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Thu Jul 03, 2008 7:19 am

Ladies and gentleman, we have a winner... I wrapped up my aircooled hunt this past Saturday (June 28th) when I bought the ’67 shown below:

70,000 original miles, never wrecked, solid pans, channels, inner fenders, bumper brackets, and so on. Beyond cosmetics, my only area of concern at this point is the need for a rear parcel shelf R&R.

We all know that the correct MY for a Herbie clone is a ’63, but I plan on keeping the decals firmly in place. I have a 2 year old and his eyes light up when I open the garage door to reveal a Herbie of our very own (quickly followed by an ‘Ooohhh’). If you’re like me, and have little ones, I’m sure you know where I’m coming from. Once the novelty of that wears off (hopefully many years from now) I’ll visit the removal idea, but not before then.

Been studying up on the one year only characteristics for the ’67 MY and it would seem that I have a fairly correct vehicle. I’m now putting together a list of needed/wanted parts and to-do’s. Stay tuned for more ‘before’ pictures to come and ‘progress’ shots along the way.

Feels good to be back in the game...

Thanks,

Thu Jul 03, 2008 7:23 am

Congrats, John. Many of us parents can fully relate. My sons are both in high school, now... but still get excited over cars like I do.

When you're ready to remove the stripes and numbers, look into using a hair dryer if you're going to save the existing paint. Then, you can use Zippo™ lighter fluid or WD-40™ to remove the residual glue without marring the finish. I've done that many times.

I still have a full set of "53" stickers left over from filming the original Herbie movies. Enjoy your new car.

Thu Jul 03, 2008 9:23 am

don't forget to paint your bumper brackets the silver instead of black. :D

Thu Jul 03, 2008 9:57 am

bill may wrote: don't forget to paint your bumper brackets the silver instead of black. :D

GREAT call, Bill. I'm a firm believer in that. When I worked for the Volkswagen dealers back in the early '80s, we'd sell 'em painted black. Most people left 'em that way. I always painted mine silver. That's how they left the car factory.

Thu Jul 03, 2008 10:11 am

Quit using the poor kids as an excuse and just admit YOU will never grow up!

Thu Jul 03, 2008 10:15 am

I thought the original Herbie was a 64?

I often thought about getting a set of those stickers....Yes, Herbie is played out, but it would be cool for a few cruises.

Thu Jul 03, 2008 10:39 am

83_WabbitGTI wrote: I thought the original Herbie was a 64?

I often thought about getting a set of those stickers....Yes, Herbie is played out, but it would be cool for a few cruises.

I wasn't sure at first either, but yes, it was a '63. Check it out:

http://www.herbiemania.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbie
http://www.geocities.com/lovebugfans/faq.htm
http://www.edmunds.com/insideline/do/Features/articleId=106120

I'll admit, the kid in me thinks back to watching the old Herbie movies on Disney and for now it is pretty cool to see this parked in the garage.

Thu Jul 03, 2008 10:57 am

One thing is for sure - You dont need the Herbie stickers to hear the Herbie comments everywhere you go.... :lol:

Thu Jul 03, 2008 11:07 am

The original Herbie sported small "peanut" turn signals and a smaller license plate light housing. '64 had larger front turn signal lights (and they were amber versus clear) and wider license plate light housing (two easy ways to distinguish a post-'63 car :wink: )

Congrats on your find, and don't be intimidated by the "one-year-only" hype. '67 is not the only model year with one-year only stuff. There are plenty of parts out there to be had, sometimes you just have to be patient if you want very nice or even NOS ones. The higher up the scale of condition you go, the higher the price will be - but that's true of any year part, not just '67. Half the fun of owning a '67 - or any bug for that matter - is the hunt for the proper parts and pieces :)

Thu Jul 03, 2008 11:37 am

Your car is 4 years late...

Thu Jul 03, 2008 11:38 am

I get the herbie thing all the time cause mine is white, and looks an awful lot like it.

Great find by the way.... Drive it like you stole it.

Thu Jul 03, 2008 12:48 pm

drscope wrote: Quit using the poor kids as an excuse and just admit YOU will never grow up!

I'm in this line!

Nice looking find! :)

Thu Jul 10, 2008 8:29 am

I went into the garage last night to see if my deck lid had the one year only dust cover and while I was out there, I was looking at the paperwork from the notary that did the registration when I bought my car and noticed that the clown that did the paperwork put a '4' in front of my VIN? I wanted to register it as an antique but the shop I went to had pretty limited services, so once I have the title I will send it into PENNDOT with an MV11 and the needed pictures, but I wonder if they can correct the VIN at that point too?

