1973 Sports Bug

[CWAVE]

Thanks for your comment! I most certainly will keep at it. I have a pretty strong desire to be driving this car next summer, so I'll have to keep up the momentum.

[CWAVE]

Another productive day.

Started the day today completing the last patches. As anticipated, the rust wasn't as bad on this side, so the repair panel ended up being considerably smaller.

Funny thing, as I was welding the small patch inside the rear fenderwell, I thought... You should check to see if anything is burning inside. Well on the inner fender well there was still some of that felt stuff remaining from when I ripped the carpeting on. That was all well engulfed in flames. Heh. Caught it early and patted it out. No harm. It's been a good practice that I've gotten into of keeping an eye on the inside as I'm welding away.

After completing that (at around 3pm), figured I'd try separating the body from the pan. Been contemplating this all week, and by the time today arrived I decided to commit to pulling the body off the pan.

Happy to report that every bolt came out without issue. Nothing twisted off. Was so impressed. The front suspension also came off without any problems at all. Cotter pins all slid out, and all the tie rod ends all just popped out.

Once that was done, and all the bolts were out, tagged and bagged, I tried separating the body from the pan and apart it came. Awesome!

So... on to 45 minutes of musical-junk, as I had to move stuff around to get my chop saw and stand out so I could cut the lumber for the body support. As I'm setting everything up, it starts getting windier and starts snowing... By the time I finish cutting all the pieces it's a full on blizzard. GAWD. There was an inch of snow on the chop saw by the time I start packing that up. Murphy's law.

Got all the pieces cut though (hopefully it'll all screw together as planned). Didn't get to assemble anything today as it was getting late.

Packed everything away for the night.

Tomorrow I'll assemble the body stand and with luck it'll fit and you'll see photos of the body separated from the pan.

Been looking at the patches I did on the sides above the running boards, and have decided that it's going to need a bit more body filler than I'm comfortable with... so I've decided to lead both of those areas, to get it as close as I can to the original body lines. That'll minimize the amount of filler the body shop will need in that area. Hopefully just the thinnest of a skim coat is what I'm shooting for. So that'll be something coming up too.

CWAVE

[houseofboyd]

Good job...Keep it up!
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1968 VW Beetle
2012 Turbo VW Beetle

[mikewilkinson007]

Looks great....can't wait to see how you lift the body onto the stand you are making!

[CWAVE]

Whew... that was a bit of work. The body is now officially separated from the pan. I think the height of the stand is going to be great for working on the underside of the body and cleaning up the fenderwells... but for paint, I think I'm going to drop it right down to about 16" off the ground.

Here's the stand that I built. And you'll see in later photos, I also built it so I can store the pan (for the time being) under the body. Next Friday I plan on putting the pan in my trailer in storage. That'll give me better all around access to the car if it's not here. Once the body is at the body shop, then I'll bring the pan home and get to work on that. Then I'll only bring the body back once the pan is done and ready to go.

As for lifting the car onto the stand, it actually was pretty easy. Rather than using jacks, a buddy of mine came over and we just lifted the car onto it. I'd imagine once I get more of the stuff out of the car and (dash, glass etc etc), it should get even lighter.

Here it is at the end of the work day today. Might not look like a lot, but this took me all day!!!

CWAVE

[19super73]

You keep finding the only Sport Bugs in Alberta. I am envious of your skills.
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1970 Campmobile [url=https://www.vw-mplate.com/mplate-47260.png]Click to view image[/URL]
1970 Fastback 1600 TL
1971 Doka [url=https://www.vw-mplate.com/mplate-14845.png]Click to view image[/URL]
1973 Super Beetle
1973 Westfalia [url=https://www.vw-mplate.com/mplate-31892.png]Click to view image[/URL]
1974 412 Variant
1975 La Grande Bug
1984 Vanagon

[CWAVE]

Thanks... yes I cannot believe my luck in tracking down my favorite superbeetle.

