Lit Up

While I was taking a some pictures of the Bug inside the warehouse a few days ago, I snapped off a few shots of the interior as well. The lighting was kinda cool and I knew I could do some neat effects with the pictures in photoshop. Here's a shot showing the instruments all lit up. There's just something neat and clean about the early VW Beetle dash that I love. Simpler times maybe. The tachometer, although kinda silly in a 40 hp Bug, gives the interior a little touch of attitude. The Scat Drag Fast shifter with reverse lockout helps with that too but you really can't make it out in this pic. Nice to have them already with the car since I will be putting in a healthier motor later.

Anyways, enjoy the photo. Now go out and drive your aircooled V-Dub....don't have one? Go get one or get in one!

Daily driving a 43 year old Bug

I've been driving my '67 Bug just about everyday now since the beginning of February. My 1988 Mustang GT daily driver is at the shop getting a couple repairs and a new performance transmission installed. In the meantime I've been driving the Beetle and really getting to know all of it's unique "characteristics". It really is an easy car to drive, although getting up to speed can take a bit more effort and patience but it's part of the vintage V-dub experience. It scoots through traffic very well, highway speeds though are more of a challenge with my Beetle being happy at speeds below 75 mph or in my case 120 kph.

It gets a lot of attention, it sips gas, and it's just plain old fun to drive. You get used to the couple small squeaks, the slightly bouncy ride, all in all it's not a bad little car to cruise into work in as long as you're not in a hurry. Just get 'er up to speed, kick back, put your right arm over the tops of the low-back seats - drive and relax.

Above is a shot from today outside of work. Little soggy out, but still no problem for "Euri"!

Panscrapers Barcelona

Here's a fun video on You Tube of a couple guys cruising around in their slammed V-dubs! I have a soft spot for Yellow Beetles.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZN70nJic7XY&feature=player_embedded#

AirCooled Addicts Cruise - Marietta Diner

I get a call from Carl this morning..."Hey are you going on the cruise?" I pretty much forgot about it. I had a couple things apart on the Bug, no big deal. I said sure I'd go. I scrambled and got the new heater hose replaced, put the air cleaner back on, hooked the battery back up and put the rear seat cushion back. I hadn't really driven it enough to see if the new adjustments made by John and Charles at Scatts Auto were dialed in but "Euri" seemed to be running pretty good. I guess this will be the shakedown test.

After I meet up with Carl at his place, we get everything together and we head out to meet up with the rest of the Aircooled Addicts gang at Discovery Mills Mall.

We got there and by the time we needed to leave we had a good group of air cooled v-dubs to cruise together with to the diner. It wasn't the nicest day with the temps in the upper 30s, cloudy, damp and windy but it wasn't raining so I was good with that.

We all arrived at the diner and another VW club was there so we parked in the back of the lot with them and got out to check out the other rides. Cold but once you got to lookin' around and talkin' with other V-dub freaks you forgot about it for the most part.

Time to eat! Good food and HEAT! We hung out for a couple hours sharing volkswagen stories and ate good food. Once we got warmed up and had enough food we headed out to cruise back home.

Even though traffic was pretty tricky down and back on 85 we had fun cruising together and getting a lot of attention from the other cars in traffic. Just about nothing gets more attention than a really cool old V-dub!

I had fun, my '67 Euro Bug ran great, I had a blast on my first ever VW cruise. I look forward to the next event - Thanks Gary and the Aircooled Gang for putting on a great event!

To see more photos from the Aircooled Addicts VW club event, I put together 2 slide shows. Here's some other photos I took....

http://s250.photobucket.com/albums/gg277/JohnnyGMachine/Aircooled%20Addicts%20Marietta%20Diner%20Feb%206%202010/?albumview=slideshow

Here's a few photos taken by Gary Kohl and other members of Aircooled Addicts....

http://s250.photobucket.com/albums/gg277/JohnnyGMachine/Aircooled%20Addicts%20Marietta%20Diner%20Part%20II/?albumview=slideshow

For more info on VW clubs in the Georgia area, please visit http://georgiadubs.forumotion.net/

Some new Photos of Euri!!!

