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1963 VW Beetle:Ragtop Resto.


63Ragtop

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Yes motivation is peaking!!
nice to see a car again, nice to be able to walk around the shed without having to move something first.

Back window time, Started unfolding the gutter.

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previous repair left a little to be desired. icon_confused.gif 

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decided to just cut the whole thing out.

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there wasn't really much holding the panel in at window frame, the sides are buggered anyway and when I took the donor car apart the spot welds under the vents where right bastards, this must be one of the few area's were the spotwelds could actually be seen on the car, but they are so well finished that they are completely invisible from 
the top/outside, making drilling them out tricky.

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sorted. I'll go back and clean up the scrappy bits on the weekend and remove whats left of the window frame.

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here's the old one with it's replacement.

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this is the inside, I had thought about just cutting patches out of the new panel and patching the holes, but after seeing this side, I'm glad I've removed it completely.
I'm also going to remove the second vent panel that the engine lid hinge's attach to, as there is rust stains running out of there, only time to do it, so might as well!

yeah yeah yeah!

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  • 2 weeks later...

HELLO EVRYBODY!
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So I've removed all the crap from the window frame and side, with the deft hand of a skilled surgeon.
By which I mean I pulled it off with pliers. icon_lol.gif 

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Which reveled a small amount of rot in the very bottom of the roof gutters.

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A little bit of bog and a weird hole someone had punched?

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After drilling out the spot welds that hold it on, the inside panel was finally removed, I didn't take a pic, there was a fair bit of krusty krap in between the two layers of metal, so again, I'm glad I did this.

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After spending a solid 5 hours grinding, sanding and blasting, this and a fucked sandblaster is the result.

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rusty tail ends bobbed

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I got this far with the other panels before the blaster died.

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I also made a what is for me a rather exciting discovery, tucked way up inside the roof cavity.

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a scrap of the factory aussie headliner, one of the very few things that I know is original to this car.

Moving on, I made some patches for the gutters, this was harder that I thought it would be!

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the metal gently rolls up, then has the sharp crease were it folds over.

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looks okay now.

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I have also welded up the drill holes in the rear wondow frame, and couple other small holes and now it's ready for the panels to be welded back in.

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I'm going to see if i can get the two grill panels pro blasted, so until that happens I might have a wee rest.

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  • 4 weeks later...

finishing up the rear window.

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half way done.

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happy with the body lines all lining up.

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so many spot welds, so fast, so clean!

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and primed, still need to hammer the folds down.

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blind man would be happy to see it.

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still need to grind the welds under the vents, inside the engine bay, where the inner vent panel is welded to the firewall, ran out of time on the weekend.

merry christmas everyone! hope you all have a good rest and don't drink to much!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hi everyone, managed to get a few things done in the madness between christmas and new years.
I folded the gutter seams back over the new metal, tidied up alot of small details like s few of the spot welds had burned right thought both layers of metal so I had to plug them up, tidied up the inside of the window, pretty happy.

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Stripped the bog off the weld to the rear of the sunroof, shit was over a cm deep in places.

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it's a bit of a mess, heaps of warpage, dents surface rust and even a nice rust hole to fix.

Then the other day I finally bit the bullet and fixed my cockup were I had tried to weld up a 1 inch hole in the firewall, I think I had the welder on the wrong setting and just kept trying and trying to plug up the holes, but just blasted more and more holes in the flippin thing!

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so I cut it all out.

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and very carefully welded in a patch.

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much better!

also, Santa (Beaver what a GC!) brought these up from kapiti for me.

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they fit good, are comfortable as and not nearly as fucked as I thought they would be.

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right i gotta go pack for a week of family camping, after which I'll be hanging out for more shed time!

All the best for 2016 people!

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  • 2 weeks later...

so, usually I post up stuff when I thinks it's coming together well, but most of the time I've got no idea what I'm doing, like the last two days.

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start with this.

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I have not been looking forward to trying to seperate these.

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take a not quite as stuffed example.

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this panel was on the old baja I cut up, seems the short baja fibreglass bonnet needed some clearance.

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spot the diff

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this side is rough!

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started hammering it into shape.

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than I chopped this out, just past the old welds

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still trying to suss out the best way to stick it all back together.

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tried to save the dash side of the lip, but as you see....

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so I guess I'll have to make a new one?

I also sprayed some primer on the roof, for now, and cut out and patched the holes.

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trimmed the new panel up and had it blasted by the same crowd on henderson valley road.

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pulled the dash out, thought about cutting the lip off it as a doner.

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so now I've just got to make this all fit back together again.

oh, and I welded up about 15 holes under the dash from radios and stuff over the years.

was hoping to have this finished and back on the spit soon to finish up the sills.

ah well!

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  • 3 weeks later...

slowly getting there with the front screen, this thing had me shitting my pants at one point, WHAT HAVE I DONE!! etc.

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made a completely new lip for the dashboard side, using the new panel as a template cut a 12mm strip and welded it on

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welded up these holes

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looks like this after much fucking about.

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getting there.