[19super73]

[pittwagen]

I wouldn't have thought there would have been that many in Alberta to begin with. I believe each dealer received about six - three of each colour. Smaller dealers less so. Maybe they just all landed up there for some reason.

We bought ours in Winnipeg in mid May 1973. Only stayed there for 5 months, thank god. It was never really exposed to any serious winter weather. Still alive and well and living a very sheltered life these days on the West Coast.

Nice to see another one coming back to life. Keep up the great work!!

[CWAVE]

Man, does yours look fantastic. I hope mine looks close to yours when it's finished, I'd be so proud.

What brand and size tires are you running on your Sports Bug?

I consider myself quite fortunate to have a yellow one and a blue one. The yellow one will get my attention some day, but for now I'm well on my way with this Marathon Sports Bug.

CWAVE

[pittwagen]

Continental. 195/65 rear and 175/65 front.

[CWAVE]

So, work has continued... baby steps forward.

First thing that was done since the last update was that I've moved the pan into an enclosed trailer, so it's now residing in storage until I'm finished with the body and it's off to the body shop.

Today I wanted to start working on cleaning up the wheel wells. Starting on the driver side front, I wanted to get the steering box bolts out... That started a half day journey removing the gas heater, gas tank, and eventually the steering box. No real surprises except that I'm continued to be surprised at how nice this car is in for it's age. Did discover that the car was in a bit of a fender bender at some time in the past, as there's some repair work on the passenger side fender well. Nothing too bad, but will need to remove a few remaining wrinkles.

I was however surprised at my success in separating the exhaust elbow on the gas heater exhaust pipe. I wanted to preserve it so I ended up spending more than an hour working to separate it from the pipe without damaging anything. I was successful.

Here's a shot with the fuel tank and gas heater removed.

Kinda crazy, but it seems the previous owner had completely disabled the circulation system. The fan box had foam jammed into the duct leading into the car. Looking behind the dash, there seems to be quite a bit of ducting missing too. Guess I'll have a bit of work to do in there to figure out what's missing and what will go where when I re-assemble.

So, once I got through all this, I cleaned up the one wheel well, ground down all of the rusty areas, de-greased it and gave it a quick shot of primer.

I did discover a bit of perforation in the sheetmetal around the bumper bracket, so that's an area that's going to need a little metal replacement. Actually three spots in around there that I'll be repairing. Didn't get to it today... Another day.

CWAVE

[CWAVE]

Got to spend a couple days working on the car since the last update. Work on the wheel wells continues. Finding more areas that need patching, but nothing huge or really unexpected.

The hope is that next weekend I'll be able to finish with the wheel wells so that I can move on to stripping out the rest of the interior and glass.

CWAVE

[[email protected]]

This was my favorite car of all time, got the Marathon Blue after finishing college. Had it for 8 years, traded at some point, I wish to this day I had kept it, but life moves on, wife ,kids, house. I have always kept a VW aircooled of some sort for fun, currently we hace a 73 Thing. Good luck with yours, I have years of memories of travel all over the USA and Canada in mine.

[CWAVE]

I just loved mine when I got mine as a teen. That was in Ontario, and it was a giant pile of rust already by the time I got it. The salt was very unforgiving.. Loved it the few years it lasted.

Did you buy yours new? Maybe this is your old car...

I look forward to making lots of great memories in this car. It's already been an interesting journey the short time I've been getting to know it...

CWAVE

[mascrappo]

I have one in practically identical condition, same color, same rust, etc! It could be twins, I mean creepy identical! Will follow you with great anticipation.

[CWAVE]

Cool. Do you have any photos you can share of yours?

The next update will be after next Saturday as I plan on spending the better part of the day with my slowly recovering Sports Bug!

CWAVE

[mascrappo]

[CWAVE]

Excellent, look forward to seeing your mirror-image Sportsbug!

CWAVE

[mascrappo]