1972 Beetle Restoration

Thanks for documenting all of the body work. Seeing someone do it gives me hope for my future projects. Carry on.

Great job!! I'm looking forward to seeing this one finished.

Berking magnificent! I do love me some fat chicks.

No, wait... well, y'know.

Oh man, that came out amazing!

Beautiful.

Awesome!

Did you use an old school spray gun or HVLP?

Color looks great.

Come do my 96 next.

most excellent progress......

rollins111 wrote:

fujioko wrote: Awesome! Did you use an old school spray gun or HVLP?

I actually used a lvlp gun, similar to hvlp but uses less air. It only uses something like 6 cfm at 40psi which my compressor can easily handle. The only downside is slightly slower transfer of material - but for a beginner painter I think that's actually a positive.

Since I am going to do the same type of thing, I am very curious which brand/model you ended up with.

rollins111 wrote:

tuna55 wrote: Since I am going to do the same type of thing, I am very curious which brand/model you ended up with.

I used the Asturo WB that I bought from spraygunworld.com. It's supposedly a high quality Italian copy of the Iwata LPH400. I'm no expert but certain parts of the car have almost no orange peel so it's certainly capable of that. My technique leaves much to be desired thus other parts aren't so smooth! I can attest to the fact that it doesn't need much air. My 60 gallon cheapo Husky compressor would actually catch up and shut off while I was spraying. I bought multiple tips for it so I could spray everything from poly primer (very thick) to base/clear with the same gun. btw - I've been enjoying following your truck build. I definitely know where you've been with regard to the rust battle and feel your pain.

I was considering that exact gun - so thanks for the advice. It's great to hear you've been following my build! You're much farther along than I am, I am inspired.

I like the color on the car.

How did I manage to miss this thread?

Great build, and I love the colour.

Looking great! It looks like the intake is going to be a pain to fit to the throttle body. Can you move it? I was thinking maybe the manifold can be flipped 180 degrees, but then the alternator is in the way.

Nice work!

Is the EJ25 physically larger than the 2.2 or would you have been facing the same situation if you had gone with that instead?

Paint looks fantastic.

Beautiful project. My first car was a Beetle, will always have a soft spot for them. Love the Subi engine too, hell a Beetle is a handful with 140 hp! Anybody have any trouble keeping the front wheels on the ground with that kind of power? My 1.8 GTI powered sandrail would lift them with just a little effort. IIRC you have a 4.56 final drive right?

Your car is full of awesome.

Great build man. I put a vanagon motor in my bug. It's turbo'd and it's a ton of fast/fun. Your car has came a long way. Great job on all the rust repair. The color looks great. I love the color cause I was gonna paint my last super Beetle I had this very same color. I'm glad I get to see it on a Beetle. I will say that putting a water-cooled motor in my bug was the best thing I ever did for the driveablity and power I wanted. My motor is a vanagon waterboxer 2.1 and when it was N/A it was still fairly fast. The stock gearing of the type 1 is really short for any motor the puts out a decent amount of TQ. I could easily go up any Colorado mountain pass with ease and do it With power to spare. The power best described for my motor was that it was like driving a new 4 cylinder car. I will say it's better your going with a non turbo motor cause the trans will hold the power better. I got my car running about 3 months ago. I saw people saying the stock tranny will hold 200hp earlier in your thread....wrong. My car doesn't make 200hp as of yet cause I'm only running 8lbs of boost. I knew my tranny was a ticking time bomb, so I drive it very nice. No super hard shifting, not one burn out and just from the higher torque I've managed to spin 3rd and 4th gears on the main shift. My 2nd gear now sounds like it's outta a rally car dog box with the crazy gear whine it has. I'm getting a built, higher geared tranny built. The Beetle trans can only hold about 100hp from what I've read (and now I can justify that as well) . But even that is only saying so much.... You throw in burn outs, side stepping the clutch into that statement, it's just not gonna hold in Stock form. I'm telling you this now cause I've been thru it and I'm now in the process of saving for a new Transaxle myself. I'm telling you this cause you have an awesome car, and a sweet build. I'd say since your their and the old wallet can afford it, get a tranny that can hold the power you wanting to put down now so later you won't have to do it twice.

I'm getting mine from R/C trans outta Las Vegas. It's who build all of KCW's tranny. He said he could build me what I want for $799. I figure that's not too bad of a price.

Beautiful! How is your project coming along?!!!

link to the thread on the surge tank? that looks like it may be the ticket for my elcamino build.

This is a cool project, and that is a cool color!

Great progress.

Love it! That paint looks amazing. I've been really wanting to build a beetle track-rat since out here in CA if I get it <1976 it's SMOG and inspection exempt.

72Subabeetle wrote: The last thing I'm working on is some sort of IAC system since my ECU doesn't work with the Subaru IAC. I'm going to try this one from an early 80's bmw with mechanical fuel injection. It's just a bi-metal strip that is connected to 12v. As it heats up the hole closes and no air is allowed to pass. I'm going to plum it around the throttle plate.

That won't be super helpful as an IAC, but it might help with cold start. They only add air on cold start and initial warm-up. They came on CIS systems and the voltage wasn't regulated... It was on when you started the car or off when you shut it off. At least that is my recollection.

Could you try an IAC from a LH Jetronic car? They can be controlled by most ECUs on the market. Think '80s SAAB, Volvo, etc.