Missing the seat rails up front. Yet another thing to add to my shopping list.
Wednesday, December 27, 2006
Bulkhead tacked in.
Looks kinda rough now but with a little sand paper and some paint, you'll hardly know it wasn't original.
Missing the seat rails up front. Yet another thing to add to my shopping list.
Missing the seat rails up front. Yet another thing to add to my shopping list.
Tuesday, December 26, 2006
Second Patch Ever
This is the second roof patch. It came out much better than the first. It's completely ground down and all the pin holes are filled. 
This pic is from front to rear. You can see the first patch in the distance.
Next project is the missing bulkhead.
This pic is from front to rear. You can see the first patch in the distance. Next project is the missing bulkhead.Thursday, December 21, 2006
First Patch ever
This is the first patch I ever attempted on my bus or any other car. It went pretty well. This is a roof section at the rear. It seems that a previous owner cut 14 inch holes in the roof for skylights or something. I had to widen the holes because several holes had been drilled around the perimeter to rivet/screw whatever was on there in place. I chose the roof panels as my first repair jobs because I knew there would be a learning curve. The roof won't bee seen much by your average Joe.
I learned three hard lessons from this patch. First, when I initially tacked the panel in place, I started in the center fore and aft. I then tacked the centers left and right followed by the four corners. In the future I will start from the center and tack toward the edges. As a result of tacking the corners and then coming back toward the middle, there were some fitment issues. Nothing major, but there is a little waviness that shouldn't be there. Second, I need to be careful not to apply too much heat to any one spot for too long. I caused a little dip in the front a little left of center by trying to fix my my final mistake. My last (but not least) mistake, was to get a little carried away with the grinder as I was cleaning up the welds on the front. I thinned the metal and the welds too much in one area and It cracked a little. No sweat. I'll either patch the patch or fill in a little with the torch.
This photo is from the rear to the front. I still need to do a little more grinding and some sanding to get it perfect. you can see (at the eleven o-clock position on the patch where I went a little nuts trying to fill in some metal after I ground it too much.
I learned three hard lessons from this patch. First, when I initially tacked the panel in place, I started in the center fore and aft. I then tacked the centers left and right followed by the four corners. In the future I will start from the center and tack toward the edges. As a result of tacking the corners and then coming back toward the middle, there were some fitment issues. Nothing major, but there is a little waviness that shouldn't be there. Second, I need to be careful not to apply too much heat to any one spot for too long. I caused a little dip in the front a little left of center by trying to fix my my final mistake. My last (but not least) mistake, was to get a little carried away with the grinder as I was cleaning up the welds on the front. I thinned the metal and the welds too much in one area and It cracked a little. No sweat. I'll either patch the patch or fill in a little with the torch.
This photo is from the rear to the front. I still need to do a little more grinding and some sanding to get it perfect. you can see (at the eleven o-clock position on the patch where I went a little nuts trying to fill in some metal after I ground it too much.
Passenger side view from front to rear. You can see the slight waves that I caused by tacking in the wrong order.
Underside.
Passenger side view. You can see where the front doesn't quite meet correctly with the roof line. I still have a little grinding/sanding to do, but it wont help this section much. After It's painted and a light skim of some filler, I think It'll be hardly noticeable.
The starting point.
I bought this thing for $250. One of the most rust free vans I've seen on the east coast. It's been butchered all to hell though. It's a '67 VW Type II/Transporter/bus.
The louvers on the side have been cut out. and the rear wheel wells have been cut as to accommodate bigger tires at some point.
The left rear corner is in pretty bad shape. I have a replacement that came with the deal. I'll be welding that in as well as all the other stuff that's missing. 
It Appears that someone has cut holes in the roof to accommodate those old school bubbles that used to be on conversion vans back in the seventies and eighties.
Hardly any rust in this thing.
The louvers on the side have been cut out. and the rear wheel wells have been cut as to accommodate bigger tires at some point.The left rear corner is in pretty bad shape. I have a replacement that came with the deal. I'll be welding that in as well as all the other stuff that's missing. It Appears that someone has cut holes in the roof to accommodate those old school bubbles that used to be on conversion vans back in the seventies and eighties.Hardly any rust in this thing.It came with a 1600 dual port engine. It turns freely by hand. All it needs it a carb (and I have one) to find out whether it'll run.
Saturday, December 9, 2006
Here we go...again.
Thank you for visiting my new build blog. This one will go really quick (I hope.)
The background.
This is my 1967 bus. I bought it from a dude on Craigslist for $250. I know it looks like a complete disaster now, but in a couple months, it will be a decent daily driver. This van is worth saving. Here on the east coast, VW buses are hard to come by. To find one that has as little rust as this thing does is nearly impossible. I deemed it worth saving for this reason alone. It came with a complete drive train engine (that turns freely by hand) and trany which we'll find out about in a couple days if the thing fires up. These two components make it worth more than I paid for it in core values alone. My goal is to have this thing on the road by February. Stick around and find out if I can get this monumental job done by then.
The background.
This is my 1967 bus. I bought it from a dude on Craigslist for $250. I know it looks like a complete disaster now, but in a couple months, it will be a decent daily driver. This van is worth saving. Here on the east coast, VW buses are hard to come by. To find one that has as little rust as this thing does is nearly impossible. I deemed it worth saving for this reason alone. It came with a complete drive train engine (that turns freely by hand) and trany which we'll find out about in a couple days if the thing fires up. These two components make it worth more than I paid for it in core values alone. My goal is to have this thing on the road by February. Stick around and find out if I can get this monumental job done by then.
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