TheSamba.com :: View topic - A Diamond in the Rough

Wed Sep 04, 2024 12:34 pm

This has been a long time coming. I bought this L50B Diamond Blue 1970 bug back in 2016 with the intention of creating a daily driver in the style and ethos of class 11.

First order of business was re-sealing the engine and tightening up the cylinder heads. Well... a pulled head stud lead to a full rebuild. In the spirit of class 11 I kept the motor 1600cc but wanted to add a bit more power. So I replaced the stock cam with a CB Performance 2280 "cheater" cam, ported the heads (still single port) and topped it off with Kadron carbs.

Enjoyed driving this basically stock bug for the next several years while collecting parts. This spring I finally set out to do the suspension overhaul. The front was first. Thing spindles and trailing arms, disc brake kit from Top Line, new ball joints and Bilstein shocks. For the rear I re-indexed the torsion bars two outer splines, notched the inner (dual) spring plates approximately half an inch, shortened the lower shock mounts and added Bilstein shocks. To play nice with this much lift I'm running stub axles and half shafts from an early Porsche 944. The inner output flanges are 924/944/Thing from EMPI. At ride height I measured a tad over 18 degrees for the axles and at full droop around 21 and a half degrees. Tires are 215/75/15 Falken Wildpeak AT Trail on chrome EMPI 8-spoke style wheels.

Still much I'd like to do as time and budget permits. I'll update as progress is made.

I must acknowledge those who have come before. Below are a few of the class 11 style bugs that have inspired me.

AZ-BUG's most awesome C-11 style build:
https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=290228

sxuxrxf's:
https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=335057

Adventurer's:
https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=467031

Wed Sep 04, 2024 1:52 pm

Awesome =D>

Wed Sep 04, 2024 5:30 pm

Very nice looking car!

Wed Sep 04, 2024 7:50 pm

OMG a new car on the page.
Looks great!

Thu Sep 05, 2024 4:27 am

There's a Bug with attitude! I like it!

Thu Sep 05, 2024 7:52 am

Sweet!

Tue Sep 17, 2024 9:52 am

Thank you guys for the kind words!

Here are more detail photos of the suspension overhaul...

Started with tearing down the front. I did not remove the beam.

I made my own splash shields for the disc brakes using sheet metal from an old microwave. On one of them I got lucky and it already had a lip formed at the perfect diameter for the disc. The other one I had to form by hand.

Thing spindles and trailing arms with new ball joints cleaned, painted and mounted.

Brakes finished up.

My DIY alignment setup.

On to the rear suspension. I ended up using a 1-inch wide ruler placed on the weld of the torsion bar end and then lined it up with the bottom edge of the middle trailing arm mounting hole. Drew a line and then place the spring plate back on the car to determine how long the notch had to be. This resulted in approximately a half-inch notch.

I re-indexed the spring plates 2 outer splines (with equals just over a 4-inch ride height change). 2 splines made for a struggle with getting the spring plates back on so I made this little helper tool out of a piece of angle iron. Made it a lot easier to press the spring plate back on the torsion bar.

Out for a couple of tacos to celebrate.

Tue Sep 17, 2024 11:06 am

Good job!

Tue Sep 17, 2024 6:03 pm

MI-Bug, how much longer are Thing trailing arms from Beetle trailing arms? Is it worth the effort to convert?

Thanks, Dan

Tue Sep 17, 2024 7:20 pm

Dan_Lockwood wrote: MI-Bug, how much longer are Thing trailing arms from Beetle trailing arms? Is it worth the effort to convert?

Thanks, Dan]

Hi Dan,

I'm not sure if Thing trailing arms are any longer really. The main differences are the ball joint direction (on the lower arm) and the ball joint size (bigger). I've heard of guys flipping the lower beetle arms to work with Thing spindles but, others have said the angles are different and therefore won't work. I did not try my original beetle trailing arms with the Thing spindles so can't confirm which claim is true. But, I'll go out in my shop and measure them both and report back...

Tue Sep 17, 2024 8:15 pm

Dan_Lockwood wrote: MI-Bug, how much longer are Thing trailing arms from Beetle trailing arms? Is it worth the effort to convert?

Thanks, Dan

Thing trailing arms are the same length. The difference is in the lower arm that is machined differently to accommodate the ball joint that points down instead of up. You can grind off the lip & install Thing ball joints into Beetle trailing arms.

The height difference is due to the spindle .

Sun Sep 29, 2024 1:17 pm

Very cool build! It looks great. Nice upgrades with the Thing spindles and type 4 CVs