|
|
Super Project '71 Part: 10Some Last Minute Things From the March, 2009 issue of VW Trends By Ryan Lee Price
|
|
We missed something, we know (now). It was pretty big but it escaped most all of us. In last installment of the rebuilding of our beloved Super Beetle, we proclaimed that we were finally ready for painting, and nobody who saw the car argued with us. This "Super Project '71, Part 10" was scheduled to show you the ins and outs of a paint shop and their talented work, but thanks to our unplanned omission, our plans have to be extended by a month. We really thought we were ready: The old paint was, if not in primer in most places, scuffed to a dull sheen on the rest of the car; the interior was gutted and clean; the wheel wells primered; the pans resurfaced; and the car was in a general state of readiness. Or so we thought. Standing proudly in front of the Super, I decreed to my wife Kara that the car was ready for the paint booth. After circling the garage, mildly impressed, but groaning about the intended cost ("unnecessary" and "bad timing" I think were the words she used) of getting the "hulk" painted, she knowingly remarked, "You must be using a talented painter." "What makes you say that?" I responded somewhat surprised. "Because he can paint a car with the windows still in it." It seems that in our haste, we had forgotten completely about the door hardware, windows and regulators. Oops. With that victory, my wife retreated back into the house and I was left with some work to do. So, in addition to those errant leftovers, we decided to do our paint guy a favor by removing the deck lid and hood, and along with the fenders, we would get them media blasted and primered. Lucky him. However, odds are pretty good we'll screw something else up before be move on and we'll never get this little car painted. There are very few talents or tricks involved with removing the hood and deck lid. I mean, seriously, eight bolts and a spring are all that hold the two parts to the rest of the car. For the hood, grab your nearest 13mm socket and remove the two inner-most bolts first, then the outer-most. This way, the weight of the hood rests on the outer bolts and the hinge pivot bolt. Leave the hinge in as it can be painted on the car. The deck lid is easier still, and there's no right order to remove the spring or the bolts. We chose first to unclip the spring with a pair of pliers before we unbolted the 10mm attachments. With these two parts (and the four fenders) off to our friendly sandblaster, the overall car is seriously lacking the rounded character of a typical Super Beetle, but nonetheless looks like progress. Follow along as we tackle the windows and doors on our never-ending quest to rebuild/restore a once-beautiful Super Beetle. Conclusion:
Removing and dismantling parts and systems from a car, any car, is relatively easy. Find the attachment points and unclip, unscrew, unrivet or unbolt. It doesn't take a lot of know how, as confidence on your part to follow along with these seemingly simple procedures should be higher than, say, rebuilding a six-speed-sequential gearbox. Next month, perhaps we'll be showing you all about painting a Super Beetle; we're hopeful, but there's chance in everything. Stay Super.  01. Beautiful Kamax 5.8 metric...  01. Beautiful Kamax 5.8 metric bolts untouched by man since they were first installed 33-years ago. Since the front end of this Super has never before been hit, the bolts are perfectly lined up, pulled far to the front, as they should be. If yours has been adjusted in a previous repair, make sure to score the metal so you can line them up again after paint.  02. Here is our 13mm ratchet...  02. Here is our 13mm ratchet hard at work removing the rearward bolts first so the hood can rest on the front bolts and the hinge. If you've got good balance, you can remove the hood alone, but it is best with a friend holding the sheet metal while you unbolt the remaining bolt.  03. The same holds true for...  03. The same holds true for our deck lid hinges, as they've never been affected by an accident and are still in their original location. Again, if yours isn't, score them to retain the position so your lid will line up again later.  04. Squeeze the spring together...  04. Squeeze the spring together with pliers and pull it free. Make sure you've got a hand on the lid or it will come crashing down on your head, followed, no doubt, by a woven tapestry of obscenities. To keep the lid up, place a screw driver in the hinge (like in photo five)  05. Of course, you can remove...  05. Of course, you can remove the four 10mm bolts first and merely lift the lid (and load spring) off of its bracket. Either way, the job's done, right? [At least with this method the spring is still attached to the lid; it's 2am before deadline as I'm writing this and I don't remember what I did with spring after I removed it this afternoon.]  06. Moving to the doors, the...  06. Moving to the doors, the first order of business is to remove the inner scraper, and this is held to the door by four clips, which are easily snapped free.  07. This 10mm bolt shown here...  07. This 10mm bolt shown here is the lower mount point for the vent window frame.  