My bug - ANGRRR - the ongoing project

[calooker]

Nitriding, beware, I had a 8 dowel flywheel and some other bits done a few years ago, the flywheel came back with hairline cracks between a couple of the dowels, Pewee was unable to explain why.
the FW was toast as I was not going to chance it.

[Mr. G]

Greetings

I hope you are well. I am new to this community. Please call me Mr. G.
I own a 1975 Beetle S with half round windscreen. I have been working on the vehicle for sometime now and i miss driving it. the car is ready to hit the tar road now.
I am a gadget freek and like to push buttons. I would like to incorporate powered mirrors on my vehicle but I have not yet found anyone who has done something of that nature. So guys if you know of anybody naughty enough to have managed o comeup with a nice set of power operated mirrors for a beetle, could I have their contact details.

Thank you for the great forum and site

Best Regards
Mr. G

[vader]

Don't want to hijack sorry. Bugger who can do the Nite rideding? I may need to do that some time. Thanks

Never appolgise for a National Sport!!!

[vader]

Greetings

I hope you are well. I am new to this community. Please call me Mr. G.
I own a 1975 Beetle S with half round windscreen. I have been working on the vehicle for sometime now and i miss driving it. the car is ready to hit the tar road now.
I am a gadget freek and like to push buttons. I would like to incorporate powered mirrors on my vehicle but I have not yet found anyone who has done something of that nature. So guys if you know of anybody naughty enough to have managed o comeup with a nice set of power operated mirrors for a beetle, could I have their contact details.

Thank you for the great forum and site

Best Regards
Mr. G

Dude you fasinate me!!
Are you retarded?
I only ask cause 1stly there is only enough space on this site for one of those and its already been filled for quite a few yrs..
& 2ndly Fig told you yesterday where to post your introduction to the site!!! He even put the link to it in his reply!!!

[Thumper]

Easy with the newbies Vader..


Fig educated Barney Curtis, who was looking for the 1600S body...

Mr G has already introduced himself.


Mr G, Why don't you open a new thread regarding your bug, and the electric mirror ideas? Which I have seen incidentally. It can be done.

[vader]

I was "visiting" Tony's Man Cave the other day and was impressed with his "Laptop" LMFAO

It does work....

Thought you might get a kick out of it....

07-01-13_0921.jpg

[Tony Z]

OK, a small update on the proceeds over the last few weeks as and when time allowed.

I have been getting a few long overdue and needed things done as well as a few nice extras that I have been wanting to do for a while.
Since Retrovan convinced me to take the car to George, I have been under no pressure at all to get things done. Not that I dont have other things I need to do, like my 5 year refresher courses and looking after builders at the house...

anyway enough complaining and some updates.


When I got the car way back in 1997 the camber on the drivers side front wheel was out by a slight amount, positive. So I finally decided to do something about it. Vader came around and we tackled the job. This is when I realised he cant count properly. So when we put it back together, the camber was still out, by what looked like almost the same amount as before.
The next day I took it all apart again, found his counting problem and corrected it. Camber is still out..... something isnt right and is possibly a little bent. So I redid this again and moved more shims around. Now the camber is almost where it should be. I'll get around to looking further into this at some other stage, for now its a lot better than it was (0.5deg positive).
While I was busy with this lot, I replaced the tie rods on the steering. It took a while to get new tie rods as I bought out the last stock at Shelleys, Suburban and Autozone. All this to make one set...

After this, I got my wheel alignment done. The guy who did the job was pretty good and he started from scratch adjusting the wheels by seeing how they react to the suspension. This revealed that my steering wheel was out by a bit. After moving the wheel to the new position, I now have nearly a 1/5th turn more on the wheel before the rims hit the suspension.
for those of you who dont know it, I have 7.5J rims up front and this drastically affects the turning circle.

I have also found that since the engine rebuild, the carbs run a little lean. I have swapped my 140 main jets for 170s so I can safely drive around and get to the dyno when I get a chance for this. She now runs a tiny bit rich, but this is fine.

