Well after two, or more, years of lusting after a bay window and being glued to the classified on here, VZi, the samba etc. I've finally got myself a 1971 Westfalia! After reading many of the threads on here I'd like to say that I did all of the work myself but I didn't, that was all thanks to Gary at Cool Campers a short trip down the road from me in Bournemouth.
It was originally a US van that looked something like this before it was shipped across the pond:
Not much had been done to it when I saw it other than removing the spare wheel from the front panel:
I don't know too much about early bays but I've got a Karmann Ghia and owned a beetle in the past so I went all over the bus having a good poke around for any tin worm and was pleasantly surprised to find it only required a new battery tray where the old battery had been leaking and a small patch on one of the sill closing plates, the rest of it was all original metal. So other than that all it needed was a little bit of a tickle to straighten out the front end and the body work was sorted. I was going to have it resprayed in it's original colours but after a bit of discussion settled on Sea Blue and Blue White so now it looks like this:
The interior is pretty much stock and in surprisingly good condition, however I did have the seats retrimmed by a local company than, in my opinion, look the dogs bollocks!
I was also lucky enought to get a seventies awning from a friend of mine that only cost a pint of ale and a glass of wine!
However, it didn't all go smoothly. When we got the van back to my parents house we discovered that the car shelter is too small so me and my Dad spent the next day taking the roof off so we could park it in the garden! And, annoyingly we're still waiting for the DVLA to get it registered so I'm restricted to driving it backwards and forwards for two meters in the back garden :lol:
It was originally a US van that looked something like this before it was shipped across the pond:
Not much had been done to it when I saw it other than removing the spare wheel from the front panel:
I don't know too much about early bays but I've got a Karmann Ghia and owned a beetle in the past so I went all over the bus having a good poke around for any tin worm and was pleasantly surprised to find it only required a new battery tray where the old battery had been leaking and a small patch on one of the sill closing plates, the rest of it was all original metal. So other than that all it needed was a little bit of a tickle to straighten out the front end and the body work was sorted. I was going to have it resprayed in it's original colours but after a bit of discussion settled on Sea Blue and Blue White so now it looks like this:
The interior is pretty much stock and in surprisingly good condition, however I did have the seats retrimmed by a local company than, in my opinion, look the dogs bollocks!
I was also lucky enought to get a seventies awning from a friend of mine that only cost a pint of ale and a glass of wine!
However, it didn't all go smoothly. When we got the van back to my parents house we discovered that the car shelter is too small so me and my Dad spent the next day taking the roof off so we could park it in the garden! And, annoyingly we're still waiting for the DVLA to get it registered so I'm restricted to driving it backwards and forwards for two meters in the back garden :lol:
