Friday, October 13, 2006

Interior


The interior is painted in the same color as the body, but brushpainted with a rough finish. The radio is also a strange monster, likely to be replaced with something more OG. The plan for the interior is to grind the surfaces bac to OG standards, and repaint in L73. I will try to remove the blue paint with paintstripper, but am prepared to paint it all.

Small steps


Nothing much is happening to Zwitter these days, but next month I hope to get things going. Most of the time still goes to prepare the workshop. But small things are better than no action at all.
So now the doorpanels are removed and the vinyl cover peeled off.
Here you can see the result...

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

And some more inspiration...


I think this picture can make a grown man cry... There is something about the attitude and racing spirit =)

Starting the puzzle



I try my best to collect as much information as possible, before I start the process of welding the zwitter. The options for ready made weldingparts, are limited to a car this old. I have found some, especially from Wolfparts in Sweden, but think I have to fabricate some as well. Here are a couple of pictures borrowed from the net, showing home made pieces. I must say these look great. It sure give some inspiration to start hammering out some own parts.

Welding practise


It's always good to have something to reach for, something who sets a standard. I think this picture shows what a rustwelded corner can look like. This is my goal, and the furure will tell how it turns out =) I am in fact excited to get started on the welding.... Maybe not so excited when the struggle begins...

Inspiration



As we are getting our stuff together in the Outlavws workshop, there is a hope to start tearing the car down in a month or so. Meanwhile the days are getting shorter, and the time for collecting inspiration increasing. I have been lucky to see the Norwegian car "Thündersodder" a couple of times, and this car sets a new standard. I really like the vintage-race feel of the car.
The attitude Øystein gave this car really is a inspiration to me. I look at my own pictures and the Ultra VW story quite often. I'm not going to copy-cat this car by any means, but hope to catch some of the attitude. I will stick to a more "stock" appearance, because my zwitter has a lot of correct parts, that not will be replaced.
I once said that the goal for the project is to build a "50ies Cal-looker", meaning a "outlaws-cal-look" built like it would have been in the 50ies. But I know my projects always change a lot during the restoration period... stay tuned and see the result =)

Monday, October 09, 2006

Peeling of...


Purchasing a resto object is always exciting. The good moments when your expectations are forfilled, are really whorth the elbowgrease of some rust welding. The first positive surprise with the zwitter came when I discovered the original paint color. The second came when I understood that all the sidepanels had a vinyl cover, to protect the original whool covers. The vinylcovers have probably been there since 58 as well, and the OG covers underneath looks awesome. I can just imagine how this will look with the car painted chestnut brown and the brown fishbone interior....

At one point something went wrong...


Very wrong I would say. It probably happend in Sweden around 58, just before the car was exported to Norway. At the time time Norway was short on cars, after a regulation period after ww2. Swedish cars were sold as "New" in Norway after going through a make over. Blue seemed to be the color of the time, and were sprayed on this zwitter. There are a few other items as well, that probably was changed at the same time. A split front wing, split rear decklid, and turn signals on the front fenders are things that didn't come with the car. Luckily I think the older parts says something about the cars history, and are not going to be changed, except the turn signals of course. The car shown in the picture has the same color as the original zwitter color, L 73 Chesnut brown. I think this color will suit the car better... agree?