1964 Turbo Bug

[Keefy]

OK, here goes. This project is 10+years, please don't expect a short thread! lol

This was my daily hack at uni (we're talking back in 2000 here)

come march 2002 and the body and chassis were split, the chassis looking like this

this was fully stripped, powdercoated, and rebuilt by me. I was then convinced it would be a good idea to have a cage, as I was now thinking about a 2007cc engine. The chassis went to a well respected cage builder and a 6 point cage was put in place, tying in the framehorns (though not how I asked : )

anyway, during this period the wheels were ordered from the states, and this is how it was all looking. This was 2003, in fact we were mocking this up while the rest of the country was watching the rugby world cup final ;D

time passed afterwards and there were numerous conversations about the state of that shell - once we got into it, it became clear virtually every panel would need replacing. This must have been summer 2003.

So we hunted down a 1964 australian shell. When it came to dropping this shell on the chassis ... it didnt fit. From the lack of metal in the old shell it had a load of flex and so dropped over, this one didnt have the flex and wouldnt fit over the recently fitted cage. Hence the perfect heater channels were clearanced and the shell dropped on. After a lot of head scratching I gave the ok to chop the door bars off to make life simple.

We knew there was a (comparatively) enormous porsche gearbox to fit, and in an ideal world the rear wheels could do with being an tucked in an inch or so. Oh, by now the front beam had had 4 inches chopped out of it too.

2004 seemed to just pass by, a few things moved along, nothing serious, I got let down by a lot of people and the simplest task seemed to take an age to get done.

However the engine went from being a 2007cc, to a 2276cc, to a 2276cc with a switzer turbo, to a fuel injected 2276 with a switzer turbo and finally settling on a 2276, FI with hybrid turbonetics turbo. All mocked up, it looked like this

Eventually I made the decision to have Chris Isaacs sort the cage out, get the porsche gearbox fitted, and tuck the rear in about 1 1/2 inches each side. Basically get it all rolling again. I spoke with him at the end of 04, and by april/may 05 the chassis was in his workshop. After many discussion when it arrived we decided to chop the rear end off, have a motorplate made, do away with the framehorns, solid mount the lot, and have him fabricate all the rear suspension.

it started like this

and u can see here how much of the old cage was cut out

and very soon it was like so ...

June 2005 and it was all welded up

then the interior panel work was done

with space for the intricate turbo set-up

and when mocked up with the '64 shell, and everything actually fitting, it looked like so

at long last, attention could turn to the shell. This was Aug/Sept 2005 (ish).

It wasnt in too bad condition, but there were areas that needed attention!

Work began on the shell mid October and the guttering got done

and the inner quaters all look like this

here you can see how the channel was cut away to clear the old door bar

the other side was the same, but is now repaired -

Early '06 and the interior was mocked up;

Vents from a late bug were grafted into the early decklid

By the end of 2006 the body was in paint, the chassis powdercoated, and the floorpan given a few coats of POR-15.

And thats how it sat until about 12 months ago. It had been stored under a sheet and well looked after. I was blown away with how good it looked truth be told.

I had the bug shifted back to my Dads house (my place is rammed!) by the end of the year

With work slowly progressing this year, ive spent most of my time stripping and rebuilding the suspension, whilst trying to organise the mountain of parts I had stored about the place!

And I found the original key!

Its been about 3 months now since I touched the car. The largest problem is that my Dad lives 100 miles away from me so I cant exactly tinker away in the evenings. Still, I found time to try out the Budniks!

I'm hoping to keep plugging away, and I want the car rolling asap.

I mentioned in the off topic board that we are looking to move to NZ, and Eb (as the car has become known) will certainly be coming with me!

as requested, discussion thread is here -> http://bit.ly/njzByg