Grandma Mildred's 73 Automatic Perpetual Restoration

[Ceckert64]

Awesome looking trip so far! Good luck with the rest of it!
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1964 sunroof Beetle Restoration "Herbie"
“Joann” 1970 Elm Green Squareback
1972 Yellow Tin Top Westfalia -Sold
“Fitz” 1971 Westfalia Poptop EJ22 swap
“Rome” 91 Syncro

[Abscate]

That’s some good looking steaks on that grill(e)



My pictures of Brazil Boosters were deleted by Mrs Abscate
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🇺🇸 🇺🇸 🇺🇸 🇺🇸 🇺🇸 🇺🇸 🇺🇸 🍊 🍊 🍊

[orwell84]

Arrived in Salt Lake City after a couple nights of camping in Wyoming.

The I-80 was a white knuckler through Wyoming. More and faster traffic compared to 30 years ago. You used to be safe in the slow lane crawling along on 3 cylinders. Climbing is the worst. Watching out for semis in the side mirror, watching oil temps soar and pressure plummet. CHT’s have been good though. I think it’s doing as well as a stock bus can do.

[orwell84]

Finally got the bus back together and departed on our road trip.

Kicking back in Clyde Ohio.

Kids did a shit job of packing. Made them redo it.

[Clatter]

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Bus Motor Build

I have excellent news for the world...
There is no such thing as patina.
It does not exist!

[lil-jinx]

Very nice,
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https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=620186
https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=668799
1974 Bay Westfalia. she likes to be called Ethel.
1968 Dune Buggy sold dec 2024

1974 parts bus
A smart man learns from his mistakes,a very smart man learns from other's mistakes.

[orwell84]

[Clatter]

You go brother.

And always remember,
Flattening/leveling/straightening is done with 36 on a longboard.


Hit me up if you end up in Santa Cruz.
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Bus Motor Build

I have excellent news for the world...
There is no such thing as patina.
It does not exist!

[orwell84]

Finally got it in primer yesterday afternoon. Couple coats of epoxy followed by highbuild. Giving it a couple days to cure and shrink.

It’s a relief because I wouldn’t want to go for a 5 week road trip with uncovered metal and filler. Should be fine until I can paint it when we get back.

Still going to try to get the paint on before we go while everythings out. Got the rest of the week.

[soissisc]

That is huge, way to go.
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Mark

68 Westy
92 Jetta (oh it is retired)
99 Eurovan
05 NBC
06 Audi A3
72 Westy (I am going to fix it up)

[orwell84]

Had to cut and weld in a little edge of the seal lip on the slider track to line it up with the other panels. Track and inner rocker got a final round of sandblasting.

Doesn’t look like much except it’s the last of the metal work I had left to do on the bus. Like the entire bus.

Only took me 35 years to get to this point. I remember back to when I was 20 patching up the wheel wells with pieces of sheet metal and roof tar. Since then I have been through every cavity and crevice of this stupid bus replacing metal or blasting it clean. For most of those years, it’s been on the road.

[orwell84]

So many little things to get done before paint. After the big pieces go on there are always lots of close ups, tie ins, and adjustments that bring it all together. This stuff never gets figured in when budgeting time, but they add a lot of it…for me anyway. I still end up chasing pinholes, touching up welds and finding things I missed.

And it will all have to be seam sealed between layers of primer.

Threw the door back on before tidying up the b-pillar and wheel arch with filler. Makes the contours, seams and body lines look better than they really are. Feels like cheating, but I guess it’s done a lot. It will hold up indefinitely if done correctly.

And this little bit that was cut out inside the wheel arch when I did some repairs on the b-pillar.

Hopefully the last layer of filler on the main part of the nose. The rest of it will need a skim too. Lots of tiny dents from stones.

Big panels didn’t end up as straight as I thought. I think I now understand why:

Relied too much on hi build primer for final leveling. It doesn’t work for that. Even if left to cure for a long time it will still shrink. Leveling is for filler. Better to spend more time working out the filler. Hi build is only for creating a smooth surface, not a level one.

Blocking flat panels requires a light touch especially at the end or you will create low spots. Guide coat won’t show it.

Aggressive color sanding of runs can also make low spots in the paint surface.

