Speed welding

Knechten's 52 zwitter is rapidly coming togehter. With a welding-speed like the devil himself were chasing right behind that splitted rear window, welding of the car is nearly completed. Last night saw the rear left chassismount to be worked on, here under careful supervision from Brezelfürsten.

Preparing parts

From the first day I purchased this car, I have tried to follow the wise word of those who have done it before. "Everyone can restore a chassie, but God knows how many who left their half-finnished projects there". I have therefore consentrated on the timeconsuming rustwelding insted. But seeing the light in the tunnel, it's time to look a little ahead. The floor pan was sandblasted and painted when I got the car, so all it needs is a good cleaning after 20 years storage. But everything else is not ready and stored in a LOT of different small boxes. To make things ready for assembling the car, I have started some small preparations. First thing out is the pedal assembly, sandblasted, painted and adjusted. The nice throttle pedal got a good cleaning and new grease... Ready to floor it =)

New update

Last night after cleaning out some scrap from the garage, I could not resist the temptaition of picking up the welder. A couple of weeks ago we ran out of gas for the welder, but with a fresh bottle at hand, I fired it up again. I used two nights a while ago making all the pieces to be welded, and the welding therfore went pretty easy. Some adjustments had to be made, but the corner was almost completed in two hours. One year of practise with the welder makes a hell of a difference in speed. Every step brings the zwitter closer to road legal again =)

Knechten`s cal-look

This pic shows Knechtens 65 cal-look which he sold (how is it possible to sell such a pearl?).

It is only minutes before we are heading for BugRun 2006.

Building a cardboard-car

Some of the welding parts are quite difficult to make without having a cardboard model. The trickiest part is the one in the corner of the backseat, around the heaterchannel. I pray for this part to be reproduced by someone very soon, because it's a pain in the ass to make. For now I have made it, but for the next(?) project it would help a lot. Drawing, cutting and taping... Kindergarden for grownups =)

Rear apron

I removed the rear apron as well, because I will change it for a H-type and make it removable. This is toget easy access to the engine, and make removal and fitting easier. Removing the apron revealed more rust. Both end pieces with the bumperbrackets will be replaced. More parts to order from Woffe =)

Keep on struggeling

Last night I cut out a pile of rust again. The heaterchannels doesn't stand a chance when someone put insulation materials in them many years ago. It had soked up a lot of moisture, and of course rusted like hell. I manage to remove all of the rust and started making new welding parts... Not to forget removing the old undercarriage material on the innerwing, that took half the night... But now it's gone forever =)

Weld through spray

I use a weld through spray made of zink as protective layer before I weld the double layer metal together. I dont know how effective this is, but I intend to use some sort of undercarriage spray to penetrate between the metal sheets after painting the car. But I cant understand anything else that this is a rust trap how you do it, if it's supposed to look factory stock. Next time I will weld the NOS support metal for the rear bodymount.

Closing the rear end

The rear end of the heater channel has a distinctive profile. Luckily the outer panel was intact so I had to make the inner part. This was also timeconsuming, and had to be made in three pieces. I was looking to get good solid welds, because this is a very exposed area on the car. It all turned out Ok at last. Final grinding is still necessary to make it lokk satisfying. I also remebered in the last second to add the new mounting nut for the running board before closing the channel.

Closing the corner

It's always a little tricky to make ends meet (not only economical) and make things look right. To remove all evidence of rust and make fresh metal meet in every corner, I hade to make som new small pieces in the intersection between the heaterchannel and the inner wheel well. This proved to be difficult as the piece had double curves. It would have been nice to have a leather bag to punch against, but with some improvisation it fit at the end. It's both good and bad to know there is just a similar corner left =) I know how it's done, but also how much work there is behind it.

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...

A new assistent

It has been a couple of months with little progression on the Zwitter. Most due to other projects as the Kvikk engine for the "Rallye-bug" and other tasks in the workshop. Some of the time is used to collect and sort out parts as well. Some of the things purchased this spring, was a new assistent for the shop. This will be very helpful when all the pieces of the car is going back together. It's great to be organized. The Hazet assisten is from the late 60ies as far as I can sort out. It's in great condition, and of course it will stay with it's original paint and patina =)

Hopefully this assistent will help speeding up my project.... (Before and after pictures)

A lot of air

This picture helps to make the decision of using danish steel even easier =)

Rear right corner

This is far whorse than the left rear corner. Nothing is left of the rear corner, and heavy surgery is needed. To get to the rusted area, the heater tube under the rear seat had to be removed. I cut it in a way that the top cover will hide the welding when finnished. The job now is to find out where to cut and replace with fresh metal. Here I see no other way than to use some danish metal to replace the rusted area. It's to huge for me to create, as there are few ends to meassure from.

Starting out back

Some exitement was certainly present when it came to removing the rear fender. After struggeling with both the front fenders, I expected nothing less here. But surprisingly it seemed that all the bolts and the fender had been removed at some point before, and the bolts could be removed by hand.

