Just brought home a Vopard Vokaro

[DeathBySnuSnu]

I had one of those shifters back in the 70's.
As I understood the instructions (I was 14) the reverse plate was left out with this shifter.

Make sure your stock type replacement has the anti rotation pin.
Your pics show the reciever slot for the pin in the socket.


Studying you pics..... still trying to understand what is so off with the body mounting.
I am guessing a 1954 to 64 model pan.
Maybe is was so rusted out that the perimeter of the pan was completely gone.
And then body and shortening job just all out of whack with the attempt to make something from whatever was left.

Pull the body and the wood.
Probably have to start over with a later model pan.
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[dlyle]

I tried it without the reverse lockout plate and the shifter wouldn’t move. Put it back in for now.

I ordered this shifter. Hopefully this has the anti rotation pin. It’s for a 56-67 Bug. I would think since it's bent it must have the pin. Otherwise it would rotate away from you.


https://www2.cip1.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=VWC%2D111%2D798%2D121%2DCUR




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[dlyle]

205/70-15 tire is now on the 4.5" rim.

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[dlyle]

In these shots you can see an uncut Vokaro body. The front wheel opening has the mud flap on the back. That's been cut off on mine.

You can also see the heavy mold seam in the middle. That's why mine has that black strip down the side.

My car and the red car at Sear's Point have very similar wheel openings. The wheel is just in the wrong location in mine. You can see how body location and being off by an inch or two can really make or break the look of the car.

Sitting on flat ground the Vokaro body is a little lower in the back than the front. Most dealer photos have this same rake.

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[DeathBySnuSnu]

Best sides of mine before cutting it up.

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[dlyle]

[NJ John]

I’m sure the clutch pedal can be worked out.
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1973 standard, yellow, lowered, 3” narrowed front, 1600 blo-thru turbo w/single dell 15.4@86, so far
11.41 et buggy. Long gone
Let’s go O’s! Let’s go O’s!
https://www.youtube.com/@AirSpooledGarage

[dlyle]

[DeathBySnuSnu]

I would be looking for a later pan and start over.
Ball joint front and it's rear.....but that would mean 4 lug hubs. That could be worked around.

My pan was such a hack job I was going to start over.....but then it snowballed.

I think you are doing right by pulling the body and wood and finding out what is going on there
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[dlyle]

[dlyle]

My friends came over and we lifted the body off the Vokaro. All of that hard work and after it was done we put the body back on and moved it back 1 inch and the front wheels were centered and looked good! The rear wheels weren't quite centered but still looked good. I forgot to take pictures though so I'll have to get the body back on at some point and get some pictures.



That's Nelson (BL3Manx) and Ramo working on the chassis. The driver side outer frame rail had a little tweak to it so Ramo was applying a little adjustment with the sledge hammer while Nelson plugged his ears.

Spent a little time scraping off the underlayment. I'm not sure but it may be original black paint on the pans. They cleaned up nicely and just had a bit of surface rust.

A little upside down but you can see that he pans survived. I'm going to weld some square 1" square tube to the side of the frame rails for the inner body tub to mount to.

Now if I can just find a place to store the body while I work on the chassis.

Look at that beautiful structure that holds the gas tank and the rear of the body. That will get redone. Tank has some surface rust but is clean inside so will be reused.

[DeathBySnuSnu]

Good news!
Way better than I expected.

Now for some weld and fab.
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[dlyle]

[NJ John]

You can store the whole thing at my house when your done! Lol
_________________
1973 standard, yellow, lowered, 3” narrowed front, 1600 blo-thru turbo w/single dell 15.4@86, so far
11.41 et buggy. Long gone
Let’s go O’s! Let’s go O’s!
https://www.youtube.com/@AirSpooledGarage

[dlyle]

[NJ John]

Lol. Dollies help.
_________________
1973 standard, yellow, lowered, 3” narrowed front, 1600 blo-thru turbo w/single dell 15.4@86, so far
11.41 et buggy. Long gone
Let’s go O’s! Let’s go O’s!
https://www.youtube.com/@AirSpooledGarage

[dlyle]

Lots of time spent on the Vokaro this weekend. Cleaned up the floorboards a little more and also welded up all the holes. It's slow going but good progress is being made. Below are pictures of the initial support structure for the body.

I'm going to get rid of that angle iron attached to the upper shock mount. I think something similar will work to support the body but I'll fab something a little less cheesy.

The inner tub is slid as far back as it will go. These support pieces will look a lot better than the plywood that was in there before.

The body is sagging on to the supports. It will sit about an inch or so higher. The body will have some mounting pads bonded in several locations. The rear of the body will only have about an inch between the top of the air filter. I may have to go a bit lower.

The end of these tubes will tie in to the lower part of the bode for a little extra body stiffening down low.

[dlyle]

The body fits much better than before. Not perfect but it's going to have to do.


The rear of the body will sit a tad higher.

[dlyle]

The inner tub doesn't line up with the floor pan. I tried pulling it in but it doesn't pull in enough to be able to bolt it down. I'm going to have to add a 1.25" square tube on each side to give it something to bolt on to.

The spacing here looks pretty good.

[dlyle]

I've always suspected that the rear scoop/hood bulge of this car was copied from a Corvette stinger hood. I may try and open up the scoop and put in a chrome strip from the Corvette hood. Does any one have access to one of those that could measure it?