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Hello, my name is Charles and this is the story of the beetle that I bought two years ago for £300 off ebay at the age of 15. My mum and dad thought I was joking when I mentioned bidding for it! Its nothing special, and most people would probably think its a bit of a shitter but on a sub £1k budget including the cost of buying the car I think i've done fairly well to get the car back on the road and looking fairly reasonable. All the work was completed in my back garden hah! I replaced everything necessary to gain the beetle a fresh MOT and smartened it up a fair bit with a temporary paint job, second hand interior, new suspension and steering parts, servicing of the engine, fitting of disc brakes, new carb, new front wings, bumper....... It currently looks a bit like this:
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Last Edit: Aug 22, 2009 22:07:51 GMT by oldspeed
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nice looking bug m8 get it to a few shows
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Next season, I intend to start taking the Bug to Autotest, Autocross, Classic Rally, Trial events etc at club level in my local area so my task for the winter is to get the Beetle prepared. I don't mind driving it to its limits as the car is hardly in concours condition and is rough and ready as it is. So the idea is to optimise the handling and drivability of the car to make it a fairly enjoyable daily town runaround and track car on a very light budget as usual ;D Heres the big list of parts and tasks that will be required: 1. 4x 5.5” Steel Wheels 2. New wider front tyres. 3. New wider rear tyres.4. Short Gas Shock Absorbers5. Gravel Guards 6. Tachometer7. Front Suspension Lowered 2”8. Rear Suspension Lowered 2” 9. Small Diameter Steering Wheel10. Shim Rear Z Bar11. Camber Compensator 12. Front Disc Brakes13. Traction Bar 14. Straight Through Tail Pipes15. Remove Internal Baffles From Stock Exhaust16. Period Carburettor (Reece or Minnow Fish) - Pending!17. Window Rubbers 18. Spring Plate Covers19. Rear Shock Absorbers20. Inner and Outer Rear Torsion Bar Bushes21. Urethane Steering Coupling 22. New Steering Damper23. Traction Bar 24. Driving Lamps25. Quick Shift26. Urethane Gear Shift Coupling and New Bush. 27. Mud Flaps 28. New Tie Rod Ends29. New Front Beam Bushes30. Castor Shims x2 31. Stone Chip Inner Wings32. New Gauges (Fuel, Oil Temp, Pressure & Tacho)33. Hydraulic Hand Brake I'll cross them out as I get through them! The aim is to achieve all of this over the next year with a maximum budget of £300, hence the wheels and tyres may have to wait! As far as the engine aspect of things go, it'll be staying as a fairly stock 1300TP for insurance purposes but a few minor mods maybe made such as a power pulley for racing, a period performance carburettor such as a Reece or Minnow Fish, maybe give the heads a dose of light porting, a modified stock exhaust with free flowing tail pipes and the baffles removed to further improve flow... Just simple stuff 55BHP or so would be a nice improvement of the stock 44! The original engine was recently rebuilt anyway and only has a few thousand miles on it since! The engine as it was when I bought the car: Nice and clean!
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Last Edit: Jul 26, 2009 10:50:11 GMT by oldspeed
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Also, for when Insurance costs will allow, i've got an EFI project system in development which is on pause for the time being to finish off! So far its come from a box of dirty bits to this detailed and polished piece of kit: Based around stock T3 Bosch Jetronic Fuel Injection it should provide a boost of quite a few extra horses to the engine once the air runners are extended to clear the T1 cooling system Heres a picture of my Bug pre-second paint job attempt photochopped by Wishart from Volkszone to look a bit like a period 70's rally beetle! Right so onto the handling. In order to optimise the handling / drivability of the bug at mimimum expense, i have decided upon the following course of action. Firstly i'm lowering the whole car about 2" front and rear to increase low speed stability and reduce the height of the center of gravity. Secondly i'm going to install a rear camber compensator which will prevent dangerous positive rear camber when cornering hard and shim up the original Z bar which also does the same job so it acts more quickly. I'm also installing Gas Shocks which are set up for the correct suspension height to each corner of the car. This should further sharpen the handling and reduce body roll at the slight expense of comfort. New rubber and urethane suspension and steering components such as bushings and steering couplings will be added to further stiffen everything up. The tie rod ends, steering damper etc will be replaced to eliminate any wear in the steering system. I'll also add a home made hydraulic hand brake constructed from a single circuit brake master cylinder plumed in series into the rear brake line to allow tight handbrake turns around cones etc in autotests, this will also prevent handbrake wear. Finally for now i'll add a traction bar to support the engine under hard acceleration and i think thats about it for now! All these parts should come in at about £200 from SSP which isn't too bad me thinks! I'm also thinking of getting some 5.5" stock style steel wheels for the back of the car so i can get some better stickier tyres for the rear such as 185s or 195s at the widest, i don't want to go to fat as i will need to be able to swing the rear end out during autotests I'm going to keep the stock 4.5" wheels up front with narrow 155 or 165 tyres on to keep the steering sharp and light. With a near stock engine a good 165/50 or 165/65 sports tyre should provide more than enough front grip. Ooh, and also, if anyone can think of an apt race car name for the bug, i'm open to suggestions
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qwerty
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 2,416
Club RR Member Number: 52
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Awesome project and plans sound really good.
