10 years ago

Came across this old email communication recently from exactly 10 years ago (dated 18/06/2007). It is from a local classic car restoration company who I had previously contacted about getting some 'economic' repairs done to the heater channels and body mounts with a view to keep Gretchen on the road. No doubt that this concise reply was a huge contributing factor for me ultimately deciding that I had to tackle this resto myself or part ways with her. The reality was that keeping her running was no longer viable:

"thanks for the pics. sorry to say but i am not willing to do a simple
weld it up for the mot job due to how bad the whole area around the rot
is. if that was just plated up it would be a night mare to get it back
to being a nice car again due to having to weld he floor and body together."

The decision to fully restore the car myself was a tough and intimidating choice to make, especially being totally unskilled in the area of automotive restoration. I am really pleased I stuck with it (I think) and still have my fingers crossed that I can actually pull this off! 

More Hooky's panels!

Some fresh new Hooky's panels have just landed on my doorstep, so it's time for me to really get going on the major shell repairs:

• Engine Bay Side Tray
• Rear Bumper Mount (LH)
• Rear Bumper Mount (RH)

As I have no doubt mentioned before, the quality of Steve Hook's panels are outstanding! If only he made every body component that I will need to complete this resto...

Safer Motoring

Thanks to a well known online auction site I managed to get my grubby mitts on a collection of old British VW 'Safer Motoring' magazines from 1965!

It has been fascinating to flick through the pages and see what was going on at the time my bug was born, such as the prestigious award for Miss VW: 

Then of course are all of the vintage adverts for accessories for me to droll over. With this accurate reference material I now have a wish list of accessories to fit the period of my car. Just got to keep my beady eye out now:

Even in '65 they understood that if you wanted to market a set of boring foot well mats, then you can always rely on the fact that sex sells:

I want to wrap this post up by wishing you all a Happy New Year! My sincere thanks to you for your continued interest in this resto journey. 2016 should see some big leaps forward...

It's electric!

A garage with power and water has now been located. Plans are now afoot to transfer Gretch to her new workspace within the next month. Finally the real work can begin! To say that I am excited is an understatement.

A special thanks to the marvellous Dangerman for making this breakthrough possible. You sir are a true legend!

Should last me a while (maybe!)

Thoroughly replenished my stock of metal cutting blades - don't want a repeat of last weekend's nonsense!

The project is still happening - it's just been in hibernation for the winter!

Wow, such a vast amount of time has elapsed since I have even set foot in the garage, let alone posted anything on this blog! The problem with this time of year, apart from the numbing cold and relentless drizzle, is that it gets dark at around 4pm (although the days are starting to get longer...). Sadly, these factors make working in a garage without any electric a bit of an uninviting prospect!

However, I am determined to resume the work shortly.....

"Now you know, and knowing is half the battle" – GI Joe

Some big steps are looming over me and this has induced the stark realisation that up until now I have been idly ‘tickling’ the car without any clear idea or structure on how to transform the rusty old girl into a gleaming low-rider. If I am honest, I guess I have been ignoring the scary stuff! But no more I tell thee! I am determined to steer this project into a more focused direction, so with a ravenous lust for knowledge I have been immersing myself in books, magazines and instructional videos. An unhealthy amount of spare time has been spent scouring the internet to learn from the experiences of other car restorers. I have also been progressively equipping myself with the proper tools and together with a confident state of mind I have developed a plan of action for separating the body from the chassis over coming the coming weeks.

I will be using Rick Higgin’s technique to accomplish this daunting feat, which I have learned by religiously watching and re-watching the ‘Bug Me, Vol 6’ video. Truly essential viewing for simplifying the intimidating processes involved in restoring a Bug. I got this and ‘Bug Me, Vol 7’ off eBay for the combined bargain price of £7! Good old low cost / low quality VHS!



Step 1: Disconnect the myriad of parts that run between the shell and chassis. Locate and remove all the relevant bolts (for any that will not budge I will liberally apply WD40 and leave it to penetrate for a few days). Take exact measurements of my garage to determine the dimensions that I need to build the saw horses on which the body of the car will be sitting on whilst I focus on restoring the chassis.

Step 2: Purchase wood and brackets for making some sturdy saw horses. Cut to all pieces to the required size and partially assemble.

Step 3: Finish assembly of saw horses after transporting them ‘flat packed’ to the garage. Beg, borrow or steal a large floor jack that will provide enough elevation to get the car onto the saw horses. Enlist the help of a friend to !GULP! assist me in splitting the car in half!

Step 4: Strip chassis down and transport back to my house to begin repairing.

A few gems from afar

I got back from Berlin a couple of weeks ago but unfortunately I never did make it to Wolfsburg for my planned day trip to the Autostadt (aka the Volkswagen factory museum). Oh well, another time. It turns out that Germany is rather a large place and what I thought would be a short inexpensive journey was in reality an expensive lengthy one (the train ticket alone cost more than the return flight from Bristol to Berlin!). However, I did get to see a beautiful example of an early Beetle in the German history museum which helped sooth my disappointment of not going to the Autostadt!





As you can see from the pictures above it is a split rear screen model, from 1951 I believe, but there is one inharmonious feature that really bugged me (no pun intended)… The rear light clusters are from a 1962 > model! My friends were quick to point out that I needed to “get out more” and it would probably be healthy to calm down and “let it go”. Whilst I agreed to an extent with their dismissive opinion I still felt that a museum, especially one dedicated to German history, should have made the effort to ensure that the car was historically accurate! I mean, how could I possible trust the integrity of the other exhibits knowing that this particular example of iconic German design was in fact an amalgamation of inconsistent parts?!  Even so, it was still beautiful to behold. Here are a couple of commemorative coins that were produced to celebrate the 5 millionth and 10 millionth Beetles to roll of the production line:





Back in Blighty very little progress has been made on the bug lately. Occasionally I seize the opportunity to run outside with my power tools when the weather permits and it’s not dark! This general lack of activity means that I have nothing of interest to report.

Long time, no blog!

It certainly has been a while since my last update. I wish that I had more news to impart about Gretch's progress, but alas nothing much has happened.

This is partly due to having my camera stolen at a music festival a couple of months back (stupidly I had all the detailed photos of dismantling the car stored on the SD card and never download them, Ggrrr!). Without the means to accurately document I just seemed to lose my motivation.

Anyway, I am now feeling a renewed sense of inspiration and will be pressing on with the restoration without further delay. Regular progress updates to follow shortly :)