Right front corner

Some progression is visible on my project, but not as much as hoped. But the timewindow for this car is wide, and I'm in no hurry. Bulding piece by piece, the front end is becomming more solid each day. The regulator on the welder broke last nigt, so I didn't finish welding the last two pieces of the corner. But there is only filling of spotwelds and grinding left before anti-rust treatment and painting.

Backside of the medallion

After inspecting the backside of the H-apron, it seemes to be quite some work needed to make this baby shine again =)

Nice ass

A well formed rear end is never wrong in any way. The rear apron of a classic beetle is no exeption. As seen in the pictures posted on the zwitter, the car had a modern rear apron mounted at some point. This will of course be changed for the well known H-apron. These are not easy to come by, and to find an uncut example is almost impossible. Repro versions are on the marked, but there is always something about the real thing. After a tip from Fürsten, I collected a H-apron last night, although in a cut version. Having no experience in restoring this piece, it looks possible to reverse it back to a solid apron. Some pictures of the operation will follow.

Inside right side

On this side I did a little twist to the welding of the ouside channel. Because it was more solid than the other side, I made a more solid overlap weld. As you see in the pictures, there are still some pices to make.

Repeating procedures

To get the corner aligned again, I used measuring points from the other corner to get the pieces right. I started with the outer channel, and the cut the bottom part and tack welded it in place.

Corner nr. 2

The right side corner of the front heaterchannel, was even worse than the left. After cutting out the rusted pieces, there was not a lot of intersection points left. On this side the front wall was rotten on the underside all the way up.

And wholaaa...

Sometimes it's better to act than think to much... In this case the result came out better than expected. Porsche sparewheel wide 5? Formel-Vee? Classic racing? E-bay?

Struggling through

It's surprisingly not the funniest job at all times to weld, weld and weld... To get inspiration to start again, day after day on removing rust, it's important to have some visions of the project.

And a very important issue of a project is the wheels. I have many ideas in my head, and one of them is spinning around the wheel shown in the picture. This is a 911/912 Porsche wheel, and would fit an outlavws car quite nice... keep on dreaming =)

The outside corner

Here is the result of the outside corner. It may not be professional, but with some sealing of the welding and grinding of the surfaces, the result will be good enough to last another generation. I think the most important procedure will be the rustproofing inside the channels. This frontpiece welded in, will be exposed for hard conditions, and therefore I painted it with "weld through" paint on the inside of the channel.

The next corner

Hopefully the tricky parts will be easier to make on the next corner. Can you spot the intersection point on this corner? It's not easy to make these parts without measuring from a other car. Buying the channel bottoms from Wolfparts has been great help. Just three more corners to go.....

The first complete corner

The extention of the front wall and bottom piece, was a tricky part to make. But after several cardboard models and testing, the pieces seemed to fit. Of course it's easier to make the cardboard models when you have two splits to compare it to. After adjusting a little bit, the final piece was welded in. And then we have the first corner of the car rock solid. A little more welding and grinding needed to get the paint-ready finnish.

Towards a personal milestone

It has proven to take some time and skill to weld up the heaterchannels to look as good as stock. After fitting the heaterchannel bottom last time, the contour of the corner came back. First step was to extend the front side of the front wall, and to make and weld in the inner channel.

Front corner

At last I got some speed on the welding again. During one evening I managed to finish up the inner wing and started working on the heatercahnnel. I replaced the bottom part with goods from Wolfparts, and made the rest by papercutting and fitting before welding. The bottom and outer side of the left channel are now OK. Just some grinding and welding needed to finnish it up. A good feeling to se things look like new again =)

Strange things

Some new strange things about the zwitter appears for each time I look at it. Yeasterday I discovered that the when the car was rear ended, the fanhousing smashed into the firewall and made a dent. It popped out just by pressing it. Somehow the car doesnt seem to have suffered from it in other ways than body parts replaced on the rear.

Piece by piece

After a very satisfying session on the "El-capitan", I managed to make another welding piece for the front inner wing. The technique is improving, and it's showing in the details and tempo. The weakest link at the moment is the welding equipment, and for next welding session I think the welding-gas is bought in, and the powder-thread put on the shelf. I'can in some way see some kind of end to it now. Hopefully the welding is done by the summer.

Building up

I have a philosophy that it's smart not to cut the whole car to pieces before weldig it up again. Therefore it was satisfying to spend an evenening with the welder at last. My goal is to save as much as possible from the original car, instead of turning it into a danish "Veng-car". It didn't take much time before I saw the results of that. Welding into metal that containes small spots of rust, is not easy. The welded parts will probably not be as solid as new, but on the other hand didn't Wolfsburg treat the body against rust attacks. So with "nearly as new" welding, and modern chemical treatment, the car will last at least 50 years more. Being a "freshman" on welding, quite a few lessons were learned the first evening =)

Crackers

Removing the other front fender was quite easy, because most of the bolts followed the feder off the car. This side had the original cloth band between the fender and body. This side looked a lot worse, and some more extensive repair work is needed here. The picture show what needed to be cut out for a beginning, but the whole area underneath the fender mounting zone is all eaten up.
With good tools and a good attitude, this should be fun welding up =)