The best German Look Beetle in the UK... probably!

''It wasn't meant to be like this," laughs Terry Fuller of this frankly incredible 1972 Beetle. "It started out as just a set of wheels and a breathed-on motor..." But where some projects go off the rails or change direction completely, Terry's car has simply evolved to its logical conclusion which, truthfully, is exactly what Terry had wanted from day one. "I remember seeing the green Remmele car that you guys had in VolksWorld and thinking 'I want a bit of that'." And so with that in mind - along with vague recollections of a tech article we once ran on fitting a Porsche gearbox into a Beetle chassis - Terry promptly went out and bought a second-hand 915 five-speed gearbox from a Porsche 911. Well, you've got to start somewhere haven't you? "I had a '74 Beetle that I'd had since university, so I took that and the gearbox down to Jim's [that's James Wooton at Vee Dub in Welling] and said make this work." "No problem," James replied, "it can't be that hard." However, once they started cutting the floorpan, they discovered the conversion wasn't quite as simple as the article had made out, especially not when trying to do it all upside down on a complete car. "We got about half way through and I wished I hadn't started," recalls Terry. But James isn't one to give up, and so suggested a different plan of attack - they'd start with another car, but one that could be stripped to a bare floorpan, so they could flip it over and work on it upside down and get it right. A rock-solid '72 was sourced - yes, such things do exist - and the project started again. By now, Terry was more focussed on what he really wanted out of the car and so began collecting the other pieces that would complete his vision of the ultimate German Look Beetle - the brakes, hubs, torsion bars and aluminium rear trailing arms from a Porsche 944 Turbo, an uprated front anti-roll bar, Sparco race seats and a suitably potent engine. Once the gearbox was in, the boys could start to assemble the rest of the chassis. There's a two-inch narrowed adjustable beam up front, along with dropped spindles that were machined by Taylor Machine Services to take the 944 hubs. "We fitted the 18-inch GT3 wheels I'd bought but, as soon as they were on, James said 'the brakes look a bit small'. And he was right, they did, the big wheels made them look like biscuits. So they had to be changed. This is how it's been with the whole car. If there have been any problems, we've addressed them and worked through them, so it's now right. Otherwise, if you look at something and you know it's not right - even if no one else can see it - it'll always wind you up." This goes some way to explaining why this car has taken six years to be completed, but it's not just because of an obsessive devotion to "getting it right", it's also because - despite its looks - this car has been built to a budget. It's not one we're going to disclose, and it doesn't mean any corners have been cut, but it does mean Terry has been involved at every stage. "I couldn't afford to keep paying people, so everything I could do myself I did," he explains. A lot of that was the design and detail work, and that's where Terry's background as a model maker and current occupation as an oil rig engineer came to the fore. "I guess that's why I'm so anal," he chuckles. For the full story check out the June 2008 issue of VolksWorld magazine. On sale on 18 April and then available through back issues. SUBSCRIBE Never miss an issue again by setting up a subscription to VolksWorld magazine! VW Wallpaper You can download a wallpaper from this feature for your computers desktop in our VW Wallpaper section.