Had a little spare time during lunch at work to tinker with Euri. So I wheeled him into the warehouse and when I was done checking a couple things I looked around and thought it'd be neat to take a couple inside warehouse pics so I positioned the car for a couple poses and shot some pics. I put the car back outside, then brought the pics back to my desk and manipulated them in photoshop a little.

Here's one that I made into a B&W with a slight sepia tone to it....

In this low angle shot, I made it into a B&W photo as well but thought it would give it a neat effect to leave the euro-spec yellow headlights in their real color.

Pertronix Ignition and Degreed Flywheel Installed

I've been away from the blog for awhile, haven't posted much lately but have been enjoying the Bug anyways. A few weeks ago I drove the Bug over to my buddy Carl's house again to do some more minor surgery. I finally got the Pertronix electronic ignition installed along with the new anodized black flywheel. I'll have to do some minor modifications to my engine tin that installs in front of the flywheel for proper fitment. Now we're able to really dial in the ignition on the bug and it's running like a dream compared to before. Found out that I not only had bad points but my condenser was bad and causing coil failure. The I've been using a used Bosch for now but have a new Bosch to install when i get to it.

Carl came by last Thursday night with his wife and his 1970 Bug tagged along with me, my family in our bug. Had a lot of fun. Noticed a low idle and a little sputtering intermittently but I think I got a little trash to clean out of the carb. So that's next on the agenda along with new valve cover gaskets, plugs, ignition wires, and distributor cap. Installed a new rotor button but the cap and wires I ordered are wrong. I think I will get my tune up parts locally, Cip-1 isn't sending me the correct tune up stuff. Learn as you go.

Hope to keep this more updated. I may not have as much to post for the next month or so due to winter and cold temps.

The man who got me back into aircooled VWs - Will Torres.

This is a tribute post for Will Torres - fellow VW enthusiast, past college classmate, fellow industrial designer, and one of my best friends. Will was a huge influence for me getting another aircooled VW. It's very possible that if not for him I'd not have bought my current '67 Beetle. Will and his wife Monica came up for thanksgiving. Will and I hadn't seen each other since 1995 when we graduated from the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. Currently will has a mid 80's Vanagon (which he drove to Atlanta from the Tampa area) , and a clean red 1972 Super Beetle which is really sweet I must add. Will is very meticulous, thorough, and detail oriented when it comes to working on cars - specifically VWs. SO the day after thanksgiving, Will and I decided that we needed some "garage time" working on something...and that something was my Bug. We didn't have anything in mind so we started looking around the car and Will decided he was going to help me out in the battery compartment area beneath the rear seat. Will did a great job making everything clean and we even made some minor improvements.

Here's will sorting out what's needed to be done here in the battery area...

Here's Will working on the battery area and I'm cleaning up the battery hold down bracket preparing it for fresh paint.

Will and I are hard at work to get the task at hand completed. Here's me laying down some self etch primer on the battery hold down bracket. We noticed it wasn't even being used and just laying on the floor under the seat.

The hard work paid off. Battery wires were cleaned of over spray, terminal connection insulators were added to keep any contact with the seat to the battery. Also note the freshly painted gloss black battery hold down and new clean hardware.

We also noted the dome light not working. After fixing a faulty wire connection and adding a new connector and bulb the dome light worked great.

Hangin' out with my fellow VW buddy Carl at his home shop

Another great thing about being in a car club is that one of them is bound to live nearby and when it's VW guys they're quick to call each other up and find any excuse at all to get together and hang out with their V-dubs. Carl invited me over and helped me out with some adjustments on the Bug. While I was there I got to check out his son's Baja Bug that he was changing the brakes on. That Baja had a lot of trick parts including a bus trans and a one off custom built shifter mount and shift linkage tube mounted in place. Neat! I also got a ride in Carl's sweet 1776 powered Bug complete with DVD player and surround sound. Nice ride! Once it started getting late we finished up playing with the timing on my bug and I headed back to the house a couple miles away. After I get back from my trip to China in a week Carl offered to help me convert my Bug from points over to electronic ignition - Can't wait!