08. After pulling free some...  08. After pulling free some weather stripping at the top of the vent window frame (on the door window side), you will find this Phillips-head screw. After removing this screw, and with some finagling, the entire vent window assembly pulls out. You may have to wiggle the window from side to side for it to clear.  09. For the window regulator...  09. For the window regulator itself, we'll start with these two 10mm bolts that hold the crank shaft to the door frame.  10. You'll notice that this...  10. You'll notice that this door has hardly ever been touched, as it is a pretty rare thing to have the original rubber grommet still attached to the regulator. It's function is merely to keep it from rattling in the door (something our driver door is missing).  11. These two 10mm bolts (isn't...  11. These two 10mm bolts (isn't it nice that they are all 10mm?) and one directly below them are all that's standing between you and an empty door. These two hold the window to the regulator and the one below holds the regulator to the door.  12. As you can see, once gone,...  12. As you can see, once gone, the window and regulator all but fall out of the door. Be careful, it is glass, you know.  13. This is a closer look...  13. This is a closer look at the retaining clips for the felt channel, specifically along the outer edge of the door. You don't have to keep any of these as they can be had brand new (West Coast Metric first comes to mind). We tore the felt off at a point just below the window sill.  14. The 10mm bolt here holds...  14. The 10mm bolt here holds the lower window channel (and felt). At the top of this piece is a metal guard to protect the door mechanism from theft, so it would just pull straight out but rather sideways.  15. Before yanking it out,...  15. Before yanking it out, this small clip (see arrow) must be bent up slightly, It keeps the lower channel close to the door so it won't bind the window on its way down or up.  16. The other half of the...  16. The other half of the felt retaining clip snaps though holes in the aluminum stripping and into the car, holding the felt down, the aluminum tight and everything in place without glue.  17. We don't have a better...  17. We don't have a better picture of it, but the outer window scraper and aluminum trim are attached via a half-dozen rivets, of which you can see one here (see arrow). Since we knew we weren't keeping the pieces and because they were so old, the rivets popped out with a little added pressure.  18. After we were done, here...  18. After we were done, here is the pile of discards. The only thing well keep is the vent window frame, glass and window glass. The rest can easily be replaced, so in the trash it goes.  19. Doing its part to keep...  19. Doing its part to keep the door shut (and helping it open when needed) is this seemingly innocuous little gizmo, but hiding behind it is a complex system of levers and switches. It is attached to the door via three screws (two shown here above and below and one on the door side), the manual lock lever and the inside door latch. The screw above and to the left threads the door handle to the door.  20. First order of business...  20. First order of business is to remove the door handle, and you can do so by simply removing this screw.  21. However, to get the handle...  21. However, to get the handle free of the door, don't yank it off. Squeeze the lever, as if you were opening the door, slide the whole thing forward (toward the front of the car) and then pull it free. If the preceding didn't make sense to you we've included a nifty video clip of its removal on our Web site.  22. Unscrew the door lock...  22. Unscrew the door lock knob, otherwise the door mechanism cannot be freed from the door.  23. Again, the 10mm to the...  23. Again, the 10mm to the rescue, as it pulls free the door latch. The connecting cable is looped through an eye-hole. Normally, foam would have surrounded this piece, but it is long gone and will have to be replaced.  24. Here is the inside screw...  24. Here is the inside screw that holds down the the lock mechanism. Remove this screw and the two on the jamb.  25. Here is an inside look...  25. Here is an inside look at the mechanism...  26...and finally out of the...  26...and finally out of the car. Easy. After some cleaning and greasing, it will be as good as new.
|
|
Read More
What would you do with an extra twenty to thirty grand? Take a trip around the world? Use as a down payment for a house? Buy a new car? How about restore an old one? That's roughly the amount world-re...
|
Magnaflow Performance Presents 3rd VW Trends Dyno Day!
|
It's interesting the way some people progress through the VW hobby. Time and tastes evolve inevitably, and many times the fire of youth is replaced with more conservative values reflected in a given e...
|
Finally, we can honestly say that the Super Beetle is done. We've included all of the parts that we can find that will fit on our Super Project '71 and we've tried to cover each step in as much detail...
|
This is really where the car starts to near completion. This is the exciting time of any project, because, at the end of this story, the project is as good as done. Provided we had a battery and the c...
|
|
|
|