57 body on 60 pan

[goopher]

Hi there,

I scored a nice 57 body, and I have a 1960 pan standing around. What needs to be changed on the pan / body to make it fit? i will most likely put in a 1968 12v swing axle tranny too.

Thanks in advance! / Jonas
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Falun, Sweden, Europe.

[djkeev]

Probably the biggest issue besides the different tranny would be heater hose size but adapter hoses are readily available.

It is done all of the time.

Dave

[KILLERWATT]

The body mounts in the rear wheel wells of the body will need to be raised. I just drilled out the spot welds, removed them, bolted up everything else to the pan and then welded them in their new location.

I pulled this pic from the gallery. The triangular bracket is the mount I speak of.

BTW. Your tranny will need a bus nosecone to work or you can cut out the nose cone mount on the frame and weld a later one in. The bus nosecone has worked fine for me.

[Alan Willis]

You will also want to change from long axle/long spline to short axle/short spline if you want the car to look right and have wide 5.
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die schwarzen Schafe #666

[djkeev]

"The body mounts in the rear wheel wells of the body will need to be raised. I just drilled out the spot welds, removed them, bolted up everything else to the pan and then welded them in their new location."



I haven't heard of this, the only frame change I'm aware of was in 66 on the front mounts when they introduced the new front axle. A newer body on an older chassis would need 7mm spacers.

There were other minor frame changes like brake support locations in the front, raised nibs for body spacing to prevent excessive pan seal distortion, etc.

Have others had to relocate rear mounts?? maybe it was a "fluke" on your particular body??

Worth being aware of, will head off a lot of frustration with the knowledge of this potential problem.

Good Luck
Dave

[Major Woody]

[Blue Baron]

It's a direct swap, but you're going to run into issues trying to adapt the later trans to the '60 pan. It was a one-off year for transmission mounts, so prepared to do some fabrication to get it to fit. I would avoid the '60 pan for this very reason.

[mk-Zero]

[KILLERWATT]

My '56 is on a '59 chasis and I had to move the body mounts. This is the car when I got it. I don't know if you can tell from this pic but the body did not sit flush with the pan and the bolts under the back seat couldn't thread for this reason. I had an opportunity to look at another '59 rolling chasis and a '55 at my friend's shop and the torsion housing was definitely different. I'm not trying to argue, this is just my experience. I hope your's bolts right up.

[Major Woody]

My 56 is on a 64 pan and was a direct bolt up, with the only problem being nose cone clearance and two extra rear body mount holes in the body.

[djkeev]

Hi,

My personal feelings are that over time there are so many floor pans being replaced and Heater channels being replaced that the structural correctness of the breed (read Beetle) is being horribly compromised.

Almost NO ONE has the dimensions for correct replacement of these items.
If you replace pans and channels on the same car... it will work because you aligned everything relative to each other.

What used to be standard from VW 1952 - 1965 (slight modifications due to ball joint beam) and maybe into standard body 66 and later ( I don't know for sure) we've managed to bugger up !

The dimensions are out there, It was NOT easy but I've gathered most of them from various sources and am still looking for some.

Many people on Samba, Pre67VW, Bentley and other sources have been very helpful.

That is My, 2 cents anyway.

My conclusion is.......

Any Bug Body in the years October 1952 up through and including 1965 SHOULD fit on any other Pan. There are slight modifications on brake brackets, pedal mounts and other minor items but as a whole, it should work, if not, your Bug or the donor pan has been seriously messed with.

Ball joint beams muddy the water on this issue a little but can be dealt with.

Dave

[johan_l]

Just working on putting a later tranny on a 1960 pan. Read a lot on this forum about it... Search the forum, but in short;

The trick seem to be to keep all mounts, replace nose-cone with a bus nose cone (incl. the hockey-stick). Then it is a bolt in conversion that get's all things seated correctly.

Do NOT try to use later tranny type 1 nose cone, and do NOT weld in a later transmission mount. This will make your engine sit at an incorrect angle!
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Johan, Sweden
1960 Karmann-Ghia coupé
1957 Oval window
Bastard Split window <-- Translate