Veng? Who??

The next step was to fabricate a new piece of inside channel with the correct profile. Fürsten had a sample laying in the work shop, so I used this to find the shape. And it turned out perfect =) Now the alignment was close to perfect, but the corner was far from solid. Making the rounded piece around the heater tube was no easy task. But after a little trimming and adjusting, the pieces fell together. After welding everything up, it felt more solid and looks straight. It's probably forgivving to weld on a VW T1, as many of the lines on the lower body can be meassured out from straightlines, and nearly everything has the flat bottom of the car as a reference point.

I decided after starting the welding that the Veng part was no option in this corner. The shape was not anything near the OG shape. So I wnt for a total fabrication of the pieces myself. And it turned out better than expected. I had to skip the dimpeled part with the two holes for the bodymount, but in my eyes this is a small detail missed compared to welding in the Veng part with totally wrong shape. Maybe I can fabricate the the correct profile after everything is welded in place?

Puzzle with alignment

With so much metal removed, it is a challenge getting the corner in the right position again. It was no way around cutting away all this metal, to have solid material to weld into. I started with fabricating the outer channel side, and made sure to keep the draining holes intact, and got the height of the channel sitting right. The next step was cutting a Wolfpart bottom to fit, and tack it togheter carefully. Then I extended the last piece of the cross member, and meassured the hight to be as good as it could be at this time...

More rust

The rear end of the riht heaterchannel is a sad story... Quite much of this corner has to be removed, and there will be a problem finding the reference points again. After making the nessecary cuts, it became quite spacious back there =)

Trial fitting

Then it was time to try fitting the NOS part.. and wow, it "fit like a glove". The quality of the metal and the accurate fit is amazing... far from the repro pieces you buy today. Now it's just grinding down the weld underneath and rustprime the first layer of sheet metal. And then spotweld the new panel in place. I must admit it feels good to know how solid this corner of the car is becoming =)

Making a new part

The new innerwing plate was made out of sheet metal and cut to fit... The curved area had originally a nicely rounded edge. I hammered that out and it looked quite like the original panel. In the picture a little adjustment of the curve is still needed. The sheet metal was butt welded, and after changing from 0,6 to 0,8 mm thread in the welder, it went a lot easier.

Removing the rot

The rotted area was almost as big as the new welding plate, so I decided to make the cut in a way that most of the welding are covered by the outer plate when finnished. The edge of the rear compartment area was all good...

Re-using the bracket

Luckily the bracket was pretty good, and I think sandblasting it and remake the reinforcement will make it good as new. There are pretty much work to recreate all these details... Always a little more than you think...

Rear bodymount

After visiting Bad Camberg, the spirit to finnish the zwitter was back again. Sourcing som good NOS welding parts made the job more greatful. I started to drill out the spotwelds on the existing bodymount with the backplate, because some rust was showing through. After removing the 3 layer plate, a LOT of rust came foreward....

Collecting pieces

The choice of VW happenings to visit this summer was Bug Run in Sweden and Bad Camberg in Germany. They both have a swap meet, and the the best in each division. Bug Run swaps are the best in Scandinavia, and the BC is world class. Even on a limited budget, due to house building, I managed to track down some items for the zwitter that I have been looking for.

In the "pile of shit" are for example a KDF fanhouse plate, a NOS vdo fuelgauge with sender, a Störk temperature gauge, OG brakefuel reservoir w/floater, NOS welding parts, OG zwitter bonnet handle, and some split rubber "hard to find".... And some other "juggel" that may be used for the car...