71 Sierra Yellow, OG paint refresh

[magui]

Yes very nice work indeed, aswell as the bus

You mentioned you got kickpanels when you bought the "nos" seat. For my 71 Sunroof deluxe im looking for a template to reproduce some. Any chance you are willing to take up measurements etc of back and middle seat kickpanels ? Havent been able to find any

 

[squareweave]

Yes very nice work indeed, aswell as the bus

You mentioned you got kickpanels when you bought the "nos" seat. For my 71 Sunroof deluxe im looking for a template to reproduce some. Any chance you are willing to take up measurements etc of back and middle seat kickpanels ? Havent been able to find any

PM me in a few weeks and I can trace something out for you.

Rich

 

[JordyB]

love this Bus cannot beat sierra yellow

 

[squareweave]

Well it seams that I have been delinquent here for the past few months. I've been helping a friend work on his bus, enjoying the last bit of summer and enjoying some of my other cars.



I have been plugging away on this 71 as well. While I had decent original black front seats for the van I ended up scoring a mint pair recently, which truly are beautiful. They still need to be cleaned up but i'm super stoked with them.



I had a set of new rotors and drums in my parts so my good friend Jay was kind enough to true them up on his brake lathe at his shop, I painted them along with new ATE calipers in VW paint code L329 Shetland grey rather than black to offset colors looking through the "windows" in the Cosmic wheels. I found a nice set of small diameter slam shocks this summer for the front and KYB Gas A Just on the rear and I painted them the stock green color.









As you can see in my first posts this van did not come with a motor so I sourced a correct AE code block and am going to run that in it. I am going to run a completely bullet proof 1600 DP. It has a new Pertronix distributor and flamethrower coil, electric CB Performance fuel pump, new alternator for good power and stock Solex 34 Pict carb. I am keeping it stock with a few upgrades so i have no problems as I plan on driving this bus on some long road trips

Before I send out the engine tin for blasting and powder coating I like to test fit the engine tin, just to make any adjustments. I've had a Puma (VW of Brasil) doghouse fan shroud laying around here for a while so I thought I would use it on this bus. Puma fan shrouds are a few inches shorter than a stock and will be perfect if I decide in the future to do a raised type 1 transmission swap.



I recently put the bus back up on jack stands and taken all of the suspension off and motor apart and dropped off the parts at the sandblaster and then will go to the powder coaters and done in Satin black . There is a whole bunch of parts to be done but in the end it will be nice , clean and detailed. The dash top was a bit ugly so I thought I would get that done in Satin black as well. All of the original hardware is at the plating shop and it is being Cadmium plated.








Bumper will be blasted and powder coated in the factory white

 

[vaughan]

Is the cover a tease ! when's the big unveil :lol:

 

[squareweave]

Is the cover a tease ! when's the big unveil :lol:

Ha ha. No the cover was on just because I have it and the van was sitting outside I don't have the windscreen in yet. I am hoping to have the bus done by Christmas, I want to get the 70 tintop westy home in the new year so I can have it finished by late spring for camping with Leanne and Duke summer of 2015

 

[vwwinston72]

This is by far my favourite bus on here at the moment i love it! 8)

 

[squareweave]

This is by far my favourite bus on here at the moment i love it! 8)

Thanks for the kind words, this bus has been a bit slower to complete than I wanted but I think in the end it should be worth the wait.


I've been away on holidays for the past few weeks but while I was gone I organized to have all of my hardware cadmium plated and powder coating done. I had all of the hardware from this bus and some spares done as well, 1699 pieces in total, it is a big box.


I came home with a damn cold so I took an old paint drop sheet and decided to start sorting out the hardware with the boss!


Just a few more to go.


There was also a lot of powder coating with all of the suspension (front and rear) and all of the engine tin.


On this bus somebody had done crappy spray paint job to the dash top so I had it powder coated semi gloss black as well.


The bumpers were really nice but I had tapped out a few dents. So I brought them home in raw metal and giving them a quick once over with JB Weld to fill in any scratches from the pick and filing. I will drop them off with the brackets to be powdercoated white on Monday.


The devil is in the details so I redid the foam on the back side of the air vents like original. The old foam is usually dried up and like powder

 

[Lee C]

That's a new one like!!! :lol:
Re foaming the vents!!!!

 

[squareweave]

That's a new one like!!! :lol:
Re foaming the vents!!!!

Funny enough, I always redo them in my vans.

 

[gninnam]

That is a lot of metal :shock:

OCD by any chance

 

[squareweave]

I had a bit of a marathon at my trimming bench today. I'm happy with the outcome. The bus now has a nice original upholstery interior that compliments the og paint. I assembled the front drivers seat. It took parts from 4 different seats to make this nice original seat. The rear seat that I picked up was in nice condition but the piping has started to separate in a few spots so I sourced an exact match. I then removed and disassembled the original covers carefully and restitched them together with the correct piping. Tedious..... Yes, but so much cooler than repro covers!!

 

[squareweave]

Started out this morning by assembling the fresh powdercoated axles with CV joints, boots and some of that new Cad plating. Not the best pics due to using my phone






Then found the plated hardware for the Slamwerks spring plates and put them back together.


Then decided to get the Z-Bed brackets assembled and get the back seat in as it was sitting in my way after restitching a few days ago. This is a cool set up as you can see, you have have the stock back seat and also have a full width bed when you fold down the back seat.

Rear seat backrest catch.


Laundered seat belts and back seat.


Sleeper

 

[squareweave]

NOS middle seat extensions mounted. More to come today

 

[Resto-raider]

Wow, that's no half jobs here. Doing a great job. So what are these NOS extenders meant for? So you can take out the seat and still sit on it without falling over or to set the seat more forward when folding the rear seat down?
Were did you find them? Maybe a good idea to make them myself.

 

[squareweave]

Wow, that's no half jobs here. Doing a great job. So what are these NOS extenders meant for? So you can take out the seat and still sit on it without falling over or to set the seat more forward when folding the rear seat down?
Were did you find them? Maybe a good idea to make them myself.

Thanks for the kind comments. The extenders are to move the seat middle forward enough so you can fold down the rear seat into a bed while keeping the middle seat in the van. The hose clamps are how they were meant to be held on. They were part of the kit when you bought one new back in the day.

I believe Roland at "Roland's Bus Farm" has reproduction extenders in stock. Check with him, he's in Belgium

 

[squareweave]

I got the seat pedestals trimmed up.


Seats are all now mounted.


Middle seat mounted, including correct middle seat belts.


I've now started to re-hydrate the original rubber floor mats as you can see in the last pic

 

[squareweave]

Work has been a bit slow after buying the Hanover camper. But I've been out in the garage a bit plugging away. The motor is coming together nicely.


Starting to use some of the Cad plated stuff. When only original bolts will do



Picked up the bumpers yesterday from powdercoating. Of all the people that I farm out work to I have to say my powdercoating guy always gets it right and I never have to worry about being let down!!!

 

[*Sam*]

Out of interest and because I think this is an awesome bus, will it be up for grabs when you have finished it or will it be staying firmly in your collection. Hope you don't mind me asking.

 

[Cab89]

Looking Great! Can you tell me who did the seat pedestal recovering?