52 Split Crotch Cooler Rebuild

[topnotch]

So i had to decide whether to keep the badly painted grey paint and paint the wings and repairs into this - or work my way through 4 layers of resprays to uncover the og L90 Sand paint.
Perhaps foolishly, i have chosen to try and uncover the og paint - it is slow work!

The og paint is in not bad condition, but a bit rough in places and thin from having been sanded the fisrt time around.

But its the og 70 year paint it left the factory with so hopefully worth getting back to !

Progress so far...

[bally]

The og paint is coming up nicely. Great work! What products/techniques are you using to remove the old and revive the original?

Cheers. Dave

[topnotch]

Thanks - it’s a combination of sanding , wet and dry, razor blade and paint stripper! It’s pretty difficult not to mark the og paint , but have to be careful when you get down to that last layer 🙂

[bally]

Thanks. Keep up the good work 😊👊

[topnotch]

Got my chassis, bonnet and wings back from the blasters - very pleased with them - not bad for a 70 year old pan. Some pin holing in the floors but nothing we can’t sort .
Only bad thing is they didn’t notice the tape over the faint vin number on top of tunnel. It is barely legible now 😱

Got some etch primer on them all as quick as I could

[topnotch]

I also cracked on and let in one of the floor pan repairs - came out really well - 2 more to do and the frame head repairs aswell.

I also carrried on with the paint stripping - that is soul destroying!

[bally]

Nice work!

[topnotch]

thanks

I managed to do some sections of the floor pan yesterday. I used a virtanen panel for the two rear sections but for these front ones, i had to get a generic floor pan piece to create the sections and the quslity is no where as good. It was thinner and the ribs were not as well defined. But i have made the best of what i have! A small skim of filler will be needed over the repair to compeltely hide it i think.

You can see i tried to fill the pinholes first and then grind them flush - never going to work though - thankless task - easier to just let in a repair!

[topnotch]

Napoleans hat end bits were a bit holey after it came back from the blasters so repaired them the other day 🙂

Not loads of pics but will get some more when I do the underneath and that bits finished

[topnotch]

Its been a while since i did an update, but i've been doing the odd bit here and there

Here's some of the underside of the framehead - you can see where it has holed up where water ingress got in there.

[topnotch]

I also sent the chassis, wings and bonnet all away for blasting and they all came back looking pretty good, so i've sprayed them in epoxy primer, seam sealed and then put a top coat of raptor paint on there.
One thing, though, the raptor paint is awful to work with. I t doesnt spray easily, gets on everything and i couldnt get the smoot finish i was after. I was a more textured finish which i'm ok with but not exactly what i was after!

I also removed a section of the underside of the tunnel so i could get in to weld in seat belt mounts properly. Unfortunately, i nicked part of the fuel pipe as i cut a section out - the pipe is right up against the underside!

This led to quite a job to get the old one out and the new one threaded through - not something i would like to do again!!

[topnotch]

Heres some of the buildup starting of the chassis - the fun part !

Didnt get loads of pics, but i've got thre rear end pretty much built up and the part of the frond end now. I've also stripped the pedal assembly, cleaned up and put back together. Cleaned the steering box up aswell.

Also, the paint is pretty mcuh stripped back to the original on the main body - its a bit rough here and there, but will suit the car once i've cleaned it up.

[cyberdyne systems 101]

That's been an enjoyable read, great progress, and nicely done. I'm sure the pictures can't convey the amount of time it's taken, especially the paint work.

Looking forward to the next instalment.
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When I think of something to say - I'll be the first to know

56' Oval
71' Westy

[mikeandkirsti]

Nice work. The pan and black chassis/engine parts however were originally L41 glossy black, not flat black.

[topnotch]

Thanks guys

Today i had some time and felt like i made some real progress on the body - putting some primer on there. Its not perfect by any means, but it feels like i'm moving forward !

Some pics here

[andybla]

very nice progress on that chassis!

[lil_azza]

Awesome work buddy
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70 early bay
71 deluxe beetle
58 rhd beetle
69 karmann cabriolet
61 panel bus

[topnotch]

Thanks 😊

This has reminded me to add a few pics of what I’ve been up to. Not much recently, but I did a couple of repairs to the wings ready for painting an I also fitted all the brake lines and bled them earlier this week.

Oh , also removed the loom as although I’d like to have saved it, it really is too far gone unfortunately, so I’m having a new one built which will have some customisation to allow indicators in addition to the semaphores.

[topnotch]

So I’ve busy building the chassis up over the last couple of weeks - pretty pleased with it 🙂

Here’s some pics

[topnotch]

And then yesterday, after a failed attempt ( note to self , make sure you can jack the shell high and the right angle!), I got the body back on the pan 😀

And also gained some garage space back!