HMC WBOD news

[DaveDorson]

5 hours ago, Cookiesouwest said:

Are the mexibug's frowned on / disliked because they are not authentic German?

They are still bugs though. They should be embraced.

Volkswagen people are a bit silly really.

The single best driving air cooled VW beetle is a late model 1303s, it's got better suspension, steering and is bigger inside and because so many are considered the "fat chick" that you don't want your mates to see you with, they got chopped up for using the better gearbox and suspension in VW buses, so they win on rare points too.

 

But no one likes them.. they want the earlier, crappier stuff with no visibility, asthmatic single port engines, with inferior gearboxes and then they slam them to the floor, fit skinnier rubber at the front to make the light front even worse for braking, then fawn over them.

 

Original German stuff commands a premium, even if it's shagged,  Mexico bugs are a bit unloved but in reality are absolutely fine things, if you like VWs that is.

[bunglebus]

I like Beetles. I might have mentioned that in the past.

I even like the silly ones with no suspension 

[Bear]

12 minutes ago, DaveDorson said:

Volkswagen people are a bit silly really.

The single best driving air cooled VW beetle is a late model 1303s, it's got better suspension, steering

And all of it attached to a rust-prone 1970s body in a much more structural fashion than a pan and beam front...

That's always been the reason for my resistance to them since in the '90s rotten Super Beetles were everywhere 😕

[DaveDorson]

10 minutes ago, bunglebus said:

I like Beetles. I might have mentioned that in the past.

I even like the silly ones with no suspension 

Yeah me too.  Your bike looked amusing at the weekend by the way.

[DaveDorson]

1 minute ago, RichardK said:

And all of it attached to a rust-prone 1970s body in a much more structural fashion than a pan and beam front...

That's always been the reason for my resistance to them since in the '90s rotten Super Beetles were everywhere 😕

I still reckon that's only because the "cooler" ones were more likely to be looked after than the "fat chicks" were.  I lived through the UK cal look era and got into them in the early 2000s, by which time all beetles were a mix of fiberglass and patchwork shite, much of the "restored in the 90s" stuff was showing its age by then and a lot of my cars were at the bottom of the curve.  

I've seen my fair share of rusty 50s and 60s beetles and vans in my time too, a lot of the early stuff in the UK right now has been imported from sunnier climates, let's not even talk about that "hoodride" rat look nonsense where driving a deathtrap was almost embraced... I don't mine a bit of honest patina on a solid car, or even one that's been left to look unrestored but had been gone through structurally and mechanically, but stuff that pulls out cats eyes with the frame head, that's low enough to remove the gearbox and engine over normal roads and doesn't have any positive scrub lines in the event of a puncture can get right back into the swamp it was dragged out of before some idiot decided to make a "build" from it.

[Dick Cheeseburger]

This is my old 67 in the very early 90s, just before I bought it. I always liked it like this and knew the car well. Unfortunately the PO resprayed it in peppermint green and removed the the banded steels before selling. 

[bunglebus]

5 minutes ago, Dick Longbridge said:

This is my old 67 in the very early 90s, just before I bought it. I always liked it like this and knew the car well. Unfortunately the PO resprayed it in peppermint green and removed the the banded steels before selling. 

Awesome. Reminds me of "Alice", the well known Athena poster bug

[bunglebus]

41 minutes ago, DaveDorson said:

Yeah me too.  Your bike looked amusing at the weekend by the way.

Cheers. I like to build a silly one for the shows

I'm really hankering after another Beetle now though

[HMC]

Daimler FTP!

For the second time this crusty old dame has  failed to proceed. Ive been getting used to its little quirks, including that you need to manually prime the mechanical fuel pump if you leave it a few days.

This i did this evening, and i noticed no sounds or change in resistance to the pumping that told me the fuel was not the right place. I wondered, had e10 ruined the diaphragm in the pump? had it dissolved something critical elsewhere? it was far simpler than that. 

I wondered if it was because the car was parked on a slight angle where the fuel pick up pipes (on the near side) were sucking from the lowest fuel level. I decided to risk beaching it in a worse place by rolling it downhill and doing a quick about turn to leave the car angled with the pick up pipes in the deepest bit of the tank level (the downhill side, if you follow me)

Anyway, i got back under the bonnet and after a few pumps, i could hear the fuel getting into the float chambers again. Phew!

I went straight to a petrol station! This is wast happened last time. Must fix the fuel gauge! The trouble is its so much fun to drive so i use the fuel up. 

“Failing to proceed” would for sure be how daimler would have phrased it in their period clipped Queen’s english

 

[bunglebus]

Did you finally close the bonnet properly too?

[HMC]

Just now, bunglebus said:

Did you finally close the bonnet properly too?

Yes ! needed to fiddle with the cable pull and the latches.

[jonny69]

Full pineapple on the Beetle please. 

Those hand-painted plates, you tend to see them on much older stuff. I usually see them on VSCC-age vehicles or older, Brooklands kind of stuff. Cool find. 

[High Jetter]

1 hour ago, HMC said:

Yes ! needed to fiddle with the cable pull and the latches.

Ooh, Matron!

Was it just low fuel level?

[HMC]

57 minutes ago, High Jetter said:

Ooh, Matron!

Was it just low fuel level?

Yes, need to sort the gauge out ASAP!