AirCooled Addicts Meet at Fox Pizza - Nov. 19th 2009

I'm a little behind on the updates so here's a few photos from the meet out at Fox's Pizza a couple weeks ago. My bug wasn't quite ready to hit the road for the meet so we took the Mustang and my daughter and I snuck in. Reason for not bringing the Bug is it had a bad coil. But part of what makes this VW club great is the people. Gary Kohl brought me a used coil and sold it to me very cheap and it helped out. Lately I've been able to go out and cruise in the bug again until all my new ignition parts show up. We had fun though checking out all the cool stuff and eating lots of Pizza. Here's a few pics I took as well as some of Gary Kohl's pics.

This is one of Jason's Bugs. Matching luggage and cooler with nice patina!!!

Check out the killer single Cab!!!

Nice black oval window! If I remember right it's a 1958 model year and it's still running 6V too!

Me in the blue shirt on the left, showing my first piece of VW artwork to Carl, Jason, and the guys after we got our fill of Pizza. They approve - Cool!

There's me and Caitlin in the back center eatin' Pizza.

Always cool to see Gary's Herbie Bug.

Nice lineup!

Fastest way to change the belt on your V-Dub???!!

I don't know if I'd try this or not. I might end up with that screwdriver in my head or something biazrre!!! Pretty cool video though.

What's inside that counts!

This is a pretty cool video plus this Bug really flies! Check it out.

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

Brown Truck Came Again!

My heat exchangers have seen better days, I think that a flap on one of them is stuck or rusted closed so it was time for replacements. I also ordered new cables and hardware for the heat exchangers. While I had the heat exchangers and exhaust off, I decided I wanted to replace the exhaust system as well. I hate bolting up old rusty parts back on especially if they bolt onto the new parts I just installed! So I also ordered an Empi GT twin pipe exhaust system with the polished coating. Not only does the polished coating look cool it helps the car to run a little cooler too! I'll be away for a week but hope to be installing this stuff when I get back. Winter's around the corner so I need to get my heat in proper working order soon!

Fuel System Overhaul - Part 5 - FINISHED!

I finished up the fuel system last Sunday afternoon, and got her fired up. Obviously from the previous post you can see that I got the Bug runnin' and already out drivin'. I put the finishing touches to the tank this evening, and took the finished photo. I replaced the tire pressure specifications sticker on the fuel tank next to the filler neck and put in the soft gasket that goes around the bottom of the fuel tank flange to keep the

flange from rubbing on the trunk floor. I'm pretty happy with how it turned out and it's all operating nicely. All in all not a bad job that you can do yourself.

Cruisin' the Church Parkin' Lot...

Gary shot out an email to the Air Cooled Addicts informing everyone that there was going to be a local car show at Lanier Church of God in Buford. He and Herbie were heading over to check it out. Since it was literally only a couple miles from my house and the weather was absolutely beautiful - I thought this was as good an excuse as any to bust out my '67 Bug and head over to meet up with Gary and anyone else that might drop in.

After meeting up with Gary and some of the gang from AirCooled Addicts up at Fox Pizza Den in Lawrenceville, Gary gave me a used set of points for me to swap in place of the worn out ones giving my Bug some driveability issues. Today was a good day for a test run and the points I swapped in made a difference.

This is Harold's 1974 Super Beetle Convertible. This Bug was really clean. I think Harold has had the car less than a year so far and is out in it havin' fun with the top down.

And here's Herbie!!! Gary came in with Harold shortly after I arrived. Herbie attracted a lot of attention not only from the kids but the kids-at-heart! Gary's done a great job personalizing his Herbie with a low front drop, and satin L87 pearl white paint.

2009 Sugar Hill, GA Fall Fest VW & Classic Car Show

Although I couldn't get the Beetle ready in time we still went and checked out the 2009 Fall Festival and VW & Classic Car Show. It was about 48 degrees and rainy but still a lot of fun to go and check out the aircooled V-dubs. Click on the link below to see the slideshow.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/43100116@N03/sets/72157622620266876/show/

Fuel System Overhaul - Part 4

I haven't posted up here in a few days because the Bug has been soaking up a lot of time. I missed my goal of having it ready for the local Fall Festival VW and Classic Car show this past Saturday. I should have listened to my instincts and used the laquer acrylic based paint from the beginning! I tried the Rustoleum enamel and had problems with the paint lifting especially when I applied the clear - YIKES. So I had to strip the top of the tank down to bare metal again. The bottom painted up nice, didn't spend as much time on making it as smooth and perfect since you won't see it anyways. So to recap the project, to this point here's what I've replaced and restored in the fuel system.

