I`ve been doing a lot to the electrics whilst its all exposed, and have wired in a few extra lighting circuits along with a trailer socket on the front so that I can use the Buggy lights when it is being towed.

The black case you can see contains my iPod and is mounted to the cross bar using a waterproof phone holder for a mountain bike. The iPod inside is actually a smashed up one that I picked up dirt cheap on ebay. It had been dropped, the front casing is smashed, the LCD is smashed and the buttons on the front are missing, however, as it is both charged and controlled by my stereo, I`m not bothered by the broken bits and consider the 80Gb ipod to have been a bargain at £7.50 including postage !!



Nearly ready to put the bonnet back on. 

Time to get my newly refurbished rear wheels fitted.

Like many of you, I`m using standard rear drums on mine, with a PCD of 4x130mm (4 studs within a 130mm radius). Apologies for mentioning this bit again, but its very important, and I have just learned of yet another local Air Cooled VW that has lost a wheel, so felt it was worth mentioning again. The original VW wheels were held on with bolts with either a Radius or Taper head on them, depending on the style of wheels you had. Many of the period aftermarket Alloy Wheels went even further and used a flat washer instead, or depending on brand, a tapered washer. Now one of the biggest causes of wheel nuts coming loose, or even wheels falling off is because many people still do not appreciate the differences in the Wheel Bolt Head styles, and that you must never mix and match them. If, for instance, you put a Radius Head Bolt onto a Taper Head wheel, it will still appear to tighten up correctly, but a few miles down the road, the wheel bolt will have unwound itself and fallen out, often with disastrous consequences.





With the choice of available wide wheels being fairly limited in a 4x130 pattern, I have been using Chevy Adapter plates that attach onto the drums with bolts, and give me a five stud Chevy / Jaguar pattern which opened up my choices of wheels. When using convertors such as these, it is also commonplace for the bolt size to also mimic the converted type too, and in this case the thread size is 7/16" so that along with the wheels, the Chevy nuts are also used.





There is nothing wrong with using adapters, and they are perfectly safe. The only reason I am messing about here is because a while back I acquired a very rare set of matching rear wheels in 4x130, and I want to change them over. As M14x1.5 wheel bolts with tapered washers no longer exist (I knew that when I had the fronts custom made) I have decided to do things properly this time around and convert over to rear studs, but even this has quite a few pitfalls if you are not careful. If you thought it was as simple as buying some rear studs and fitting them, then think again.

Wheel bolts come in various lengths, and my own requirement here was that I needed a bolt that protruded from the drum by around 30mm. The thickness of the drum was 10mm, so a 40mm stud was needed with a thread size of M14 x 1.5mm pitch. This size is readily available, but you have to be careful as they are not all the same. The problem stems from the uncut section on the shank itself, which is there to prevent the studs from winding themselves through the drum and out the other side. As you insert the stud, and wind it in, when you reach the smooth section, it starts to tighten up. Most modern 40mm studs are known as "20/20" as they have 20mm of thread either side of the blank bit as can be seen here, and these are what everyone is having problems with.





Modern drums are made from much thicker material around the bolt holes, anywhere from 15~20mm, but if you screw that length into an old Beetle drum, chances are it will stick so far through the other side that it will foul on the brake shoes and cylinders, which is why you always hear of people having to cut them down to the right length. But there is also another major problem, and its the actual width of the uncut section, it is simply too wide. We know it prevents the stud from going through the drum, but it also has the effect of preventing the nuts from tightening up against the wheel too. Often, the wheel nuts will be as tight as they can be, but the wheels are free to rock loosely on the studs, as the nut has tightened against the uncut section instead of clamping hard against the wheel.

The solution is to use a different style stud. In my case, still a 40mm one, but divided into 30/10 with a much narrower uncut band. These ones were readily available from VW Heritage for the Type 2 (Part No:AC601SS26), and because only 10mm goes into the drum, it should not foul anything behind it.





Although optional, I applied a small amount of Threadlock to these before tightening them up. The only niggle I had here with the Heritage studs is that they used a weird size of Allen drive, and its not one usually found in your socket set. Closest I could find was either 7/32AF or 5.5mm. For those of you converting from bolts to studs, you will also notice how easy it is to refit a wheel and line up the holes.





