VW Cabriolet Project for the wifey

Will that pedal cylinder then sit under the dashboard? Or just before the firewall in the engine bay?

I picture you having to pour break fluid through the defrost vents next to the windshield, lol.

It will be under the dash yes. Should have easy access pulling the cluster out. lol.

gross, cmon man (lol)

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I think you’re missing an opportunity to engineer a remote way to fill it… :slight_smile:

no. no more projects.

Looks like they make off-the-shelf stuff like this one for a Corvette:

Finally got back to this about a month ago. Been pretty slow progress, but its a tough time of year.

Picked up a used 4G63 cam trigger in good shape for the USRT adapter I got last year. Pretty slick package that apparently works very well and wont require trying to hack in some sort of crank trigger. Just needs to be cleaned up and probably painted.

And finally tackled the mangled quarter panel repair. It was pushed back pretty good, full of holes from spot weld pullers etc, and prob had a good 3/16 of filler in the previous repair. Hell, they must have used 1/2" of RTV to seal the tail light and one of the mounts was so far off it didnt even touch.

What I started with

Somewhat pounded into place, at least the tail light fits all the holes now

Welded and sil-brz’d up the holes and smoothed the area out a bit.

Of course then I realized just how far back it was still pushed when I fit the tail light… not sure how i didnt notice this, but shit happens.

So I welded in a strip of 1/8"

Then smoothed it out with some sil-brz. Much better

With that in good enough shape it was time to shave the rear marker light holes. First I stripped the area with this guy. Worked pretty damn good, but with all the paint on the car (you’ll see soon) the drum clogged up pretty quick. But I could see using this to put a nice finish on stainless etc.

Welded up. Shouldnt require too much filler.

And then the drivers side marker shaved.

Mostly stripped

And back to just how much paint is on this thing. Looks like its been painted at least twice after the factory.

Needless to say its taken quite a bit of time to strip this thing. But Im very close, just need to do the drivers door jamb, and then finish up some corners in the jambs.

This area was especially fun.

I should have the rest stripped tonight. Im hoping to get the shell in primer by the new year, but it may spill into early next year depending.

Dan

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I love this thread so much. Keep it up!

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Made a ton of progress over break.

Removed the bracket for the trunk light switch and smoothed out the awful weld splatter here (forgot before pic).

Finished stripping paint from all the corners and spot blasted a few areas so it was finally ready for primer.

Got the old booth set back up, complete with end zipper wall and now a few furnace filters for make up air.

Loaded in and ready for primer. I used the heat lamp to help preheat the panels. Also put a kero heater in the booth since I only keep the shop air temp around 57 (typically 60 deg floor). It took a couple hours but I had it up to almost 80 in the booth. (obviously I move it out when spraying, then back in once it clears out)

Laid down two coats of epoxy, which I thought went down well.

And then topped with a coat of 2k so I dont have to scuff epoxy later. I did screw up… I should have left the dash, rollbar, and windshield frame just in epoxy. More on that later.

A few days later I thought it was time to tackle the inside. 10 hours later I have the inside cleaned, sanded, scuffed, and spot acid etch primed. I do not wish this job on anyone.

Dan

Thats weird, my pics are not showing up. They are on the 3 other forums I just posted to.

Anyone else see them? @Onyx_Z32 ?

EDIT: Now they are, never mind I guess. :man_shrugging:

So when you post pics here, the forum downloads and locally hosts them so if they go down on wherever you uploaded them they’re still here. But it might take a tad longer to load.

That makes sense. Thanks!

Next it was time to mask the inside in prep for the thermal barrier paint that I mixed up.

Supplies for the thermal paint. Basically its similar to the Lizard Skin product. I just used exterior latex paint and micro balloons (~1gal of paint and almost 1 pound of micro balloons)

Took forever to get it mixed up. I ended up making it too thick for even the schutz gun to spray and had to thin it out a bit with the paint. Ended up with that mixing bucket full to the top. If you’ve never played with micro balloons before they are super weird… look like talk but pour like a liquid. Reminded me of trying to mix Nestle’s Quick into cold milk.

