1964 Chop Top Build

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Now to get to work on making the driver's side Klokkerholm heater channel look more like a German one! This was installed by the previous owners. First step was to cut out the boxy, late model looking stamping and graph in a nice rounded panel. Much better !!

Unfortunately the pressings for the heat vents were also all wrong. Gotta fix this. I found a guy in California who was able to cut a donor section from a dry car and ship it to me. Geoff graphed it in and now it matches the passenger side. Small details but I might as well address this stuff now since I’m in so deep anyways.

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My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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Uncovering more of the chrome body molding holes :

I've had a pair of semaphore posts stashed away for years. Decided if I'm ever going to use them on something the time was now. You can see that I also asked him to weld up the small door handle holes so I can run ice pick handles :

This thing is becoming more of an oval window than a 1964 model !!

Geoff decided to take the grinder to part of the roof to see what was lurking below the paint... major Bondo !! Oh no, this doesn't look good
Hard to tell in the photo but if I remember right, it looked like it was an inch thick !!

_________________
My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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Geoff doing a little smoothing out of the deck lid and test fitting. At this point he has also cut apart my doner rear window clip and replaced the panel in behind the fresh air intake louvers :

_________________
My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

[Busstom]

Wow! Major score at that price-point too.

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Early January of 2018 - Geoff has been grinding away the bondo to see what lies underneath. Cleaning up the old welds and drilling out old pop rivets.

Turns out everything was originally gas welded.

The bondo was a good 1” thick in some areas of the roof but we both think Clarence went way overboard with it. It just wasn’t necessary to have it that thick – good news! The metal still looks pretty ugly underneath. I’m not going to ask Geoff to cut it out and replace it. Lots of work and money. I’m going to wait and see that the body shop says when they see it (whoever that might be).

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My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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Someone got carried away with the bondo on the passenger side door! Geoff did some cutting, sectioning and welding to create some better door gaps.

_________________
My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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The lower A pillar on the body was in rough shape too. Yuck!

Had major issues with the driver’s side door… had to replace it! Lower hinge on the door was buggered up and the door was thick with Bondo. All solved now. I had to get 2 new doors so that he could build a new one. He said it was easier to replace compared to trying to fix the original... and Geoff’s welding is way nicer!

Geoff also replaced all of the door hinge pins on both the left & right sides. Man… I couldn’t have picked a more difficult car to build! Lots of hours going into this = lots of $$$
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My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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Lots done in this photo.
Correct holes have been drilled so that snowflake tails can be added. Also, one of the engine compartment trays was replaced with a new one from BBT.
Because of the way this Bug was chopped, the roof now hangs down about an inch or so lower into the engine compartment. This puts a bunch of stuff out of alignment. Notice that there is now only a tiny gap between the end of the drip rail and the fender. The lid can't latch onto the catch of the rear apron - the lid is now hanging too low to engage it. To fix this, Geoff relocated the apron catch about an inch lower than its stock original location. Problem fixed. Deck lid now latches closed! Geoff also replaced all of the metal c-channel for the deck lid seal. I bought the lower pre-bent piece from virtanen :
https://www.thesamba.com/vw/classifieds/detail.php?id=1587062
But this caused another issue once the bumper was installed. Open the lid and it hit the bumper. Oh man, more problems. When this car was first built it was running custom made buggy bumpers so deck lid clearance wasn't an issue. I want blade bumpers so something needs to be figured out to bring the bumper back further. Geoff increased the slots in the bumper brackets for more adjustment. He also fabbed up some spacers to go between the bumper brackets and the small reinforcement plates. All of this combined gave us enough room so the lid wouldn't hit. The bumper sticks out a little further than stock but it's very subtle and no one will notice it.

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My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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As mentioned earlier, because of the way the roof was chopped, the roof now sits lower into the engine compartment... essentially making the engine compartment size smaller. This means fan shroud clearance issues with the stock deck lid hinge mounting brackets. When Clarence chopped the car, he just hacked away at the stock brackets so that they wouldn't hit the shroud. They looked terrible.
Instead I decided to buy a pair of thin custom ones from Limebug in the UK https://limebug.com/product/t1-beetle-single-piece...nd-off-pr/
This should solve the problem going forward.
Other problem is that I can't use the stock deck lid spring anymore - there's no room for it as it'll hit the fan shroud. I'll have to utilize a custom prop so I bought this one from Joe Bence
https://www.thesamba.com/vw/classifieds/detail.php?id=735288
More mods will be needed so I can mount it.

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My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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Some work done on the NOS fender. Turn signal hole welded up, some dents pounded out and sanding off the years of surface rust.

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My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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Geoff emailed me photos of the right rear inner fender well / body mount. It didn't look too bad at first - just a small amount of rust peeking out. I gave Geoff the green light to tear into it just to make sure things were solid. Surprise surprise! Ugly rust lurking beneath the factory layers of metal. Geoff fabbed up a replacement panel and made it all solid again.

_________________
My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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Same problem on the left rear... out with the old in with the new.

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My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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Scored an NOS pre 1957 oval ignition switch on EBay for $120.00 USD. That was a great find.

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My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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While visiting with Geoff and the Bug he says to me : "This thing would look wicked with a sunroof. Hey! Now's the time if you want to do it". I was like, ya it would be super cool but where the heck am I going to find a sunroof clip around here? The supply of used VW parts has dried up big time where I live. It all disappeared in the '80's and '90's.

Probably a week or 2 later this pops up for sale on Craigslist! And it's in the town where I live of all places !!

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My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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So I saw the Craigslist ad Thursday evening and sent Geoff a text Friday morning : “How serious were you about installing a clip? Is it something you can actually do?”. He said yes, go for it.

$400 later it was mine. Loaded it up and dropped it off at Geoff's shop on Sunday.

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My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

[pierre2]

[/quote]

That install looks factory! Nicely done....

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Haha... funny
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My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

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OK, moving right along... I dropped the clip off with Geoff on a Sunday and come Monday I get a text from him with some photos :

Geoff works fast !!
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My Beetles :
1951 Crotch Cooler 11G Split Ragtop
1953 Zwitter
1964 Chop Top

[Stephan Schmidt]

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