[cort16]

14 hours ago, HMC said:

 

 

 

I prefer my fuel systems to come unexploded rather than exploded, that can come later. 

Loving the Mexican beetle is it one of the fuel injected ones?

[DaveDorson]

14 hours ago, bunglebus said:

I'm really hankering after another Beetle now though

Get one!

Do you want to be a person who did stuff, or a person who didn't do stuff but wanted to?

DOO EEETT

 

[tom13]

16 hours ago, Dick Longbridge said:

This is my old 67 in the very early 90s, just before I bought it. I always liked it like this and knew the car well. Unfortunately the PO resprayed it in peppermint green and removed the the banded steels before selling. 

Love this!

[Vimesy]

15 hours ago, jonny69 said:

Full pineapple on the Beetle please. 

Those hand-painted plates, you tend to see them on much older stuff. I usually see them on VSCC-age vehicles or older, Brooklands kind of stuff. Cool find. 

Being an unsociable old fart, I have no idea what the term "Pineapple" means when applied to cars, can some kind soul enlighten me please?

[Bazfr69]

27 minutes ago, Vimesy said:

Being an unsociable old fart, I have no idea what the term "Pineapple" means when applied to cars, can some kind soul enlighten me please?

It’s a bit of a catch all term for the mods that people don’t like (lowered, stacked roof rack etc) but I always think of this…

[Zelandeth]

1 hour ago, Vimesy said:

Being an unsociable old fart, I have no idea what the term "Pineapple" means when applied to cars, can some kind soul enlighten me please?

"Ruined" is usually a pretty good equivalent.

Edit: In fairness, there are a fair number of actually tastefully modified Beetles out there on which the work has clearly been done as a labour of love.  However there are also a huge number of what were lovely clean cars which have been slammed to the floor in the cheapest way possible and had a ten minute blow over of fake patina because that's the trendy thing to do.  

I have nothing against owners modifying their cars... they belong to their owners after all.  Beetles just seem to fare badly in this department.

[Vimesy]

1 hour ago, Bazfr69 said:

It’s a bit of a catch all term for the mods that people don’t like (lowered, stacked roof rack etc) but I always think of this…

 

1 hour ago, Zelandeth said:

"Ruined" is usually a pretty good equivalent.

Ah, it's all a bit subjective then 😉, thanks guys.

[DaveDorson]

Thing is a lot of the stuff people consider ruined on a beetle is absolutely reversible.

You don't need to chop out any of the original metal work to fit a decent engine in, unless you're going for a wider stroker engine and massive carbs, but frankly given that people have made nearly 200bhp on a 69mm crank, unless you're racing it, you really don't need to.

Dropped Spindles mean you don't have to chop into the suspension beam at the front, in order to fit suspension height adjustment, and even if you did, you can still keep it at stock height, but have the option to go a bit lower.

Other stuff is a case of remove the bits you don't want and store them, and bolt on performance things.

 

But that's me.. everyone is different.

[jonny69]

I thought it was originally about the stuff piled on the roof rack (vintage suitcases, oil drum, random old tyre, bmx, hay bale etc) from that era of modded VWs in the 00s, but it has evolved to refer to the look as a whole (lowered, camber, poke & stretch, roof rack + pineapple additions, sticker bomb, 1 rusty wing, fake patina, whiff of Ankor wax etc etc. 

[DaveDorson]

Just now, jonny69 said:

I thought it was originally about the stuff piled on the roof rack (vintage suitcases, oil drum, random old tyre, bmx, hay bale etc) from that era of modded VWs in the 00s, but it has evolved to refer to the look as a whole (lowered, camber, poke & stretch, roof rack + pineapple additions, sticker bomb, 1 rusty wing, fake patina, whiff of Ankor wax etc etc. 

I found a tin of ankor wax the other day that I paid £9 for..

 

It's good for stopping things rusting.

[Bazfr69]

I’ve stuck to reversible changes on mine tbh. 

Discs, drop spindles and electronic ignition but I also absolutely love my Zoom Tube. 😄

[MiniMinorMk3]

I think I might have mentioned that I have been a VW fan in the past.

I learnt in a Bug, that I crashed 5 months after passing my test. 5 months later it looked like this.

Pics taken at VW Action in Stoneleigh Park, 1982.

In 1986, when Cal-Look hade been imported to the UK I had this 1200 Bug

Beach shot was taken on the first Run to the Sun at Newquay beach.

My last bug was sold in 1992, my 1963 Ruby Red Delux

In the 10 years or so that I had air-cooled VWs I tried all types, including the 1303S, Type and Type 4s. Of all of them I think the 1963 was best. It might have been the slowest of the lot, but for some reason it was the quietest. 

 

I never had a South American VW, but they are know for rusting quicker than a patinated German one.

 

[yes oui si]

On 8/31/2023 at 7:39 PM, barefoot said:

Don't, it'll ride like shit.

Ride quality is overrated tbh... 

Glad you're back @HMC 

[HMC]

Fleet shot whilst i was tinkering with the beetle today….

[jonny69]

Lol, how come the garage doors look so wonky? That’s not the angle of the picture doing funny business!

[Bazfr69]

4 hours ago, HMC said:

Fleet shot whilst i was tinkering with the beetle today….

I hope you’re finding time to drive along with tinkering?