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stuck the hinges and bonnet back on to have a look tonight.

just need to get the last details matching up and trim the posts down to match and should be able weld it in.

cheers

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  • 3 weeks later...

well well, what have we here.

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yes , some very cold welds, but I didn't want to blow any holes in this right now.

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I had to plug weld the corners as the spot welder couldn't get in behind the corner air vents.

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all stitched up.

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and smoothed out.

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managed to keep the joins looking factory as.

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and the bonnet fits much better than the kippered old scuttle.

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just need to weld up the folded over thingys and that is the rust and metal work just about fucking done!

So I need to find something else to do huh? One of these finally turned up on TM cheap, didn't want to spend to much on something I was just going to chop up.

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excellent.

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gunna make me a vert lid!

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finished up the last of the scuttle transplant yesterday, not bad icon_cool.gif 

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Thought I'd make a start on fixing the doors, pulled out the super rusted doners from under the house.

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hoping to make one good door outta these two sets.

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need to sort the bottom drivers door hinge, its fucked.

I also want to make it so my one piece windows actually work and have something for the scrapers to attach to,

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so i harvested the drivers hinge, inside and outside window sills from the doners.

The half ass plan is to use the rear half of the sills to replace the front half of the good doors to replace the narrow area where the quarter windows go, this area has always pissed me of as there was never enough inner sill to even glue the scraper to, but after this I'm hoping to be able to clip the one piece scraper all the was along the sill to give it a almost factory look and function. Only problem is one of the doner is completely rustfucked! icon_rolleyes.gif 

Also in the above pic is the engine lid vents and hinges which is a bonus as two of mine had threads stripped out,now all blasted and primed, and a check rod for the door, anyone got another one laying around? this car has never had any since I've had it.

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Felix wanted to practice his metal work, so I let him lose on the old scuttle, train em up!

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  • 2 weeks later...

here is what i'm dealing with on both doors, although the passenger side seems a little worse than the drivers.

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I plan to extend the inside lip so the window scraper will have something to clip or glue to.

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Stupidly I went over the bottom of the passenger door with the wire wheel, hmmm why so much bog?

Oh.
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Oh shit.
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Oh well!
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blasted in a wee thing to hopefully hold the hinge to the door and bent up a very small patch for the outer corner.

And then covered that rangi shit up with this neat little thing, was fun to make.

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I'm a bit over this bullshit in case you're wondering, gotta get this sucker on the road.

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that'll fookn do!

outside corner

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This was welded over the top on the outside of the door, at the other end along the bottom.

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so I made a new inner lip

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smoothed it out.

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made this to fit the outside.

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and done. It really needs this doing to the whole bottom of the door as the very bottom of the inner panel is nearly completely gone, but not keen after the mess I made of the quarter panels, to big and flat.

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and I still haven't started with the window holes!!  :x  :x

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  • 4 weeks later...

Now, the hinge side of things, bit of a mission.

first I had to cut what was left of the old hinge out.

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I managed to separate the hinge cleanly from the 3rd rivet, and drill a hole through the center of it, which would help in lining the new hinge up in the right place, after much beating and grinding I was happy with how the hinge was sitting.

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then I made up a patch to fill in the gaps

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welded it in place and ground smooth.

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using the dremel on the inside so I could fit another even smaller patch to the inside panel.
the steel I'm using is actually a little thicker than the vw stuff, but this is not a area I want to crack in the future.

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I also stuck a few spot welds between them because I could and just in case.

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the inside had to be smoothed out so the hinge would sit right and I also welded up the 3rd hole/mess once the hinge could be bolted in place.

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like this!

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nearly a door again.

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stay tuned for next weeks adventure!!!!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Alright! Alright!
I hope you son's of bitches see the light.

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you again, you again.
I know you've got the metal age of ten.

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Listen up, Listen up.
I wouldn't swap ya for a thousand bucks!

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so after all that, it all seems to go back together the same, which is handy.

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but it still doesn't fit the body correctly, the belt line is still a good 5mm lower than the door.
But I can't lift the door much as it is already tight against the A pillar.

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least I didn't make it worse, which I was worried about.

Made a start on the window sills.

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patches 

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lined up using the clip holder that the one piece glass scraper is held in with.

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Ah sadfacerednoseclowncar can not be unseen!!!!!

 

:shock:  :-D

 

Finished off the drivers door today.

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so I still need to do this on the other door, but I really want to get on with finishing the heater channels and get some paint on the underneath and the pan before the weather gets colder.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I think I have enough lights now. 

 

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the back two are the ones that were on the car, the two on the left I found at the dump shop for $5 each and the one next to them in the middle is a 50's oval era light, with the cool old greman style script Bosch logo adn VW logo at the top, the glass lens on top of the other two also has the VW logo but is a hella lens, some are German, some aussie. Most of the rings have a little pitting and rust and/or dents, some have two rivets at the the bottom, some had one, one has Bosch pressed in the top of it, nearly all different which shouldn't be that surprising as they made them for so many years, I should be able to make a ok pair out of all this.

 

dreaming again

 

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  • 4 weeks later...

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