New Members - Introduce yourself..

[Poppy62]

Howzit Jaco and Stan and welcome. Jaco, I'd love to hear about some of the travels in your bus. All over the world? Must be some great stories! Is the bus now back here on home soil?

[GEW]

Good day All,

New member here. The name is George.
Been a huge van of aircooled vw's as long as I can remeber. My dad used to drive them when I was a child. He had a fastback, beetle and a few baywindows. I previously owned a '74 beetle.
Proud owner now of a '71 T2 crewcab (wife bought it for me as a birthday gift)
It is a project so a lot of work,parts and advise needed.
Looking forward sharing with you.

Regards
GEW

[fig]

Welcome neophytes!

[terence]

Hi,

My name is Terence. I am 30 years old and stay in Johannesburg South. Don't currently own a VW, I used to own a late 70s model Beetle, had grey leather interior, custom spray painted engine bay, the engine and pulleys were gold and the fan housing and other covers etc were red. Had stock rims and the body needed a respray, the back had caught fire with the prev owner so the boot lid (engine cover) had a huge rust spot from where the paint was melted off. Motor was redone and a mild cam was put in and had an SP exhaust put on. Used to race it back in the day at wesbank raceway. Was an awesome little beetle, could smoke its tyres with ease.

Unfortunately after only owning it for 6 months and doing a lot of work on it, some @holes stole it from outside my girlfriend at the times house. I actually heard them pulling away but by the time I got outside it was already gone. I vowed to one day get another one and start all over again. But lately been leaning towards a single cab bay window or Kombi. Would love a split window but don't have that kind of money to spend.

Anyway, that's my story LOL. Hope to gain a lot of knowledge with regards to all things aircooled

[Tony Z]

Welcome all...

everyone has a "bug story", unfortunately some are not as nice as others
Happy hunting. When you find your dream car/bus, open a project thread and keep us updated

[terence]

Welcome all...

everyone has a "bug story", unfortunately some are not as nice as others
Happy hunting. When you find your dream car/bus, open a project thread and keep us updated

Thanks Tony, will definitely do so, wont be any time soon, maybe only towards the end of next year. First saving to buy a house so, currently our place is a battle with 2 small cars so I wouldn't have space to add a 3rd car. If I had my way I would sell my car and get a beetle or bus but the better half will shoot me if I do that haha. She loves the busses but til we have space to add another vehicle to the collection, we will just be window shopping

[oconnell]

Hello fellow AirHeads
O'Connell here from Missouri, USA.
Bought my first Beetle new in 1969.
Imported the first 411 into the USA in january 1971.
Raced Beetle's and Ghia's on oval tracks in a variety of states and in Germany.
Also drag raced a bug a few times.
I have restored 4 beetles and now working on a 70 Ghia pan off resotration.
I like engine building with a mild performance upgrade, currently working on doing a T4 Cali Conversion.
Married, 7 children, 8 grand children.
Like to travel.

[Tony Z]

Welcome guys.
Nice Porsche, has it got a story?

[Gerlach]

Welcome there oconnell !! Looks like you have good bit of history going there with all the things you have done over the years

[Thumper]

Welcome to the forum guys.

[Goose]

Hi, Gerhardt here.

I have been lusting after a Speedster for a while now and found this forum while doing some research. This seems like a likely spot to get info on my future car
I live in Uitenhage in the Eastern Cape and work at VWSA. I am 33 years old and married and have one dog.
My father in law actually got me looking at the old veedubs, as he is in the process of restoring a Karmann Ghia. I just returned to work after 11 months on disability after I got Guillain Barre Syndrome, so now I am going to spoil myself. Life is too short to save all my money

Cheers
Gerhardt

[Express]

Hi there guys. My name is Frik. My first beetle in 1967 was a Gunmetal 1957 and was nicknamed “Jo-Burg a Go Go” later fitted with a Corvair flat 6 Motor and used to drag at the Old
Rainbow drag strip. Then a black 1961 followed, that had stripping head bolt problems..This was replaced by a Red 68 variant.. a car that saw most of South Africa.
But then Marriage and Kids stopped most of my Car fun and it was not till years later that I bought a beat up 1959 and started restoring...in the end it turned into a Beach buggy and was later sold
A few years ago I bought a 1978 Beetle SP – This car was neglect and took a lot of work to get to near show condition, I have taken the motor apart and will do a complete rebuild during the next
Month..
Love Beetles

[Express]

Hi there guys. My name is Frik. My first beetle in 1967 was a Gunmetal 1957 and was nicknamed “Jo-Burg a Go Go” later fitted with a Corvair flat 6 Motor and used to drag at the Old
Rainbow drag strip. Then a black 1961 followed, that had stripping head bolt problems..This was replaced by a Red 68 variant.. a car that saw most of South Africa.
But then Marriage and Kids stopped most of my Car fun and it was not till years later that I bought a beat up 1959 and started restoring...in the end it turned into a Beach buggy and was later sold
A few years ago I bought a 1978 Beetle SP – This car was neglect and took a lot of work to get to near show condition, I have taken the motor apart and will do a complete rebuild during the next
Month..
Love Beetles

[Gerlach]

HI there all new newbies!!! Hope you all enjoy it hear on the forum

[Gman_beetle]

Hi there guys

I am Grant. I'm going to come clean right off the bat and admit that although our * beetle is not my number one love (a position held by my 1975 1098cc mini - apologies if that a swear word on this forum) she has been a constant companion and workhorse whenever my other cars have been on the blink, stolen, hijiacked etc - which has unfortunately been very often, particularly in the first decade of my driving career.

* I say "our beetle" because it is really a family beetle that we all turn to in times of vehicular need - which is often because my family loves their cars but our cars often don't reciprocate. She has been with the family for close on 20 years now, starting off as my older brothers first car and slowly but surely moving through the ranks.

I have recently returned to SA after a stint of living in London and my fiancé and I are now using our beetle as a daily driver. Unfortunately as part of her stand-in duty at some stage she served as a stand in delivery car for my brothers business - even though this period was really short she has never recovered, despite our best attempts, to get her to back to her former bullet proof reliability status (most people never believe me when I say this but it is true).

I am now taking the challenge up again and would like to get her back to her glory days when I would get in and know that she would start first time and get me to where I was hoping to get to - I know this is probably a case of me remembering all of the good things and forgetting the bad but these days my trips in our beetle are far too often peppered with bad things like clutch cables snapping, starter issues, petrol and oil leaking everywhere, brakes grabbing, and the thing that breaks my heart the most - squeals and squeaks from every part of the car that just sound like they are doing serious damage.

I came across this forum while trying to find out if there are any recommended beetle specialist mechanics in my area (Randburg/ JHB) - which is going to be my first post as soon as I finish up with this introduction. I know this question has been asked quite a bit in the past but apart from some good recommended guys in PTA, the threads are quite old so wanted to get some more up to date thoughts.

Great forum guys.