I have also played around with my timing... I removed my timing pulley and remade my TDC markers and feel they are a bit more accurate than they were before. Then after finally getting a computer with XP so I can get into the GOTECH program I have managed to adjust my timing curves a little.
The car as a whole is a lot easier to drive now and is also quieter. Finally she is a pleasure to drive again and not an effort. Baby steps, I still need to put more time into this, but for now it works.

Then a project that I have been wanting to do since 2009 is install new front seats.
If any of you have ever decided to google recaro and.or reclinable bucket seats, you would know that there isnt much of a selection, but out of what there is, the crem-de-la-creme is the Recaro Sportster CS.

More to follow...

[Tony Z]

SA's first set of Recaro Sportster CS seats!!!!



Now this is a secret that i have been keeping for a while.... simply because I didnt want to let the cat out of the bag until the project was done. So here it is....

Needless to say, back in 2009 I got a 13th and 14th pay cheque in December, so this was the perfect excuse to spend some money on something rather stupid.
I contacted numerous Recaro suppliers worldwide asking about the CS seats and finally found out they are made for a larger build person. For those who dont know, bucket seats come in sizes to fit all shapes of people.
OK, so I contacted the Recaro agents in SA. They said they had not yet imported a set of these seats, even though there had been a fair amount of questions about them. So I paid my deposit and ordered the first set in SA.
I stand under correction, but to this day I think they are still the only set in SA (if you exclude them in EOM form in cars like the Focus RS, RS6, RS4 and nearly any of the big brand sports cars. The shells are based on the Sportster CS seat, but the upholstery is different). Anyway I digress...

Over the last 10 days or so I have been making up the brackets to mount the seats to the beetle. Being that Recaro supplies a generic mounting system using 5mm steel and M8 bolts (which doesnt fit the beetle), I made mounts to bolt up to this system with 6mm steel and M10 bolts. That way I can be certain that my work isnt the weak point in the project.
It was about this time that items like a cut-off saw and a drill press moved up my "tools I need/want" wishlist rather rapidly.
Firstly cutting 60x60x6mm angle iron with a hacksaw takes a bit of patience. Then filing it all neat and tidy....
Then measuring, planning and marking everything out.
Drilling somewhere near fifty 12mm holes into 6mm mild steel using a cordless drill isnt a joke. The amount of times the drill bit grabbed as it went through, nearly breaking my wrist, wasnt funny. I drilled a 3mm pilot hole, then 6mm, 9mm, 11mm and finally 12mm. But after 2 days I finally got it done.

Before



After




Then off to powder coating


OK, now I have to show off a little....











and then mounted in the car....




I am so chuffed. They fit perfectly and are super comfy. Plus they look the part.

I hope you guys enjoy the pics as much as I do.
I still have a few things I need to tackle before the trip to George this year. One of which might be (if I feel like it) redoing my sound system as the amps which were under the stock seats, no longer have anywhere to live. Baby steps.... This is a hobby, not a job, so I can take my time.

[Blitzkrieg]

Love the seats, they are absolutely gorgeous

[arnocill]

Great looking seats and they fit the bug perfect. I love it

[Loopy]

Love the seats! Looks like they could have come from a Stealth Fighter...

[sean]

Very nice.

But surely it would be alot more fun to drive this performance beast to George rather than towing it at a slow pace the whole way?

[Tony Z]

Yes Sean.... Making it there and back isnt a problem, but I am not building it to do long distances.
I am not expecting to get much more than 20 000 km out of this engine, and I am definitely not going to spend 10% of the engines life in a weekend trip to George. Each to their own, if I wanted to build a beetle to do long trips like that, I wouldnt have spec'd it out the way I have. That will probably be the next project...

[retrovan]

........ That will probably be the next project...

Now I will have to keep a beady eye look out for that thread.....

Herman

[Bugger]

I knew of the seats and was so Jeoulous but you worked hard for them so you earned it well done mate they are superb seats and that is seats hitler should have fitted in the first place