Of course I didnt have a can for the schutz gun (and one i picked up locally wouldnt thread on) so I improvised. It worked perfectly and was easy to fill by “shoveling” the paint into it with a paint stick.

I did two good coats for somewhere around 30-50 mil coverage. I was sure to get it heavier on the firewall and tunnel.

And then unmasked.

Next weekend Im going to epoxy prime the entire interior and then I can get back to something that might be seen again someday.

Dan

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Had some time yesterday afternoon so I decided to knock out the interior epoxy priming, which was a real hoot. Im SO glad I got the Dekups setup for my gun, I wouldnt have been able to do this without it as I think I sprayed upside down and sideways more that right side up.

“I love masking” -no one

Dan

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Damn. At some point I’d love to strip down my car and do a full restore like this… but not for another 10 years or so :slight_smile:

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A couple more pics of the inside because Im so happy with how it turned out.

Last night I decided I was tired of looking at the old-new gas tank that got destroyed in the baking incident of 2018. That meant duplicating the mods I did to it on the new-new tank I picked up months ago.

  • clearance for fuel lines to surge tank
  • clearance in two spots for ebrake cable
  • clearance for K bracing
  • sanded all the edges since the top and bottom halves never line up perfectly

old-new and new-new tanks

No pics of most of the mods as they arent very exciting, but I did get a couple making room for the K brace. First I hammered the bump in a bit. Next mounted everything up to the car, heated the spot up and then used a small block of wood to push the tank in. Worked pretty good. With that its ready to prime and raptor line.

Pre hammered

Block used for pushing

Perfect fit with suspension at full compression to body.

Dan

Gas tank prepped for primer. Went over most of it with the D/A then with a red pad in the recesses.

I put a few coats of primer in the area created for the K brace as my hammering was a bit overzealous in spots. A quick sand and its plenty smooth enough.
Also when I pushed it up on the car it wrinkled a little on the left side of the recess. I couldn’t have it offset so I hammered in a matching one on the right, lol.

Clearance for fuel line routing to surge tank

And a close up of the sanded and rounded edge / corner.

I MIGHT epoxy and Raptor liner it tonight, we’ll see.

Dan

Epoxy primed and Raptor lined the gas tank as well as the inside of the front fenders.

Im super happy with how it turned out. SO glad I got the Raptor vari-nozzle gun, the texture is so much better than from a schutz gun. Also F taping and masking.

Now, maybe Ill start the body work on the quarter panels. Also want to get the doors setup on stands so I can start stripping them while filler is drying.

Dan

Started stripping down the motor sat am. Luckily the cylinders are in great shape. It may not matter though as everyone’s pistons seem to be oversized by at least 0.5mm

Last night I decided to start on the doors.

Fully disassembled.

Like every other part of this car the door was filled with pine needles…

Then it was time to strip the 3 layers of paint. I decided to try my Rupes21 as the air grinder and d/a just take forever, and holy shit did it work awesome. I ripped through the whole top seciton in under 10 mins with 80 grit. That would have taken me at least 3x that using my previous method.

Outside fully stripped

And onto the inside. I forget just how dirty this car was, the door jambs quickly reminded me.

Thats a good start

Dan

Decided that I wanted to paint the top inside of the doors (like the early MK1s) vs having the stupid plastic trim at the top.

My original panel and broken plastic.

And this is how the early doors looked inside.

The big issue in doing this is the window tracks changed at some point (84 maybe) which left a hole (to access the window track nut) and seam in that area of the door

First task was to create a lower mounting point for the track. I simply welded a U shaped piece to the track just below the top nut, so the bolt can be hidden behind the door panel.
It took a bit to get it just the right height, but honestly wasnt too bad.

In place inside the door

Then some magic happened and I welded up the holes and seams. SO much better.

And finished stripping the rest of the paint on the inside of the door, well most of it.

Just need to finish cleaning up around the hinges and some of the tight spots and this door should be ready for primer.

Dan

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