Started making some calls this week to VW shops in the area that I might trust doing the rear shelf R&R (actually I have a few calls to make, but only actually dialed one up so far) and they said they couldn't even offer a ball park on price because they would need to see it in person. When I offered to shoot over digital pictures by email they pooh-poohed that too, saying they needed to see it in person? I guess I can appreciate that, but even a ball park number or a range? Makes me wonder if they've seen or done enough of this in the past and whether or not I should even trust them to this work.

Anyone have any suggestions on shops in the Greater Philadelphia area that could help with this? I plan to gut the interior to make it easier on them and my wallet.

Thank you!

Thu Jul 10, 2008 9:23 am

Johnny.Baba wrote: I went into the garage last night to see if my deck lid had the one year only dust cover and while I was out there, I was looking at the paperwork from the notary that did the registration when I bought my car and noticed that the clown that did the paperwork put a '4' in front of my VIN? I wanted to register it as an antique but the shop I went to had pretty limited services, so once I have the title I will send it into PENNDOT with an MV11 and the needed pictures, but I wonder if they can correct the VIN at that point too?

Started making some calls this week to VW shops in the area that I might trust doing the rear shelf R&R (actually I have a few calls to make, but only actually dialed one up so far) and they said they couldn't even offer a ball park on price because they would need to see it in person. When I offered to shoot over digital pictures by email they pooh-poohed that too, saying they needed to see it in person? I guess I can appreciate that, but even a ball park number or a range? Makes me wonder if they've seen or done enough of this in the past and whether or not I should even trust them to this work.
Anyone have any suggestions on shops in the Greater Philadelphia area that could help with this? I plan to gut the interior to make it easier on them and my wallet.

Thank you!

They probably know that looks can be deceiving. Pictures dont do justice. They probably want to be absoulutly sure that they know what their working with. Talk to some people who have used them and what their experience was like. Nice car! Enjoy.

Thu Jul 10, 2008 10:02 am

Quote: They probably know that looks can be deceiving. Pictures dont do justice. They probably want to be absoulutly sure that they know what their working with. Talk to some people who have used them and what their experience was like. Nice car! Enjoy.

Yeah, I sort of thought so too. Any idea on what I might expect to pay in terms of a range for labor only? Just trying to get a baseline expectation.

Thu Jul 10, 2008 11:52 am

Well it depends if they give you a flat rate or by hour. The shop I used for my engine was 45 an hour. No telling how long it will take. Drive the car down and have em give you an estimate on how long to do it and if its by the hour or flat rate. Got pics of the area in question? Post em up!
If it needs the whole rear tray the repro ones are a little $ in themselves.

Thu Jul 10, 2008 12:01 pm

Honestly, I could probably get away with something less than the whole rear tray (which seems to hover around the $200.00 mark), but I'd rather cut all the crap out and go fresh. Done and done, know what I mean.

I haven't snapped a lot of pictures yet, but plan to make this thread my catch all for questions, updates, gripes, and so on.

Thu Jul 10, 2008 2:42 pm

To make the movies, Disney actually used a variety of year VWs from ovals up to an early Super Beetle for some spcecific stunts. They we're always either updated updated or backdated to look like a 63.FDor instance, my Original Herbie is a 59 European spec sunroof updated to looke like a 63.

Any way, very cool car. You might get a little bit of a hassle from PennDot about the stripes and numbers when you go to get an antique plate. It took me about a month or so of bs back and forth with them to get my plate. If you have to, explain to them that VW did offer Herbie stripes and numbers as an accessory in the 70s.

Oh, and Herbie's not played out.

Thu Jul 10, 2008 3:27 pm

"Played out" as in my area... Everyone with a VW thinks they have to put the stickers on their rigs.... New bugs, Supers, and rabbits.... Most of them aren't even the right color. (One is green for cryin out loud)

where do you get those deep dish rims that Herbie had? I always liked those with raised white lettering on the tires.

Thu Jul 10, 2008 4:04 pm

I can recommend a couple shops if your interested. All three shops are owned by guys who do alot of air-cooled work [hard to find in the north east]. All stand up guys.

The Jersey shops are within an hour of Philly.

Tell them Jeffrey from CJVWS recommended them and they'll take care of you.

Precision Import Service
1525 Belfield Ave
Philadelphia, PA 19141
215-329-4411‎
Ask for Cephus

Pegasus
536 E. Elizabeth Ave.
Linden, NJ 07036
908-587-9030
Ask for Juan

Foreign Car Werks
247 W Union
Bound Brook, NJ 08805
732-805-0907
As for Billy

Don't expect any of them to give you a quote over the phone. If you are on a budget, pull the back seats out, and the carpeting so they don't have to. It'll also enable them to geta better look at the damage.

-jeffrey