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Mike D
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 2,197
Club RR Member Number: 57
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You'll struggle lowering it exactly 2" at the rear, as it's splined torsion bars. Only lower it one spline! Mine launched nicely when i had it one spline, and gripped well in the corners too. 2 splines completely ruined both of the above. It gives too much neg camber so it just spins off the line and the back end is now super-lively! It's a mega easy job to do aswell, should take you a couple of hours per side if you havent done it before. Wheel wise, try to go for 5.5" wheels all round. Running 4.5's all round on 165's my old bug used to push the front out way before the rear let go, wider rears would just accentuate this. I run 185 55's up front on my bug at the mo, and 195 65's at the rear, and it hangs on nicely with these. You'd probably want a slightly lower profile rear for performance though, i went with the 65's for a bit extra cruising speed. Cheers, Mike
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Thanks for the advice Mike! One outer spline on the rear is meant to be roughly a 2" drop so thats what i'm going for i think. I know that 5.5" wheels would be far more ideal for the car as i'd have a larger choice of stickier tyres but the budget just doesn't allow for them yet! And thanks for the words of encouragement QWERTY
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Padz
Part of things
Personal Plates ftw
Posts: 394
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Full marks to you mate you've made a cool car from a 300 quid ebay buy, i salute you as i'm rubbish at mechanicals and it seems like you've worked v.hard.
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"I'd rather lie in a bath of my own excrement than own a Vectra " - 2002gimp 25/1/07 "Anal Alert would be an absolutely superb name for piles cream " - Hirst 28/1/08 1991 - Peugeot 205 GTI 1996 - Rover Mini Cooper
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street
Posted a lot
6.2 ft/lbs of talk
Posts: 4,662
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Excellent project! You've done a great job there, very interested in the EFi set up! Looks great
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Neil
Posted a lot
Posts: 2,485
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Nice one man!
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Thanks for the nice comments everyone ;D
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Mike D
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 2,197
Club RR Member Number: 57
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If you want some 5.5's and arent too fussy about looks, or you have the time to spend making them look pretty, i have a set of 4 5.5x15 proline alloys....The lacquer is shot and they're a bit corroded, but you can have them for £40 the lot if it helps?
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If you want some 5.5's and arent too fussy about looks, or you have the time to spend making them look pretty, I have a set of 4 5.5x15 proline alloys....The lacquer is shot and they're a bit corroded, but you can have them for £40 the lot if it helps? Thanks for the offer Mike! I'll have to have a good think about it. Are prolines the drag racing wheel look alikes with the holes between the rivets the centres? My only concern is that they maybe frowned upon if i want to take part in some classic car rallies as they only really came into circulation in the 80's and are therefore not really period correct. ;D
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Mike D
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 2,197
Club RR Member Number: 57
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A good point, i didn't even think about keeping it period! You're right in the description of them though..
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Top marks that man!!
Plans sound great. Keep at it, and keep us informed.
And welcome to Retro-Rides!! :-)
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Top marks that man!! Plans sound great. Keep at it, and keep us informed. And welcome to Retro-Rides!! :-) Thanks!
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One of the things I haven't mentioned much so far is the paint job which I completed in the last week of september in my back garden hah. I'd had a go at the method of roller painting industrial polyurethane enamel similar to rustoleum which seems to be popular at the moment in the summer but I just wasn't happy with the results so in a couple of days I flatted down all the worst areas and had a go at spraying the paint with a cheapo HVLP gun and some International Brightside Yacht Enamel which is very similar to rustoleum but has a built in water repellant telfon coating mixed in and a self cleaning system. I think it came out quite well considering the minimal prep etc but its not so great up close! Flatted Down! Some areas came out almost perfect: The workshop Here are some other random pics.... Gathered second hand parts and assembled a front disc brake kit for under 50 squid! Slightly customised dash with resto-race style switch panel. Smaller steering wheel I picked up for free after a light refurb. Refurbed distributor.
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Last Edit: Jun 26, 2008 19:45:55 GMT by oldspeed
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Check out how solid the car was for the mere 300 pounds I paid for it: Perfect bootfloor, rear firewall, rear bulkhead and rear inner wings. These areas are usually prone to corrosion and can be a pain to repair. I gave the whole area a fresh coat of paint to preserve it. Solid front bulkhead! Repaired but very solid heater channels (sills). Home made carpets were cut on my kitchen floor:
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Last Edit: Dec 6, 2007 22:07:00 GMT by oldspeed
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Heres a few random pics!
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Last Edit: Feb 9, 2009 16:14:06 GMT by oldspeed
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