I managed to obtain the correct size wheel nuts from Graystons  http://www.grayston.biz/wheelnutmenu.htm  although you may have to go through a local trade supplier as they do not like dealing directly with the general public. I needed a set of M14x1.5 nuts with Wolfrace tapered washers with Radius heads to suit. This is what they sent me.





The tyres were swapped over to the new wheels, and balanced using just about every weight available in the County and then fitted along with a new set of 80mm centre caps that I found on eBay. A little tip I have found when fitting the centre caps is to wrap a layer of insulating tape around the edge where it fits against the wheel, as it not only holds it in place rather well, but also prevents them from sticking too much when you want to remove them.





Quite a transformation, and doesn`t quite look like my old Ratty Buggy any more.

Must remember to check the wheel nuts in 50 miles or so to make sure that they are still tight.

Looking good there, the journey tithe shiny side is complete😎

Thanks mate 

Lots more shiny bits to come yet though   

Dave

They look great and thanks for the explanation ...... you have inspired me to crack on a do something with my ones that are still sat at the back of the garage   

And very pleased you have joined the shiny side 

Looks more and more like a show car with every picture

And very pleased you have joined the shiny side 

Judas DaveDND................ in the nicest possible way!  The dark side (read scruffy/dirty side) will never forget this traitory!

Judas DaveDND................ in the nicest possible way!  The dark side (read scruffy/dirty side) will never forget this traitory!

Don`t worry guys, the first trip out will be a muddy field, so that it looks like my car again   

Besides . . . .

I will need to get it very dirty, so that I can strip it down and restore it again in a few years time   

Looks more and more like a show car with every picture

Don`t worry, I am still me and that will never happen   

I hope   

Dave we do need people like you to show us how to turn a less than perfect assembly of old often neglected and damaged parts into a eye catching, prize worthy and reliable vehicle.

So now you have the looks can you keep off a recovery truck for a year ?!

So now you have the looks can you keep off a recovery truck for a year ?!

Only if I leave it in the garage   

Besides, I think Dave C has already done a block booking of them in his quest to ride each one   

They may even show that on TV   

Whilst the bonnet is off, my mind has been thinking about washer jets and what to use this time around.

There are many naff plastic jets about, but if you look at anything with a bit of quality to it, or made from metal, you will undoubtedly hit the same problem that we all do - they are all very short because they are designed to go through a metal panel. I remember the struggle I had with the thickness of my fiberglass bonnet, and that was before John doubled that with a skim of filler.

As luck would have it, I found myself under the dash of an E-Type Jaguar a while back, and couldn`t help but notice just how long the washer jets were - they were perfect and at around £15 for a pair from the bay of E - not drastically expensive either, given their pedigree.





It has taken me a while to pluck up the courage to fit them though, as for some strange reason, I could not bring myself to drill any holes.





Time to drill the rest of the holes in the bonnet now and get the filler cap secured back in place

Over the years, my bonnet has been on and off quite a few times and time is now beginning to take its toll on the short piece of fuel pipe that connects the top of the tank to the filler neck. Until now, I have used the rubberised / material pipe with the heavy metal wire that is spirally wrapped around the outside. It has always been a pain to get a jubilee clip to sit on, and has caused me to run up the national debt with elastoplast as a result.

I have had a look at some of the Race cars, and they seem to use a Reinforced Silicone Hose that has a Flouro liner to prevent it from being attacked by any liquids. The biggest problem I have with this is that the 51mm Internal Diameter pipe I want is sold by the meter, and £88 + vat + delivery is somewhat stupid when all I need is just under 3 inches.

I did find a guy selling a short bend on eBay though, which was still somewhat ridiculous at just over £45, and what you see is what I have left after chopping off the short bit I needed.





If anyone is contemplating using this sort of pipe, let me know before you go and purchase any 

Finally, the parts seem to be arriving and some progress can be made bolting it all back together again.





I`m really glad I decided to paint the inner arches, as it really does give a great contrast to the bodywork.





This evening has been quite productive and its certainly starting to look like a Buggy again





It has been a bit strange working on it when the sun is out and it is all sparkly, as it just feels like working on someone elses car - but these shots taken at around 9pm on a nice warm summer evening has changed the colour back to a more familiar one, and it is now starting to feel like "my" Buggy again.

What did you use to paint under the arches ,