Introducing Earl

[Mikew]

Firstly g'day from the sunshine coast, QLD
My name is mike, originally from Swansea in south Wales and regretfully selling my 69 bus over there I have started a slow Resto on my Australian built 1970 Kombi which appears to be a sopru conversion.
She's a rusty beast which for someone that's never welded before would appear to be too big a job, Ive been told several times to scrap it, I'm getting stuck in and learning the art of welding by trail and error by myself.
earl is worth saving as early bay's are the nicest looking..

Been working on it for 3 months or so now, witha young family i have very limited time i have managed to store it next to my work enabling me to spend half an hour to an hour a day( when I get a lunch break!!)

Pics to follow later.. Mike

 

[Mikew]

This is where my both 1970 models have sat for the 4 years I've had them and they have deteriorated a fair bit in that time so needed to start one of them and camper would be more practical with the family..

Looking sad

 

[Grazy]

Welcome Mike , looks like you have a couple of nice projects there , Are they nice and solid on the chassis etc,

Keep the pictures coming dude and get stuck in ! 8)

 

[Mikew]

Looking sad!

Resto day 1

 

[Mikew]

Chassis in good shape really, all surface rust which i have wire brushed and coated with some rust convertor/primer for now, got some Rust Bullet to paint with under there when the time comes, all 4 jacking points are the only concern underneath, not terrible but need replacing.

after a bit of wirebrushing.

Both inner sills are shot, drivers side had a good effort with fibreglass matting and passanger side just had some news paper and filler...

under front is intersting, again heavy use of fibreglass to make up inner step. good use of an old road sign in passanger floor.

 

[Mikew]

going to jump through my millions of pictures but this is what ive done so far...

no welds holding rear corners to the tray's just body filler..

first time welding on the van at this point, i have welded some parts of front door all with gassless wire which was ok at this point, i changed to gass halfway through and you can probably tell at which point that was but i can't believe how much better it is welding with gass!!

found some surface rust behind which i have cut out completely and re welded in a new piece then covered

removed inner, middle and outer sill drivers side.

battery tray also out

new in.

had to square up the added vent holes and weld in new metal

small section behind drivers wheel arch

Stripped the paint from the outside and painted with rust convertor, really suprised on how good the panles are above the bottom 8"

remove power socket hole

cut out some rusty bits

this was this weekends work and my latest welding effort

Sorry for the dumping of images but belive me i have missed out on 10X as many..

Cheers
MIke

 

[Elginbuslover]

For someone who learning to weld as you go along you're doing a really great job! The way you're going you'll have a cracking bus in no time.

 

[StuF]

Gonna be a beaut! 8)

 

[Valentine Won]

Fair play to you mate ,i don`t have the skills or patience for what your doing
nice work 8)

shaun

 

[68_early_bay]

Some good work going in there 8)

Another one saved

 

[89Rallye]

looks like you have some long nights ahead of you with that one!

Top work so far, keep the pics coming 8)

 

[rallye dale]

The weldings definately improving

Good work so far and we like pics on here :mrgreen:

 

[Mikew]

Thanks guys, hoping to be ready for paint in 12 to 18 months, fingers crossed I can get it done by then.

What I haven't given is a little background, I bought the honey brown deluxe off eBay 4 years ago, his dad had this one sitting next to it which raised my eyebrows obviously and he agreed to sell it to me at the same price as his son's ( yes I did buy them!!) ($250 each but after only exchanging $50 (for Earl the blue one) and a set of widened early beetle wheels I had in the shed, 2x 3 hour round trips later the we're both mine.

I got them 4 years ago which they sat in my mates garden as in first pic till now, I have just spoken to John the dad and blue Kombi owner to try and get a history, interesting, he had it for 1 year and got it from a wreckers which his mate owns, before that it sat in a guys front garden for over ten years, John took the twin port 1600 out for his beetle which with a new battery started straight up, puffed out some smoke for a minute and all good, he still has that motor and done nothing to it, he recalls his son pissing himself after betting the motors stuffed!

Anyway thought someone might be intersted!!

Mike

 

[Mikew]

Cut out rear drivers jacking point and part of the top hat:

Welded the new jack point in, didn't look right and after test fitting the inner sill I was amazed on how much of an angle the sill support piece is on, what's the go with crap reproduction parts! Looks like I'll drill out the spot welds and weld back on once sill is in.. Is the normal for these parts? Got the other 3 to do.

Cut some more rust out, cut more than just the bubbles to make sure sound in behind.

 

[Mikew]

Welded the rear wheel arch section back in today and played with the welder settings

Got good penetration through the tray and out the back piece of metal

Just playing seeing if I can shrink a dent that's always been there mainly to check weld penetration before doing the arch

Test piece: boring for most I know but trying to get it right

Not sure if you can make out the pool underneath is pretty much the same As the top

Took some better pictures of how it looks today 3 months into the van

 

[67panel]

good old pattern parts :roll: I have found the inner sills are the thickness of the metal to tall,bend made to high,and they dont match the drop in the floor leaving you a 8mm gap and the jacking points arnt right.need to do this on my panel some time so feel it for you.

 

[Mikew]

The sills appear to have a good fit but i was only holding in position but im sure there were some differences but wont be sure till i start putting it back together in a week or 2.

Stayed on at work yesterday and painted up 2 of the wheels which i had sand blasted last year to sample part of its new colour scheme, not 100% yet of colours but it might end up original blue.

Primed ready:

Colour for wheels is VW Silver white:

Very early to be painting i know but i have a pile of wheels at home to get through..

 

[Mikew]

Small update: spent 2 hours tonight, after wirebrushing and sanding I painted rust bullet, then made a repair section to cover up, blew a couple of holes but otherwise very very happy.

Really dissapointed with the lack of time spent this week, maybe better next week

Mike

 

[Mikew]

Ground up ready to repair the bubble section now and tidy light cutout and some primer on this side before the weeks out provided i get some time

There are a silly amount of drilled holes possibly used for some kind of poppers or something maybe for a awning?? So I started welding them up, there is also a number of them on the drivers side for some reason??, might count them tomorrow

That was yesterday,
Got 1 hour today, spent most of it bending and shaping the 2 pieces, decided to mount the first section from behind to leave more weld there for strength, painted rust bullet before tacking the cover piece in to fully weld tomorrow.

 

[Mikew]

Thought id give a bit of an update:
: Front jacking point and outrigger
: inner and middle sill, which involved extending the inner to match the original with a 90 degree fold at the end
: rear small sill
: seam seal the back of the rear welds
: got the outer sill welded in after coating the inside with rust bullet:

once the welding is finished i'll get to the panel beating

inside the rear of the side finished waiting for the hammer/dolly and seam sealer,

Sorry for the dump of images but now upto date.

Mike