TheSamba.com :: View topic

Tue May 21, 2013 8:09 pm

So I had an engine fire sometime ago and life and other projects had kept me from getting my '64 back on the road. I thought I would start a thread to track my progress now that I am finally finding time to work on her. First off the story of the fire. My wife and I were cruising up Hwy26 in Portland, OR. and for those who live around here know it can be quite a strain on an old 1200 motor. The motor started to cut out for a second then my wife noticed smoke flowing out the back. I pulled over, opened the deck lid to find the motor in full flames!!! Luckily, a tow truck was not far behind us and pulled over to help. We put out the flames but not before they did a whole ton of damage.

Needless to say I am in need of some new paint. It took weeks just to get rid of all the white powder from the fire extinguisher. I also found out that stuff is corrosive, yikes. after cleaning up the mess I found out that the cause of the fire was the brass nipple on the carb, it had came completely off the carb body. (Probably due to the weight of the fuel filter and time) I have now relocated the fuel filter and rebuilt the carb. Since I needed new paint on the back anyway, I thought I would re shoot the whole outside of the car, engine bay, and inside the trunk, as well as fix the various door dings, and punched in nose. I might change some things along the way just to switch up the look. [/img]

Tue May 21, 2013 8:20 pm

So I started the tear down and started finding many little parts that need to be replaced along the way. The rubber drain hoses in the headlight buckets and other various rubber parts were very brittle. Also I'm fairly certain that the Volkswagen script on my hood is not factory and I think I'm going to fill in the three holes along with various other holes put in the trunk over the years. There was a Clifford car alarm at one point that took me almost an hour to untangle from the actual wire harness and chop out of there. I was thinking of making new sections for the wire harness like the headlight section, since mine has been spliced a number of times. I would also like these sections longer so that I can run/hide them better to clean up the trunk.

Tue May 21, 2013 8:22 pm

Thought I would post an old photo of what she looked like before the fire.

Tue May 21, 2013 8:40 pm

Here are some more fire damage photos

Thu May 23, 2013 2:23 pm

Looks like a nice car. I'm glad you're fixing it.

Sat May 25, 2013 11:00 pm

Yeah I'm glad too. Hopefully it will be better than before the fire.

So made some more progress on the tear down today. I finished up removing all the gauges and most of the wire harness. I ended up having to adjust my beam up so I could remove the peanuts from the fenders (I couldn't fit my hand in there) :roll:

Stupid tight bolt and being impatient resulted in this. I'm sure it will look worse tomorrow.

I also removed the scraper, windows and trim from the passenger door. That was my first time doing it, what a long process when you don't know what your doing.

Also managed to strip the head off one of the screws. I guess after 49 years it didn't want to come out. Any suggestions on how to remove it?

Mon May 27, 2013 7:17 pm

Center punch the center of the bolt. Drill out center of the broken part of the bolt then try an easy out. That said I've found if they are really stuck I work my way up through drill sizes increasing the hole size just shy of the tap size then run a tap down through the hole. If it is hard to get the center punch centered because of a lump. Try And get a small file or a grinding wheel in the channel to flatten the top of the bolt before center punching.

Wed Sep 14, 2016 8:24 pm

UPDATES!!!
Man how life keeps you busy

Pics going off to paint

Wed Sep 14, 2016 8:30 pm

Glad I took photos along the way

Back from paint

New wire harness going in.

First time doing a headliner and maybe my last :shock:

Wed Sep 14, 2016 8:34 pm

spent some time, in my harbor freight blast cabinet, stripping down the wiper and door parts

Wed Sep 14, 2016 8:43 pm

hydrogen peroxide in the sun works great to remove the discoloration on plastic parts. Later learned that the stuff you can buy at a beauty supply store is stronger and works faster.

This was my first time rebuilding a speedometer

Wed Sep 14, 2016 8:45 pm

Interior going in smooth

Wed Sep 14, 2016 8:48 pm

Wed Sep 14, 2016 8:57 pm

Tired if running the 5 spokes even though I like the look, so I decided to swap them out for some smoothies. I picked up a set of 7" for the rear and am going to run stock up front. Had to drill out the hubcap clips and install some new ones. To anyone attempting to do this: the tool makes it simple.

Decided to go with powder for the wheels, I was between these two. I went with RAL 7032 as the other was too green once I got it out in the light.

I loved the red wall portawalls I had on before and thought about getting a new set since mine were trashed and discolored but went another route and just got real red wall

Wed Sep 14, 2016 9:01 pm

The wife got me some AAC grills as a gift. I think they look great

Wed Sep 14, 2016 9:05 pm

rolled it out to give it a bath, no motor yet

Thu Sep 15, 2016 2:05 am

Nice car !

Thu Sep 15, 2016 4:16 am

Oh man. REAL NICE!
Such a clean job. Those red line tires are killer. Where did you find them?

Thu Sep 15, 2016 7:15 am

The red lines are from diamond back classics.

Thu Sep 15, 2016 7:29 am

decided to track down some stale air tin as I don't planing running heater boxes anyway. Plus I think they look cleaner. Original 1200 is going back in.