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Thu Nov 13, 2008 7:33 pm

lots of people asked me about the history of this bus recently while in florida for bulli brigade 15, so here it goes.

i happened to call a local VW buddy of one day, we were going on and on about stuff and he said "hey, you know what i wanted to tell you, i found this bus recently that you would have loved to see, it was all logo'd up and had those hurst bumpers on it". he went on to tell me how rusty it was "totally gone, scary!" and how he hooked up another friend of ours with it who stripped it and cut it up. he told me who it was and i made arrangements to see it, of course seeing if i could get the hurst bumpers and thinking i was going to see a cut up. i met up with dan who had owned it just a few days, he had the hursts mounted on his 58 doubledoor panel. it was pouring rain outside and had been raining for a couple days. i asked dan where the cut up bus was. he told me it's outside but hadn't been cut up because it was raining. i walked outside and there it was. i looked it over and told him i had to have it, promised him i'd get it on the road. a deal was made. $200 but without any of the parts. after some long conversations over the next couple days, dan agreed to give me all of the parts he took off but i had to replace them with good original parts, including a set of hurst bumpers. a couple days later, lind and greg were coming thru town. i told them i had made a hit on a cool bus and i wanted them to go with me for the extraction. we arrived in force. my trusty sidekick, jDOT pickens was of course there too. cash was handed over, AAA was called and pizzas were ordered. sometime late that night, we pushed the bus up my driveway.

sometime later that summer, lind was back to help me do some work to it, jDOT helped me out with a bunch of stuff, russ henry drove up from DC one weekend to help with the brakelines. then it was trailbash time. it's first trip was to the beerstore for some newcastles in celebration of the pre-trailbash newcastle PA tollbooth massacre, another story entirely.

the history of the bus is that it was found in a garage in west philly, by my buddy that works for an auction company. it had been put away in 1966 when two brothers who owned KING Automatic Heating got into an argument about who was doing all the work and who was keeping all the money. the bus is signed by them employees of the company at that time . i got the bus 12 blocks from where it sold new in 1958. it is a march of '58 walk-thru panel with original hurst bumpers that were mostlikely put on when it was very new. it sold at WILKIE VW in philadelphia, now defunct. it was showing only 43,000 miles on the odometer, now showing over 46K after the trip to florida. it has most likely never traveled outside of philadelphia for very far until now.

here are some pictures:
as found:

partially reassembled:

out on the street waiting for AAA ("yes, of course it's registered")

hauling it up!

the crew:

the money shot:

working on it...

first ride, yo!

hitting the trails for the first time:

at a defunct dealership:

hitting the streets of jersey at the second trailbash:

getting baptised:

back in hibernation:

getting reworked:

on the way to bulli brigade 15, somewhere in VA

in NC:

in sarasota FL

back at my shop after 2305 miles and a roofrack score.

more will follow. if you have pictures of this bus and want to add them to the thread, feel free.

Thu Nov 13, 2008 8:04 pm

Gibbs, The panel is so cool. My favorite bus of BB15 hands down.

Thu Nov 13, 2008 8:16 pm

Paint that ratty old thing already.. :wink:

Thu Nov 13, 2008 9:15 pm

UZI wrote: first ride, yo!

wow gibbs i had no idea that when i took this, it was the first picture ever taken while the king panel was moving under its own power. word. :shock:

Thu Nov 13, 2008 10:01 pm

one of the coolest.

Fri Nov 14, 2008 2:16 am

Love the bus Gibs, looks awesoem REALLY! 8)
Hope to see it irl someday, just like your other cars in the collection!
Cheers, Niels

Fri Nov 14, 2008 4:39 am

slam it on earlies :wink:

Fri Nov 14, 2008 6:35 am

Kick ass bus for sure. You just don't find buses like that in the uk

Fri Nov 14, 2008 7:24 am

UZI wrote: getting baptised:

Now, that's a helluva shot! 8)

Fri Nov 14, 2008 7:25 am

thanks to the others who have recently helped me out on the bus. matt cuddy for sorting the timing, eh greggah and clara for their magical fingers in florida, jDOT for assistance in sorting the headlight switch, and to all the others for being into this bus like i am.

to get it back on the road, we yanked the motor and gas tank, put in a new gas tank, an extra motor out of my old mango DD, put on rear axle seals, repacked the front bearings, put on all new brakelines pumped the front beam full of grease, marinated all other moving parts and fiddled with the wiring a bit.

for the florida trip, i put on an extra ground to get the DS headlight to light up, installed new front wheel bearings (those things are expensive!), adjusted the valves, changed the motor oil, changed the gear oil, sorted a sticky accelerator cable and barrel nut, put on the other three new shocks, extracted the passenger side hinge pin and put on a passenger side mirror arm. all minor stuff and none of it too technical but it all takes time. i road tested it out to my house (12 miles) then hit I-95 south at 7am the next day.

Fri Nov 14, 2008 7:57 am

Where'd you pick up those "Slow moving vehicle" magnets(?)?

Sweet bus btw, wish I had the luck/time/resources to do something like that.

Fri Nov 14, 2008 9:56 am

I, and probably lots of other folks as well, look at this bus in a similar way you'd look at your buddy's hot girlfriend if she just bent over to pick up something in front of you. You know its not yours, and you know you can't touch it, but you think about it anyway. :wink:

I think this bus should be in the shaved drip rails thread....If you've seen it up close, you know what I mean. :wink:

Fri Nov 14, 2008 10:25 am

Please tell dan to eat a burger and put his fastback together!-Frank :D

Fri Nov 14, 2008 5:52 pm

frank2 wrote: Please tell dan to eat a burger and put his fastback together!-Frank :D

they call him type3dan but i've only seen buses and NSUs at his crib.

this guy "ollie" in florida sells them. i don't know his contact info but search "SMV" and something will pop up. these are the real deal, do not be fooled by cheep knockoffs.

Fri Nov 14, 2008 6:13 pm

Sweet bus Gibbs! Good thing it didn't get hacked up. 8)

Fri Nov 14, 2008 6:49 pm

That bus is cool on so many levels. I hope I get to see it one day.

Sat Nov 15, 2008 12:52 am

that is a cool bus man...

Sat Nov 15, 2008 2:32 pm

Awesome Bus Uzi , That thing does not look "totally gone, scary!" at all especially by east coast standards. Glad you saved it.

Sat Nov 15, 2008 6:33 pm

Sat Nov 15, 2008 6:35 pm

UZI wrote: there you go, comparison shor, get that thing out of the clouds like the one in front rolling on earlies :wink: