63Ragtop

Nice work man, top fuckin notch.

Well, one step forwards, two back. Got a new/old swiper motor, works nice old one musta been lazy as. Was giving it welly pulling out of a side street and oopsie. I have been dreaming about building my own stainless system. Pic of running car.

Built this little switch box this week at work, nice little project. Customer supplied the old on on the left, needed a new battery, it just opens a electric ball valve for testing. We needed another so I got some parts from jaycar. Who ever built the old one didn't include a power switch so you would have to unhook the battery every time you were finished and the wiring was a mess, half through the lid and half through the box, no heat shrink etc. also made a nice label on the laser, very satisfying.

Yes, fibreglass on a shortened vw floorpan. https://www.speedsterclinic.com/vehicles/356_a_coupe/ This place is in the UK, I'm sure there are others. I don't think the real ones ever had pans. Just occurred to me that you see plenty of convertibles and speedsters, which for some reason don't appeal to me.

Asking for a friend, how would you get on certing a 356 coupe replica? Same as the roadster/vw based bathtub?

As you can see, my oil pan has a hole somewhere, apparently the boy doesn't know anything about that!? Hopefully this cable lasts longer than the last one, 2021 I think. At least I'm getting faster! So close!! Arhhh, nearly! Just about. @#$&+!!-&&#$++_&#!!!! a few hours later... Needs adjustment but seems fine. Now, wonder why the wipers stopped working....

So I spoke to vw guru Vann at Qualitat who said the hooks do go behind the bearing on the fork, most forks have a groove for the clip to sit in but I'm sure that's a weak spot which is why my heavy duty unit just has holes. Makes installing the bearing a dickhole as the hooks have to go in first then the straight ends in the bearing. Gave the springs a good squeeze. Also gave the fork a wee blast with the welder to repair the fogged out bit. Picked up a new axle gater as mine had ripped and was slowly losing gearbox oil, about a litre dumped out whilst it was jack up, so better top it up once everything back together. West Germany? How old is this stock! Other job I wanted to do is install these urethane gearbox mounts, @sluggy gave me them years ago, I've use the front one but had the old red bug pack ones on the back, these are much nicer. I replaced them with factory rubber ones when I rebuilt the car hoping it would make the car more civilised, ha! Who am I kidding!? So after fighting with the gearbox for an hour I then realized I hadn't unhooked the gearbox from the shifter! Rookie mistake, no wonder I couldn't move it back far enough. And that's when I saw it! One very sad looking clutch cable. Usually you feel it when a cable brakes, this thing has had a slow death. Yep, there's ya problem. Also putting this spring back on sucks! Decided to reinstall everything so I can get the car back on its wheels to move it about the shed to access the other end of the cable, now that's a bastard of a job! The clutch arm was quite stiff when I put it back together, so gave the bush a wee shave on the lathe and it moves much nicer. New cable now soaking in oil, someone said it might help?

Yonked the clutch arm assembly out. Think I might have used the wrong clips to hold the throw out bearing in place? Doesn't sit hard in the groove. Has made a bit of a mess of this one. These stupid hair clip things vw decided to use have a hook on one end, I remember this being a cunt of a job, had enough with the part out. I think the hook end actually goes in the bearing sides and the straight end goes in the fork so they sit all twisting and fucked looking but are under more tension.

Clutch has been fucking around on me, not sure what's up with it? It's like the adjustment has been running out reaaaaallllllly fast. Then the last couple times if I give it a small thrash it'll go out of adjustment, once on the way to work, give the old cable a tweak and it's good as gold. So here we go again. 1.5 hours on the floor. Clutch seems fine, popped it off and checked. Which I guess leaves this end of things?

Yeah it's a Weird one, and I am definitely not an expert on electronics and definitely do not want to die! I should have said, the liner was replaced awhile ago, and I've been testing it with no wire loaded and the tension open, works perfectly when it's just the two small power connectors for the drive motor but as so as it's mounted, no go!? And I think the old unit still works as well. I should get a few bucks for it at the scrapper, fucker weighs a ton! Edit: just had another play, old unit works for a moment when trigger is pulled, new unit does not, just click from the welder. Tested both with some 12v power, both work perfectly so I guess it's something in the welder fucking up?

Anyone know how MIG welders work? I've had this old thing many years, restored my car with it, the feed started getting dicky, would sometimes not work and progressively got worse until it didn't feed anymore. I was about to get rid of it as I've got a TIG now, but came across a new feed unit so thought I'd hook it up and see if that fixes it. Weird thing is the motor doesn't feed once it's completely installed so I assume it's earthing out on something? With just the motor wires connected it works perfectly. Any thoughts?

Was at a shop the other day and noticed the folks behind the counter had these magnetic keychains for keeping track of whatever. So I spun up these little dingus' for work, now we know where shit is! Just a small round magnet with a counter sunk screw in a wee pocket, easy. So I made a mini one from brass for my keys. Now, what did I stick them to?

Very retro! Reminds me of pulp fiction for some reason!?

Made up a couple signs on the Lazer cutter, for the shed today.

Haha, I thought it was black paint all this time!!! Nice work man, looks so clean!

So your the nutter cutting up early steel rims! Haha hopefully 16" tyres aren't to hard to find these days!? 120hp is big upgrade for old volksy!

Dude, absolutely incredible work. beyond just repair work, fabrication.

Cool to see another rusty vw on OS. Good work man, those black repop panels are pretty shit eh! EJ is a good ungrade.

Sweet spaceframe mid mount subi set up, guy has a RS2000 body on it, reckon a bug would be cooler!?

Got one bench done, need two more lengths of timber to finish the second.

Very nice man. You're a luthier Harry!

After looking for a new outdoor table and chairs my workmate found this for me. Just a couple rusty frames with no wood. Have been wire wheeling, rust converting, priming and painting as I've had time. Bought some lovely Garapa this week and fitted it up today, so satisfying oiling it up.

Needed to fix a thread on the old vw but couldn't fit the usual tap handle, You can buy these but I have a lathe and the steel was free, took a while to figure out how to cut the inside part, then I overshot it a touch, tapped three M4 grubscrews to center it better, just used it and seemed to work well, I now have a bolted down battery in my car for the first time ever!

Good morrow young Alex, it's one of these little numbers. https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/marketplace/computers/networking-modems/wireless-networking/adaptors/listing/5049309357 Worse thing about it is the power wires are finer than human hair, I ended up twisting the fuck outta it and heat shrinking over the top.

Finally got around to mounting the amp. Great spot for an amp, but there isn't much to actually attach anything to and I was not drilling holes in my floorpan. So I came up with this little arrangement using the body mounts to hang the amp. Spun up some spacers to get over the lip on the body. Was hard work bending 2mm stainless like this. front was a little simpler and just hangs from the seat brace. Also added some rubber feet under the amp to isolate it. Drilled and tapped the tunnel for the earth and mounted the stinger circuit breaker, also hooked up the Bluetooth adapter, seems to work well for $20. Also gave the whole area a good clean, found a couple rust spots in the corners so sorted that. The reason for the dirt is the horse hair stuff under the back seat, shit rains down on everything and seems to have some kind of resin that sticks. Not anymore! So chucked everything back together, all looks exactly the same, had a play with the amp settings, seems okay but Bluetooth is cool, seems to have heaps of range to, was controlling the music from across the street!