Aircooled VW South Africa

Very nice!!

You can eat off that 'pan

Thanks guys, it feels like Christmas morning here this afternoon

Dawie wrote:Looks good! What is the next step?

Dawie, the next step will be to get the chassis on all fours i.e. the wheels. The rear suspension and brakes is pretty much sorted (only have to paint the spring plates and covers), but there is still some work to do on the front suspension, like (buying) and fitting the disk brakes, callipers, bearings etc. Then it is the plumbing for the brakes, the cables (that still need to be shortened) et cetera, etceteraaaaaa...

(The bottomless pit principle)

looks great pine

Pine that really looks great. I need to get the details of your powder coater. They do super work.

Beetlefanatic, the powder coaters are not too far from Bugger, in Germiston - I will give you their details when you need it.

I have realised yesterday afternoon that I have to make another plan to work on the chassis, since the place where the pics were taken yesterday aftenoon is not level (I live against a steep hill), and it is outside. It is also all of a sudden winter here in Johannesburg, with some unexpected showers every now and then, and outside usually means SPIDERS as they seem to like ACVWS more than we do...

So I made a tactical decision to move the chassis to the downstairs flat (which is anyway only being used as storage for all my crap) for the time being. There is only one small (no pun intended) problem...

THIS is the only entrance to the flat!



So the gardener and I picked up the chassis and tilted it sideways to go through the door!

Now I haven't started with assembly yet, just 'dry-fitting' a few parts to get the feeling of it - and for the first time in this thread, I feel it is starting to look like a buggy!



With the size of the entrance, it would thus be impossible to assemble the buggy inside the flat, but the suspension, gearbox, wheels, body etc. will only be merged with the chassis at a later stage (outside, that is )



I am no low-rider, and it is also not my intention, but the spring plates haven't been fitted yet, so the trailing arms are only resting on the bump stops in these pics.



Most of the parts are packed out on a table - we all know by now storing it all over in small boxes simply DOESN'T WORK!

Pine, I suggest you progress no further. Just open up that room to the public as the "AP exibition". What with all the parts , pictures and bicycle.

No, I am Pine not Fig

Pine, Looks absolutely amazing!

Just build inside and knock the wall down when you are ready to drive

pine didnt you say sumting about renovations

Dutch_Diver wrote:Pine, Looks absolutely amazing!

Just build inside and knock the wall down when you are ready to drive

Dutch_Diver wrote:Pine, Looks absolutely amazing!

Just build inside and knock the wall down when you are ready to drive

Thanks Dutch but I'll leave that till the next resto project - and do it in style!

That chassis looks great. Any reason you did not have it galvinised?

I would have loved to have it galvanised, but I got a few conflicting suggestions from buggy friends all over the world, some say it is an overkill - unless you drive your buggy through sea water every day, it is not worth it. Others said that powder coating/paint does not stick to galvanising... nonetheless, it is quite expensive as well.

The powder coaters took some extra care to cover the inside of the tunnel thoroughly for me, so I am happy!

I am thinking of having mine galvinised as I live in Blouberg. The sea air alone can do a lot of damage. But as you say all depends on the cost. Is there a big difference in cost of galvinising vs powder coating?

All quotes I got for galvanising was more than double the cost of the powder coating, and most of the guys said their electroplating tanks are too small for a chassis, but I suppose it will be cheaper in CT? In George there is a company that galvanise large (welded) devils fork fence partitions