Update...

The car show at Thanksgiving Point last weekend was fun. Unfortunately, the swap meet was pretty thin on VW parts. There were some nice VW's at the show, though, from the local VW club (I believe), which got us enthused and motivated. The guy who we've planned on doing our body work was there with his Herbie bug. We gave him a heads up that we were getting close.

I also called the media blasters yesterday to get an idea of how much it's going to cost us to blast the body. They charge about $85 an hour and say it'll take about 3 hours. Once we have the body off and ready for blasting we'll take it down and get a real quote.

We spent this evening removing quite a few more parts. Here are a couple of pictures showing where we're at:






























I'm a little worried about the wiring and headliner. I think we can replace the wiring and get it all hooked up right with the proper schematic, but the headliner... there's got to be a trick to removing that thing. It's a mess.

Almost there...

Justin and I spent this morning taking off the rest of the items that needed to be removed before we could actually remove the body from the pan. Those things were: gas tank, gas line from the rear and front, brake line, the 2 bolts under the gas tank, the two bolts from under the rear seat, fuel gauge wire, engine wires, solenoid, accelerator cable, etc.

Once we were confident we had removed all the necessary items, we jacked up the body and it popped right off! We have yet to actually remove the body from the pan, since it was just the two of us weaklings (ok, I'm the weakling, Justin is all muscle).

Here's a picture of where we're at:















With most of the interior out, we're discovering a little more rust than we originally thought was there. It's not too discouraging since we knew we were going to have to do some rust repair.

Check out the picture below to see the Flintstone floor pan. Nasty, eh? Once we have the body off and the interior completely removed (including the windows and chrome exterior parts), we'll wheel it down to the body shop and get a real estimate on repairs. He's already seen the bug and given us an idea of what we're looking at, cost-wise. But now with everything out of it we can get real.

The parts list is growing. We're getting excited for the upcoming UVSC car show/swap meet to see if we can snag some needed parts. We're also heading to the Pomona Swap Meet in Southern California in a couple of weeks as part of a family vacation and can hopefully get some deals there as well.

Wheels, Bumpers, Fenders, Etc.

We've spent the last couple of days removing wheels, bumpers, fenders, etc. Here's a shot of Justin removing the rear passenger fender...


Jake had fun with the impact wrench removing the wheels and gettin' the car up on jacks.

Once we had the fenders and bumpers out of the way, we removed the steering column. That was a bit tricky. Luckily we had an extra steering column laying around to use as a reference to know how to remove the thing.

Speedometer cable was next. (For next time, remember to remove the cable from the brake drum first).

We attacked the pan bolts maybe a little too hard. All of the driver side bolts broke. Only one broke on the passenger side. Go figure. But, I think we're about ready to remove the body from the pan. We will probably remove much of the interior before we actually seperate the two.

We're also keeping a list of needed parts (we're at about a page and a half already) and bagging/boxing everything. I'm keeping a parts wish list at wolfsburgwest.com and the price is climbing (ouch!). We may be able to pick up some parts at the upcoming UVSC car show/swap meet next weekend at Thanksgiving Point.

Running Boards

We began by taking off the running boards. Both need to be replaced. The driver side rocker panel (?), where the running board is attached, is rusted out and needs to be replaced. Here's Lane having a go of it...

"Before" shots

Here's a couple shots before we started tearing it apart





Isn't it nice?

And thus it begins...

Fourteen months ago, we set out on a road trip from Pleasant Grove, Utah to Seattle, Washington to purchase and tow home a 1963 VW Beetle. This daily driver is now the subject of a restoration project... which begins today. Our goal is to document this process and to share with others what we learn.