though


breather tower by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

Then came the Big Day... the news we'd all been waiting for. Heritage had a new stock of 1776 engines in. I whizzed... actually, I pottered over as fast as the Beryl would manage... to Shoreham, mutilated my credit card for the next xxx months, and left again with a giant box of joy sitting on the floor of the Bus


crate engine by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

Oh yeah, it's funny as hell now

well, we're on speaking terms again anyway.

Doesn't look like much for your money, does it? And this is pretty much all you get in that great big box; an engine, a doghouse oil cooler and some oil line connectors. Which are pretty much useless as they're the industrial crimp-fitting type and I don't have access to a several ton press to crimp them up in


heart transplant by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

Anyway, we went off on a mini-holiday ooop north to stay with the MIL and when we got back, Jeff the powdercoater had worked his magic. Even on the monkey metal manifolds that came with the carb kit. They were such curse word that you got the impression they were made from old Kitkat wrappers pressed into a mould by some Chinese child. Using his thumbs alone. No doubt chained to a workbench 18 hours a day. Earning a cup of rice a week


powdercoating done by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

On rather better castings, like the alternator stand, the finish was rather better. Jeff was true to his word and stuck to his quote, even though he had to put in rather more work than first expected with blasting and masking up and such. The only downside was the colour came out a bit lighter than either of us had expected. It wasn't a disaster because it's a pretty good match for Dolly's interior but I would have preferred a more caramel sort of colour


Alternator stand coated by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

No way I was spending another month and few hundred quid re-doing it now, though. We wanted to get on. And speaking of which... I had vacillated myself into a corner of helpless indecision. At first I'd intended to build the car up myself. Then I realised there were some things that were possibly outside my comfort zone, such as setting up twin double-choke carbs, for example. And that a lot of the plumbing and such was going to be irritatingly difficult on axle stands in a cold, damp garage. Phil offered to help out, and check my work but he wasn't really up for having the beetle stuck in his workshop for the duration so that wasn't really ideal as it would have to remain mobile for as long as possible ...and it was barely mobile already!

Plus, the Beryl was absorbing all of my spare time and what with shiftwork, kids, sick wife etc etc... well, there just weren't enough hours in the day to give the Beetle the love and attention she needed as well. So I had no choice but to farm the work out. And I hate doing that, especially basically having been at the mercy of one of the very few people who understand rotary engines for so long and having little choice but to accept their bodges and shortcuts on everything else.

No-one ever works on your car with as much attention-to-detail as you'd like or as much love and care as you would. And I've never been one to give my vehicle to a shop and say "give it back when my chequebook's empty". But in this occasion, there was just no choice. If I wanted Dolly done any time soon, I was going to have to pay someone to do it. Or so it seemed. Our friendly local aircooled VW emporium agreed to do the work, and we decided to get the engine built up on the stand, check everything fitted, run it a bit to check all was good and then fit it to the car later

So on with accumulating all the necessary parts then...


push to fit by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

Torques proprietary version of Aeroquip push-fit oil lines were deemed suitable; it's not as though we're running diesel pressures here, it should be man enough to cope. And a lot cheaper (though still not cheap!) than braided screw-together lines. Plus I've grown to despise braided lines. Nothing looks as motorsport-cool IMHO, but they're such a pain in the pineal gland to make up and there's no way to tell if the rubber hose inside has perished and is slowly weeping its contents through the braid.

And because at least one of the oil lines was going to be unavoidably close to the exhaust, some protective sheathing (oooooh, sheath)


pure gold by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

All filter/pressure regulators come with dire warnings that you shouldn't leave the pressure gauge attached due to the risk of leaks, but I've had a cheapy one on my RX-7 for years now without any issues, so I decided if a cheap eBay air-filled one survived the hostile furnace environment of a rotary engine bay then a decent Weber glycerin-filled one should be more than happy in a humble Beetle bay. I got a T-pice, drilled and tapped it so it could be fixed to a little bracket, painted that up and together with a new Malpassi Filter King and a Facet electric pump, that was the fuelling dealt with


fuel pressure guage components by Nick Liassides, on Flickr


fuel pressure gauge by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

There's loads of other stuff you need, and some you don't even realise you need until suddenly someone points out there's a bit missing there; blanking plate for the old fuel pump, new coil, electronic ignition gubbins to go in the dizzy, new leads, new plugs, loads of hex bolts to replace the stock VW eezzee-rust pan-head screws, throttle cable guide (I paid eye-watering Limebug scene tax for a natty one with a roller wheel on the end. In fairness, it's a bloody good idea as with a hex-bar linkage the cable would now chafe against the sharp edge of the fanshroud without the little jockey wheel. But nearly 50 quid for a ally pipe with a Meccano wheel tacked to the end? Gadzooks!). A balanced and welded cooling fan as the last thing you want with your new smooth-running high-revving engine is for the fan vanes to exceed their operational rev ceiling and shed themselves like high-speed steel shrapnel all over the engine bay! The list went on and on and I still missed parts and had to run around chasing them up later.

But eventually, the entire lot was loaded up in a giant pile in the Beryl and taken round to Doug's for the Grand Build


delivery van by Nick Liassides, on Flickr

I like the powder coating (I like all of it really, but have similar bits to most of it that are just a bit less shiny)
Might have to look into getting our black painted tinware done... only risk is what colour Tom would choose

Me too. I'd be happy looking at that thing strutting its stuff.

As long as there wasn't a flat four on the other end!