Isotropic rem polishing

 

Rear boot upgrade T36

 

Carpet Time

Pop out #2 done and dusted

Finally installed the driver side pop-out window which is a bit of a bollox job to do without damaging the outer seal. Not the best VW design and near impossible to install with the plastic anti-rattle pieces (they have been left off for now)

Next will be to screw the latches to the 'C' pillar so it's all sealed up. I am told the carpet is now in Australia for the car so that will be next focus and then I may replace the pop-outs (both) after that with my NOS set including the anti-rattle pieces if I can. Not a job I am looking forward to. For now they pop out's can remain latched closed and they can't rattle!

1500 'S' Crankcase

I have had the original 1964 'S' crankcase sitting in the roof of the garage for years because it was cracked. Not the worst news as these early cases are a bit rubbish with the small galleries, small hardware and lack of cam bearings... but I wondered if it truly was beyond salvage so got it down onto the bench after work  today.

As can be seen, I had previously faced the cylinder base areas and installed M8 case savers.

The 1 & 2 side was cast on 15th of June 1964 (1st shift).

The 3 & 4 side was cast on 2nd of September 1964 (2nd shift).

I find it quite odd there was such a difference between casting dates but suppose it's correct as the car was built on the 17th of September 1964 so it's unlikely to be incorrectly stamped.

I will be grinding out the crack to see how bad it is soon.

TPS erratic so about to be replaced

While I was messing with the black VW ECU (Sam working on his lap top) and checking thermo fan turn on temperature etc, I took a couple of photo's of the inner metal panels.

Quite pleasant in there! And apart from the replacement headliner, all original items.

Nice huh.

After calibrating the TPS a few times, warming the engine up, messing with fuel maps, and generally being poisoned by fuel vapors, we concluded the TPS was failing after a while.

It seems to work until the car is warm and then goes full spastic.

So armed with this knowledge, a pair of new ones (1 plus a spare) have been ordered from https://www.cbperformance.com/ and will be here as soon as postage allows.

This is hopefully the gremlin I have been chasing for a while now.

Black VW's matter

Thought I would take the black VW out for a spin and to check a few things.

1500 'S' Windscreen installed

I got up the other morning thinking I need to make a move on some of the outstanding items for the notchback such as the windscreen which I had previously installed with a seal I wasn't happy with.

Here is the car ready for the screen to go in. Apart from carpet and the front seats, I think were all good here.

I do need the 2 x correct slotted screws to secure the 45' grey foot plates as I have just seen!

As you can see, the antenna wire is there ready for the radio in the future. I have purposely left the Blaupunkt radio out at this stage to enable the carpets to be installed with a bit more room.

All done here. Note that I have left the steering column in original worn paint condition as a nod to the original owner. I think that was a good move regardless of folk thinking I'm a moron!

Seat release cables and gubbins all completed (all NOS too!).

Seat release lever attached to the cable.

Seat release cable secured as per original.

And here it is with the windscreen installed (original German marked item!). The trim is original too from this car and although not 100% perfecto I felt it was OK. The seal came from ISP West from memory and sits 99% perfecto. I believe that over time it may sit slightly better but it's as good as the black car in fit and finish.

The original wiper arms and NOS blades are now fitted up where they belong and look spot on. Closer every week now.

Under dash wiring completed 1500 'S'

I was fitting up the door cards and arm rest to the drivers door tonight and once that was completed (photo's soon), I stuck my head under the dash to see where I was at there with any outstanding work.

I then remembered that I was 1 x short grey wire and 1 x 4 wire joiner short in completing the fuse box connections. This just happened to be my lucky day though as I had just found a box of miscellaneous VW parts in a box in the garage which contained those 2 x items on the weekend just gone.

A quick clean of the original wire and joiner and within minutes I had completed the wiring as per the original 1964 1500 'S' wiring diagram.

All original fuse box (wet blasted), cover, headlight relay, flasher relay, hoses, wire joiners. I have made a couple of small modifications to the car though in order to future proof it (3 x extra wires to the engine bay area for tach, oil pressure & oil temp if I install any of those). These 3 x wires are well hidden inside the left rear fender and up above the fuse box area for now.

I also added an inline fuse to the black wire heading to the coil from the fuse box as this circuit is not fused from the factory which seems dumb to me as it can fry the loom out if there is a short anywhere between the coil and the fuse box.

As you can see, there are no fuses installed yet - this is to happen soon as I test each circuit.

Assuming all is okay, there is nothing further to do to the wiring on the car.

The NOS Blaupunkt speaker is installed with the wiring sitting there along with the NOS Hirschmann antenna plug ready for when the car gets a restored radio that is correct for the car (I have one but it's 1966 and thus slightly too new for the car).

The wiring has been a reasonable exercise and not overly difficult to get back to original. I 100% avoided cable ties in this car's build along with powder coating of any items, zero stainless steel fasteners unless original to the car and zero plastic electrical crimps.

The extra wires ran to the rear of the car were taped to the new colour correct loom (as you would have done back in the day) to also avoid cable ties which are just nasty on original cars. I also am not a fan of heat shrink on restored cars unless there is a very good reason for it and in this case I have only added a small piece to the horn wires up front in order to seal out moisture and dirt.

Thanks again to Mike in the UK for having the correct wiring loom remade for the car. I think it's one of the key ingredients to any car to have the wiring loom and electrical system as correct as you can get it on a restored car.

1500 'S' Front Finished

After months of looking for all the correct pieces I am happy enough with the front compartment to call it done. The hose for the breather pipe was a big hold up with it (who has this hose available now?) however (unbelievably) I had a section of new cloth wrapped hose in the garage that fixed that!

As shown above, I wasn't sure if the sender wire ran over the breather pipe, however I moved it below to protect it as that seemed logical (as below).

The washer hose is still missing as I can not locate anything right now but that can be dealt with as I find it later. Otherwise it's pretty well perfect.

It's great to see another whole section of the car completed. The 2 x outer screw holes to secure the cardboard to the firewall have been left out too for now as it was going to pull on the cardboard more than I was prepared to accept (this liner cost way too much $$$ to damage).

The rear compartment is next with the installation of the original side trim panels which requires some contact adhesive spray to make it all work (which entails a lot of masking up and prep work). Sounds like a job for the weekend to me.