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Bathurst

Newcastle

Taree

Coffs Harbour

Ballina

Parkes

Tamworth

Replacement Roof Clips

Picked up these clips from around the place. They are not rust free, so will need a bit of prep work. When considering the job, I reckon it will be quite fiddly and time consuming, but successful in the end. The straight sections are all side pieces. The roof line across the back of the kombi has a steeper profile going up to the top of the roof than on the sides. Considering that only a narrow section may need to be replaced, it should be easy enough to work the metal to fit. All will be revealed when I cut it open to inspect the internal framing etc.

Rusty Roof 1

At this point, assignments are due and take up most of my spare time. All the Kombi gets is a wishful look through the study widow.

Not so long ago, I peeled the tarp back and had a look at the roof. Quite a bit of surface rust as you can see.

The gutters didn't look to bad. Except for the right rear corner (above). The rest of the gutters were only surface (below) and should clean up easily.

Here is a closer look at the rear corner, from above and below. Kind of serious looking and in need of new metal. It looks OK from the inside. Hopefully the framework under this rust hasn't been too badly affected.

The outside edge of the gutter along most of the right side is well eaten and will need some attention. I am not sure whether to replace this gutter, or try to rebuild with weld.

 I've been on the hunt for bits and pieces over the last few months and have collected various gutter/roof section clips from across the country, and they should be enough to sort this area out. Just need that welder, and good weather to do the job!!

I'll gather the clips together and take some pics to show you..... next time.....

Left wheel arch

Having made a start on the rear end, the next job in view was the left rear wheel arch.

It seemed like an easy job of stripping back, derusting and painting over, but it ended up being the same as both corners. The more I looked, poked and prodded, the bigger the job became! It became obvious that the left side had taken a significant side swipe at some point as there seems to be a lot of filler here. You can see the where the rust had developed under the filler on the right in the photo below. Not too much, but enough to cause future headaches.

With the same goal as the left corner, I kept prising the filler off in the hope of finding the edge of the damage. It just kept going. I was again amazed at how thickly this had been applied. You can see the comparison of filler thickness with a fat screw driver shaft in the photos. I don't really want to keep all this filler. Questions came wondering about the quality of work of the last repairer!

At this point I just kept at it and so have failed you with a lack of progress photos. I took a lot of filler off which covered most of the area above the wheel arch. Just above the inner arch I found some holes drilled to pull out the damage. I'll weld these up as they should have been at the time of the repair. They are full of paint for now.

 There was not a lot that could be done to improve the damage (other than replace the panel) so this area was striped back to metal and given a good coat of protection until I get to panel replacement. The lip of the arch is very straight but the panel above is rough. You can't really see that so well in the pictures though.

So now I'm happy, Ive made a good start on a long project. This progress will also keep me in the good books of the other people who use this driveway. Don't want to leave it just sitting there, taking up space, uncared for and gathering dust. I reckon that I should find an easier, more satisfying job for next time............

Bug In 2012 South Australia

We packed the camper and set off exploring the county side south of Adelaide over the last few days. The 2012 Bug In was to be held in McLaren Vale on the Saturday, so we headed over that way to soak up some VW atmosphere. I'm not sure why, but I was expecting a much bigger show, but it had a nice intimate feel about it instead. We easily spent a coulpe of hours looking and chatting. After that we went for lunch in town, and were treated with the sight of a VW convoy down the main street. There were some excellent vehicles on display. My favourites have to be the Blue/White Ghia, as I had one like this some years ago, and the very well finished 54 Beetle.

 

Concept 3

This idea was influenced by a girl I know. Kind of like it now that I've coloured it.

Concept 2

It seems that I just can't help myself!! The orange door on my first drawing led me to think about an all orange van. Think PMG Burnt Orange.

Concept

Found myself doodling a bit today.....  Thought that I should share this with you. It's the result of some wishful, future mind projection, some hand drawn pencil on a busselecta blank. Or, what the kombi will probably look like by the time it gets on the road, unfinished, half done, but going!!!