[orwell84]

Nose section coming along. It’s been easier and faster than the big flat panels. Just have the bottom bit to finish.

[orwell84]

Turns out the nose had a crease in it about where a spare tire would have pushed on it. After a few rounds with the stud gun and slide hammer, I was able to get enough of it out to stop the panel from oil canning. Not really enough space behind it for anything other than brute force and ignorance.

I have learned the hard way that you can chase an oil can forever if you try to get it perfect or even make it worse.

I’m stopping at this point because:

The panel is stable with no oil canning.

The crease is shallow enough that it can be filled with a normal amount of filler.

Treated the nose with Ospho and it’s ready for filler.

[orwell84]

A few small clean up jobs left on the nose. Maybe 7 years ago, I replaced the deformation panel and repaired all the metal behind it. I also repaired the washer bottle panel, but had to remove bottom sections of the nose to get to it. The bottom lip was a little uneven in spots where the patch panels came together so I built up the joins with welding. I also have to grind down a gazillion plug welds along the bottom of the deformation panel.

Had to take a step back because I used the wrong ratio for the epoxy applied to the rear 1/4. It all wiped off with acetone which is a sure sign it wasn’t curing. Oh well…

At this point, I will be happy with getting the nose and 1/4 done before leaving for our trip at the end of June.

Ball joints are done
New shocks
New tires ready to go on.

[orwell84]

Well shit. Ended up with some oil canning in the nose right in the center. Not a bad one. Metal stays in place unless pushed on. I’m not sure if it’s shrinking from welding up the tire mount holes or stretching from the time it carried a spare. Not sure if I should try and chase it. Might just run a metal yardstick over it and see if there are any obvious low spots. It’s going to need filler either way. Sometimes filler will stabilize a floppy panel. I know it’s not supposed to be used for that…just happens sometimes.

[orwell84]

When you pull your bus to bits it’s often temptiing to fix a list of things because “you’re already in there”…Resist! Chances are you will get another opportunity fairly soon…busses being what they are. I have been cleaning up a lot of old welding that never got ground down and blended in. Just because. My first projects were welded too cold with lots of excess filler metal in the beads. Things got way better when I cranked up the juice.

Miles and miles of welding. Resisted the urge to replace a section of floor to make it look more “factory”. I was expecting to find lots voids and poor penetration, but only found a couple spots. Looking back, wasn’t bad at all for a beginner.

Hoped to be further along with painting at this point. Finished all the filler work ion the 1/4. First sunny day in over a week was way too windy. Rolled on some epoxy, threw the slider back on and drove it to the garage for ball joints.

Also knocked the 30 year old bondo snakes out of the tire mount holes in the nose and welded up them up. They were big as whoever installed the tire mount missed on his first try. Nose is straight enough for filler without any metal working heroics. Fixing that “one little spot” would likely send me chasing an oil can all over the panel.

Braking is now excellent. First push of the pedal at speed was quite a surprise. Servo powered bus brakes shouldn’t require leg effort just like a modern car.

Hoping to leave for a cross country trip at the end of June. I will get as much of the painting done as I can but paint won’t stop us. There are definitely drawbacks to the rolling restoration method of working on a bus. Duplication of work for masking, taking the slider on and off as well as wasted materials. But if I did it the “right” way, I would end up with a shiny chicken coop.

I forgot how small split buses were. Haven’t seen one up close in many years.

[orwell84]

Booster is in and seems to be working as it should testing the pedal while parked. There is no longer an increase in rpm or any change to the idle when the brakes are applied. Once I get the slider back on, I will do a road test.

[orwell84]

This should work. Wasn’t that bad…

[orwell84]

I ended up getting a VW Brazil booster.

Got my old one out yesterday. It was a bit of a grunt, but I managed not to break anything. It might have been easier had I jacked up the front with the wheels off the ground. This would give more space.

The Brazil booster has a different stud pattern than the original which is well documented on the Samba. The original bracket is also not wide enough to simply drill new holes. Plan is to weld a strip of 1/8x1/2 flat bar to each side of the bracket and drill new holes.

The original booster is quite rusty inside. I think it’s because the vent hose was just sort of dangling and sucking in water.

More difficult a job than I was expecting due to the tight space and getting older. But I’ll get it done.