71 project beetle ( with turbo )

56oval

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56oval
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stevieturbo said:
Same colour as your finger.

Most wheels are ridiculously hard work, especially when some places will do a refurb for very sensible money
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My fingers are ingrained with aluminium dust and paint sandings 🙈.

I had a guy lined up that my painter used, I dropped a set to him before the lockdown and then heard nothing, allegedly he was still working albeit on cut down days. He couldn't get material so couldn't vapour blast the wheels. So I thought sod it, I'll do them, the main reason was that if I wasn't happy with the colour I was screwed, plus the trim was all to be done in the same colour and I don't think he powder coats plastic etc. So the upshot was to tackle them myself. I would never do it again, 3 days rubbing down is equal to half an hour with his vapour blaster. It really is a no brainer. The wheels and trim will always be subject to change until I'm happy with it so no point spending the dough until then. They aren't perfect, far from it but a damn sight better than they were.

STILL waiting on my parts from Germany, which is frustrating the hell out of me but hey.
 

Ben P

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Ben P
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👏 Dam those wheels look good. Nice work Ben.

The colour on the car is awesome too 😎. Must be well chuffed!
 

56oval

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So chuffed with how that's worked out. 😍
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56oval

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svensktoppen said:
What's the white one?
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My painters as seen in previous pics. Had a day of it yesterday, went down to do the valve train on it as something just wasn't right. Turned out being a broken rocker. The pushrods were too long and the rocker shaft wasn't shimmed properly. Spent all day fixing it. Retuned it as the timing was miles too advanced. Now all running perfectly. None of us can wait for a road trip when this is all over. It'll be some time yet.

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56oval

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Today was a big day. 6am start, lifted a trailer from a friend. Went home, loaded the chassis up.

Stopped in at Tyre master Portadown as he messaged me just before I left to say my tyres were in. All fiited and balanced, Robert is a true gent.

Then on to the body shop where finally, we reunited the body with the chassis. Spent all day on it and got th glass in too.

Delighted.
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After all the fabricating of the turbo system without the body on, I was chuffed that only have one very minor tweak to the boost pipe to clear the decklid, everything else fits with no issues.
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PaulYDP

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PaulYDP
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tbc
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R1 Turbo
Love that! Colour looks so good and contrast of the wheels looks great. Some turnaround from the first post!
 

56oval

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Another productive day, wings hung but couldn't final fix as the wrong colour beading has been delivered 😭.

Spent most of the day on the decklid alignment and clearance of the turbo system. Suffice to say, it fits!!!! JUST 🙈

The biggest hurdle sorted and it was worrying me, so nice to have that lid fully closed and no junk hanging out.
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56oval

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A few updates.

The drop spindles widen the track slightly, along with disk brakes. One of my absolute musts with this car is to not have it scraping the road or tyres rubbing the arches.

I want dropped at the front but not slammed. After we bolted the body to the chassis and hung the wings it was obvious there was going to be clearance issues, wheel offsets Havnt helped the matter.

So this turned into my worse nightmare, I had to narrow the front beam, something I've always been against.

Long story short I removed the freshly painted beam and took it to my mates, chopped the ends off whilst he machined up some sleeves. Once the sleeves were pressed in, I removed 1" 1/4 from either side reducing the track by 2.5" in total but not going silly narrow. Once everything was checked for true, I 45 degree all the ends, tacked it then did a 2 pass weld on it all. Its not pretty but its rock solid. I then I had to refit the leaves and arms. We had to clamp the beam in the mill and drill the sprung steel leaves for locators for the grub screws. When that was done it was merely a case of cutting the excess width off the leaves and reassembling the entire thing.
I then had to cutoff the steering lock stop, modify it and weld it back on to retain the ability to set the full lock stop so as not to foul the inner arches.
All it needs now is to be repainted.

A ton of work I could have done without tbh. But it's done and hopefully will resolve the clearance issues.

My parts STILL Havnt arrived from Germany 😭
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Fit up is going well, all the wiring is pulled in and just needs hooked up.
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56oval

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Well that's the front beam back on, much better clearance, can go all the way down without fouling anything. There's enough for me to space back out a bit too which is great. That'll be something to mess around with when the car is on the road.

My wing beading arrived, 3rd time lucky 🙈
But it turned up gloss black so I had to sand it all down to dull it up.

Off to lift a trailer in the morning. Weather permitting, its coming home 🤗
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HILL9N3GTI

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omagh
Looks fantastic Ben.
The progress isn't being held back besides the the little mishaps.
love the ride high its currently at on the rolling shell, in my eyes thats the way they should all be, even if you had to do a bit of cutting magic on the front beam.

Also the wheels look great, have you thought about skimming the front of the spokes as a final finish, would set them off a hole lot more ?
 
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