What do you think?? Comment? 

A beginning.....

With what seems like a rather long list of work to be done to get this Kombi up and running, I needed to make a start at least. So I have chosen a small, seemingly easy, and obvious job to set the ball rolling. By obvious, I mean a job that has been in the feild of veiw every time I glanced at the kombi, cast my eyes over it, or simply walked past it.

The basic plan is to attend to the main repairs required on the body as a primary focus. This will mean some cutting out of damaged and rusty panels, welding in replacement panels, and removal and treatment of the many areas of surface rust, mainly on the roof and gutters.

So to start.......

Although this photo is poor quality (taken pre purchase), it is easy to see that both rear corners have sustained damage and developed rust somewhere along the way. This seemed like a good place to start. Out came the wire wheel and off came the rust, and the filler. The left rear corner had a shallow dent which had been covered with filler, then, perhaps due to poor adhesion or maybe further impact, had come off and left the metal exposed.

After removal of filler back to original well adhered coating , I had a patch three times the size of the original area. Rust had crept its way under the filler, but the damage was not too serious and the dents came out with some patient work with hammer and dolly. The result was satisfactory. A relatively straight (straighter than before) left corner, free of rust, and one happy worker.

As mentioned in a previous post, without a shed this project is going to be a challenge, mostly in terms of protection of work done or underway.

The next manditory step here was to get a coating of something on the bare metal. First up is rust converter, which needed to be left overnight ....

......then three coats of primer.

Three coats, brushed on thickly. It looks so much better already!

I haven't really decided on a final colour at this point, but may stick with the original factory colour. If you have had a look at the youtube clips in previous posts, you may be getting the idea that a rustic, ratty, worn kind of patina is where I am heading, and you are right, for now at least.

The current paint work seems to be 1mm minimum thick, consisting of the original factory blue, then maybe a spray putty, then a different shade of blue on top, interspaced with a plethora of primers and undercoats. I figured that a thick application of primer would be good to try to match some of this thickness. At some point the whole body will get a thorough sanding back, so patches of brushed primer will be smoothed over for a final even surface.

This is definately not the end of work for the left corner. On the inside, the tray needs to be replaced and the bottom edge will need to be tapped out.

The right corner is a bit more involved.......

In the first picture in this post, this corner looked like it had only one dent level with the taillight and not much more. I thought that it would be similar to the left corner. The more I poked and proded, the more bog fell off....... the worse it looked.....

This piece was almost 40mm deep! It was all that was left of the lower part of the corner. The metal it covered is as thin as tissue paper and highly perferated. I did spend time tapping the damage out best I could, but in the end decided that to replace this coner with new metal would be smarter. In addition to the exterior damage, the battery tray fell out and will be replaced. I have left this corner be for now. A welder is on the shopping list!!!!

While hanging about the rear end of the kombi, I started to look into a small crack in what looked like filler over the left rear wheel arch.....

I'm sure you can guess where this goes..... I'll tell you about this adventure next time.

And a couple more clips

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDXVsx3xgu0&feature=endscreen&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKmpQ-EkiEo&feature=fvwp&NR=1

And here's another......

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y71en2eOaWw&feature=related

Check this out!

Watch "vw bus" on YouTube

Day of the VW 2012 SA

Spent a few hours wandering among the finest VW's to be found in South Australia today at the Day of the VW held at Modbury. The pictures (best quality from a smart phone) say it all........

There was much more than Kombi's to see............ This is only a sample of the splender on offer.

Three fine Ghia's entered in the show, and I spotted two more good ones out in the carpark as well. My mind kept ticking over, wishing that I had more time today and had driven my own ghia down and settled in for the day. Maybe next year.... I seem to remember thinking similar things when I took a trip to Port Adelaide a little while ago, to see the VW show there.
Some of the cars from Port Adelaide were noticably missing. I had expected to see a nice white Ghia fitted with a Porshe motor, but it was a no show. All the same, a great day, a great show, and all praise to those who take the time to organise these events. It helps keep VW heads alive and ticking with inspiration.