- Restored the fuel tank. Sims Radiator cleaned and coated the inside.

- Stripped the fuel tank exterior down to the metal, etch primed and painted gloss black.

- All the fuel hoses were replaced with the correct replacement braided fuel hose purchased from Wolfsburg West.

- Ran compressed air through the metal fuel fuel line in the chassis and cleaned the metal real fuel line behind the doghouse. Flow was perfect, no clogs or rust in the lines.

- Replaced the old clear fuel filter and upgraded to an inline metal filter.

- Relocated the new fuel filter near the transmission, for increased safety against possible fire hazzards.

- Replaced the fuel pump.

- Screen filter in the fuel tank was initially missing so I purchased and installed a screen and O-ring inside the tank.

- Bought all new stainless hose clamps. I installed these at the ends of each fuel hose. Overkill maybe, but again, increased safety.

I did finally get everything just about buttoned up yesterday. After blowing a little compressed air in the fuel tank at the filler neck, I was able to force the fuel up and into the fuel pump to get the Bug started. After about a minute the Bug smoothed out and was running better than ever! I will take the last few photos tonite showing what I did including some of the improvements I made relocating the filter and the fuel hose clamps.

Meanbugs.com

Meanbugs focuses on Volkswagens from 1967 and earlier, with the “right” and cool low look to them. A perfect paint job or shiny chrome isn't necessary or even preferred. Meanbugs loves cars with a rusty paint job that shows age on the car. That with a lowered suspension and shiny polished wheels is what they feel really sets their aircooled rides off! Why have a shiny car like everyone else, when you can have a car with an unique patina-look by mother nature? Dare to be different, that's what MeanBugs is all about!

Meanbugs website has a free forum you can sign up for, news updates, and even a store selling unique aircooled lifestyle apparel and even skateboards! Not only do these guys have a website but they got a shop too. If you're in Sweden and wanna check these guys out stop by. OK, so enough talkin, start clickin' and check these guys out.

http://www.meanbugs.com/

Parts came from Wolfsburg West

Just received the gas tank screen, screen O-ring, fuel filters, and braided fuel line. Just waiting on 2 parts from Cip1 which should be here day after tomorrow.

Fuel System Overhaul - Part 3

I picked up my gas tank for the Bug from Sim’s Radiator Service in Lawrenceville today. From what I can see inside the tank it looks coated pretty well. They also took the bottom fuel line fitting out before coating and then put it back on for me so it didn’t get lost. For the most part they did an OK job. I could see down the fuel neck, and there seems to be a piece of grass or debris that got into the coating on the inside? I’ll try to pick it out. They also painted the outside of the tank (I was on the fence whether I should have opted out and told them not to and that I could do that part) which I was less than impressed with. Not only did they use a brush to apply the Rustoleum paint but there were very thick runs in the paint! I also found more pieces of debris and grass stuck to the outside paint. I just didn’t feel right in putting that back in the Bug like that even though the carpeting covers the tank.

For the bottom, there didn’t seem to be as thick a paint job on the bottom so I just sanded it with the orbital sander, and then used a soft sanding block and sponge with some sand paper by hand. I’ll prime and sand it a couple times to get it to look pretty clean and then just paint it.

For the top of the tank though I decided to strip the paint down to the metal. The runs and paint were really thick and I really wanted this to look extra clean and smooth. Plus there was still painted over gasket material around the sending unit opening that I wanted to remove. I used industrial strength aircraft paint stripped. This is the easiest way but man that stuff is nasty to work with. Use caution and gloves with this stuff – and do it outside.

I ran out of time and had to head out later in the evening but managed to get the bulk of the paint removal and sanding done. With a little more time, some primer, and a bit more sanding the tank will be ready for final paint. My fuel screen, fuel lines, and sending unit gasket/hardware should be here today from Wolfsburg West. My steering damper will be here Wednesday and I have to install it before I mount the tank back in. So hopefully Wednesday night the steering damper, tank, sending unit, and fuel tank to fuel line should be installed. First though I will need to clean out the fuel line running through the chassis tunnel.