My 1966 Deluxe Project

[Spitty1974]

Time to start adding some update photos to this thread. The bus is on it's way to being finished!

A picture of the cargo floors, after the plug-welds were ground down.

Here are a few pictures of the underside of the bus prior to media blasting. All surface rust, no rot.

The underside after media blasting, powder priming, and install of the heater pipe insulation. All prior to the bellypans installed.

A nice clean underside, all free of surface rust and protected with incapsulating powder primer.

Here are a few pictures of the belly pans once they were drilled and powder painted before install. The belly pans came from Grumpy, I bought them very early on in this project.

A picture of the belly pans installed onto the bottom.

One more random shot of the bottom of the bus. The transformation from surface rust to encapsulating powder primer is dramatic.

[Spitty1974]

I decided to go with a 2/3 seat for the middle seat. I know it came with a full because my bus is a bulkhead and not a walkthrough....That said, I prefer the 2/3 seat, it's easier to get in and out.

Below is the modification that was completed on the seat. The seat is a 1968 Bay Window 2/3 seat. The outer handle was removed, a new one was installed. Bought from Gary here on Samba, and welded in to mimic more of a 1966 split 2/3 seat. Also, the cross part of the outer leg was removed. Left the two others, as it provides more strength and it's hidden with the interior kick-panel.
Here are a few pictures of the seat before it's modification

A picture of the 2/3 seat done and mounted in the bus to make sure all is good. All ready for the springs... Ready to be sent to the powder coater.

[Spitty1974]

The hatch area of the bus needed to be aligned. Evidently corners from WW needed a little tweaking to get them to have clean gaps all the way around the hatch.

The right side of the hatch metal worked

The left side of the hatch metal worked

The right side with the hatch opened

The left side with the hatch opened

A picture of the hatch closed with the gaps even all the way around

[Yannvanh]

Killer restauration! keep the good work!!

[Spitty1974]

The cargo door area needed some tweaking, so the air-ram was used. This included tweaking the doors a bit for the right curvature, as well as the right gaps...Required some hours of metal work!

Picture of the air-ram all hooked up and ready to go

A picture of the driver's side with it all hooked up to twist the body back into shape.

The cargo door that had a partial skin replacement needed some pounding and grinding

A little massaging done to the inner edge of the cargo door, so the gaps are nice and even.

A picture of the cargo doors close to the roof showing the correct arc from the roof down to the doors.....Some major banging and twisting had to take place.

[Spitty1974]

After the media blasting was done a few small areas needed attention. Some pin holes and some small patch areas....Nothing major.

The wheel well area had a little rust rot, so the section was removed and patched with clean metal.

A few of the pop out windows had some small pin holes from rust, those were welded up.

[Spitty1974]

Here are some other areas that needed metal attention prior to the bodywork starting.

There was a decent size dent here. The short rocker area near the cargo doors was not replaced, but needed some major pounding. It was originally filled with a ton of Bondo!

Some pounding between the rear corner and the side vent panel area to get things nice and straight from one panel to the next.

The new WW nose didn't have the holes for the wiper squirters, so those were cut in, as originally on a 1966 bus.

A little pounding and tweaking of the passenger door area of a few dents and dogleg wheel well area.

A picture of the lower dogleg getting a good beating.

The area where the cargo floor meets the pillar supports needed some cleaning up.

Some final welding of the cargo floor needed to take place around the perimeter.

A little welding and grinding on the inner section of the short rocker and cargo floor

[Spitty1974]

While the bus was getting final metal massaging, I went about blasting all of the smalls that needed to be blasted. Once blasted, I took them to the coater and had everything powder primed for a nice seal. I consider this step, like placing epoxy primer.

A few pictures of what the rims looked like prior to blasting

In the blasting cabinet at work getting cleaned with some coal slag.

Two pictures after the rims were blasted

A picture of one of the rims powder primed. I made sure they put a round mask around where the lug-nuts hot the rim....I've heard horror stories about powder coating and rims flying off.

Pictures of one NOS rear bumper bracket and one repo WW rear bracket. Spot on in my opinion.

The NOS bracket all blasted, WW bracket came primed.

The original front bumper brackets prior to blasting

The front bumper brackets after blasting. Nice and clean, like new!

Two NOS rear bumper guards, bought from a Samba member.

Two pictures after the guards were blasted

The fresh air vent cover before blasting

The air vent cover after blasting

Some of the smalls after they were encapsulated in powder primer.

Pictures of the NOS correct pointed rear bumper. I also bought a NOS front bumper need to find those pictures. They wouldn't fit in my blaster cabinet, so the powder coater blasted them for me prior to powder primer.

[Spitty1974]

I decided I'd give a go and try a Black Oxide Kit for some of the nuts and bolts. I used Caswell's Kit. Here are the results...We'll see how they hold up over time. These pictures I believe are of the hardware for the rear shocks.

After they were dry.

The set up I used for nuts and bolts.

[Spitty1974]

Sent my speedo to Ryan in Corona. Man it turned out well, he does exceptional work! He currently has my deluxe clock and the gas gauge. Excited to get those back from him.

All pretty with zero miles, ready for install.

[EverettB]

Awesome progress, thanks for all the detailed pics

For the wiper nozzles, how did you do the hole?

[Spitty1974]

[Spitty1974]

I was able to clean up my plastic knobs and polish them up. Here is the fresh air vent knob.

Before the knob was cleaned

I used some 400 grit wet sandpaper with a litle dish soap. It took off all of the grime. I then hit it with 800 grit and then 1,000 grit.

Then, I applied some Semichrome polish and used my Dremel with a cloth buffing attachment. The plastic buffed up nicely. The picture doesn’t do it justice. They look brand spanking new.

Looking shiny

[EverettB]

Super nice!

It's weird how satisfying cleaning up little parts can be.
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[Spitty1974]

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Re the nuts and bolts......how long in each solution? Any link to the kit ?
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[Spitty1974]

[Spitty1974]

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