TheSamba.com :: View topic

Thu May 29, 2008 7:06 am

Probably not new knowledge or a new topic really, but maybe worth sharing.

(enough qualifiers in that sentence . . . ?)

Anyway, I just finished up cleaning, blasting and painting up all of my front suspension pieces for the 356SC and fit them in place, and it now makes wonderful sense.

356 trailing arms are VW components, altered with a short flat stock and an inch long piece of tubing both welded to the lower arm to secure the 356 sway bar.

They 356 arms have short sleeves slid onto them to work with the larger diameter 356 front beam tubes. These sleeves are the same size and dimensions as the urethane sleeves that are sold to replace work bushings/bearings in a Beetle link pin front. (Meaning that even if you can't locate the 356 training arm sleeves you can substitute the after market urethane items and still use VW parts.)

The link pin carriers/spindle mounts are interchangeable between VW and 356.

All of this meaning that I pulled the front disc brake and suspension assembly off of my 356SC and substituted a complete VW wide five drum brake set-up in it's place and it was an easy bolt-in ! ! !

WHY ! ! ? ? Well, mostly 'cause I'm cheap as H&LL and want to be able to drive this car daily for a long, long time and don't want to have to source out or pay for PORSCHE parts. I especially don't want to sell it to someone who'll restore it properly, blah, blah, blah. Also because I had all of the VW parts on hand. Plus I like the wide five look on a 356 very much and always considered the 356SC to be a bit over-done for a 356, especially the wheels and that cheezy dashboard plinth that surrounds the ash tray! And lastly, I figure that I can sell the SC front brake pieces in the Classifieds to fund some more of the build.

I've rough fit a pro-street Beetle swing axle trans into the car, re-shaped the rear interior bulkhead to bring the trans up into the stock 356 position, and have the axle tubes ('68 Beetle long axle assembly) up and bolted to the torsion plates. Looks like it's all gonna be just fine, I only need to figure out an adapter/bracket for the lower shock mount then onto to the front mount.

So, that's is for now—kinda cool, Huh?

Thu May 29, 2008 7:14 am

Any photos?

Thu May 29, 2008 7:35 am

yep this has all been done,the carriers on porsche spindles are different,but will fit on,you might have a camber issue. the trans has been done,im sure you know but its considered a hellish "sin" you will need to pound the shit outta the undercarrage to get get the vw starter to work.

while i think its cool your bringing another to life it gets kinda cheesy using all the vw parts,the disc brakes and porsche spindles/trans are far superior to vw so your kinda going backwards instead of forward in terms of performance/style,best of luck

Thu May 29, 2008 8:11 am

"the disc brakes and porsche spindles/trans are far superior to vw"

I was really wondering about that. I've had this stuff all over my work bench for a month and really can't see any difference at all between the VW and Porsche spindle mounts in terms of construction or strength. The spindles themselves may (probably) have been cast differently, but I'm also sure that the VW parts aren't going to fail at any point and cause my death in a ditch somewhere.

That and, even if the spindles ARE that much superior to the VW pieces, Porsche still felt fine hanging them off of the remaining VW arms, so I'm kind of OK with all if it.

I WOULD love to know if the 356 A or B use VW spindle mounts and spindles as well as the VW trailing arms. Of course the SC would be different/Porsche because of the discs, but I wonder about the drum brake spindles. Different backing plates and cylinders. shoes and drums, but what about the spindles and carriers?

Right now, considering what went into the VW trans, it's easily as strong as the original old untouched SC unit. Plus it's set up and geared for exactly what I want, AND the seller of my SC wanted the trans and axles out of the car, so I'm going with VW out of convenience (I have the trans already) and cost (I have the trans already) . . .

And I have all of this junk that I'm not using from the SC to sell:

Radio mount bracket
Steering wheel
Horn button base
Horn button crest/emblem
Steering head/directional housing
Direction switch assembly
Steering column
Steering shaft
Shifter, base, and knob
Shift rod
Umbrella e-brake handle and assembly
Clock
Pre-A dash board
Other gauges (have to check and see if they work)
Sun visors, clips and pivots
Glove box door
Glove box
Glove box strap
Glove box inner door liner
Headlamp switch
Heater/vent controls, slide, dash face plate, cables
Front seats
Front seat tracks
Trans mounts and covers
Engine mounts
Engine mount cover plates
Rear axle snubs
Heat exchangers
Heat boxes
Rear bumper
Front bumper
Front bumper brackets
Front horn grills
Tail light lenses and trim
Number plate light (for 356A, a little abused))
Number plate bracket
Complete front disc brake assemblies from the spindle carriers out
Four date coded wheels
Front stock plastic gas tank/trunk liner
Wiper motor
Door panels
Rear side "panels"
Back panel (some damage)
Luggage hook brackets
Window winder assemblies
Door window glass
Vent windows
Sun visors, clips and pivots
Glove box door

To help finance the rest of the parts needed to complete the SC. As you mentioned, it isn't new ground, but the question comes up a lot and nobody ever had a clear answer. Now, at least, I've done it for myself, the front anyway. Only half of the back it done, THEN it's time to convert the steering over to VW, hopefully from steering box right on up to the horn button.

Wish me LUCK ! !

TC

Wed Jun 18, 2008 6:46 am

good luck !!!!

pm sent

Sat Jul 26, 2008 10:23 am

From my fairly limited experience I found that there are a whole pile of parts porsche sourced directly from VW and modified for their purpose.
I'm saying that they were off-the-shelf VW stock, then modified.
Then I found other parts that are VW by design but made by Porsche, such as transmission parts: ring gears, axles, differential carriers, etc..indicated to be different from a VW part by a painted line that indicated a different forging or hardening process or an extra digit/letter in the part #- or even an exact copy of a VW part with a 616 porsche #.
In the relatively delicate use most Porsche's see these days- compared to an average VW!- I would think ANY part you can invisibly swap for one that cost 1/10th an authentic part would be a no brainer for anything but a show car.
Many Porsche parts were made superior to withstand the intended use of the car..most people aren't driving them they way they were in the 60's so some inferior/cheaper $ parts can be forgiven to keep the car on the road and affordable, in my opinion.
All that said, ...hammering the uncarriage to install a VW trans would seem a little extreme.

Sun Jul 27, 2008 9:18 am

"All that said, ...hammering the under carriage to install a VW trans would seem a little extreme."

Oh . . . . it's much worse than that ! ! In the end, I cut the rear floor seating area and a lower section of the rear bulkhead/firewall out of the body shell entirely. Boxed it in all around and up over the "bell housing" area of the trans for strength, and and to hang the new engine mounting hoop, and now have a two piece hinged aluminum cover nearly fashioned to fit over the whole "access hatch."

Considering the cost of an original fuel tank, I may also make up a boxed bulkhead back there to hold my aluminum tank and run the filler neck up and out just below the rear window and a bit into the rear deck lid. An aluminum support plate and bracket with a TR6 flip-up style filler and done.

Ought to have a neat long distance rally car look to it when everything is in place.