Long time coming - Readers' Ride

Tue, 13 Nov 2007
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Hey VolksWorld, Here are a few pic's of my restored 1972 Beetle.
I bought the car with my dad when I was 15. It had a very tidy interior and a disc brake conversion - plus it drove well! After a good run home, closer inspection showed it needed a lot of bodywork including two new sills and one floor pan.
We decided to completely strip it down and having seen my Dad restore two Classic Jaguars I was not fazed and hoped to have it ready for when I passed my test.
Although sold as a 1300 we found out the engine was a 1600 so rebuilt it using twin port unleaded heads and had the crank and cam checke and re-machined at a local engineering shop.
At this point there was a pause in proceedings, of around seven years, as my parents moved house and I moved out and discovered girls, pubs and all-night parties. During this time the Beetle lived in three different garages, I had five different jobs and traveled to 20 different countries, needless to say not much work got done during this period!
I thought about selling it a few times but all the ads in VolksWorld for "Unfinished Projects" were pretty sad so I kept it and promised to make time in the future.
Some years later, in its new home and me with a job allowing me more free time and money, we set about the task in hand.
I knew I wanted it lowered but nothing too crazy so went for a new puma beam at the front and dropped it one spline at the back with up-rated anti-roll bars front and rear. We bolted on the engine, which we had re-built seven years earlier, to the original gearbox, which was in very good condition.
Once we had lifted on the re-sprayed, de-chromed body it was time to get to work on the new auto sparks wiring loom and lots of smaller more fiddly jobs.
A whole lot of blood, sweat and tears from dad and me and we have done it.
Taking it for its first MOT was awesome, it passed with flying colours and even got a complement from the MOT inspector.
I really want to thank my mum and dad for putting up with the Bug in the garage for so long, my fiancé for not getting to annoyed when I kept disappearing to Norfolk to work on the car and to VolksWorld for all the tips and contacts in the mag.
Dan Greenway (now 31)