1971 VW Type 3 Fastback

[broady]

Waiting for the working day to end?

Something exciting to come in the next update. Ill post it up this evening. Should have you all up to speed this week

[luckyseven]

This thread needs a poll and a prize for the correct guess... maybe a an empty gas bottle or roll of welding wire. Something like

"As a percentage, how much of this car is still VW as opposed to hand-crafted in a shed in Lincolnshire?"

* 10%
* 5%
* less than 5%
* less than 1%
* none at all, don't be silly
* Ferdinand's ghost is weeping tears of blood in Heaven


I remember joining VZi and seeing photos of you re-creating floorpans from bits of KG and optimism. I remember thinking "Christ, I'm out of my depth here"

[johnthesparky]

Nov 19, 2018 10:31:20 GMT broady said:

Waiting for the working day to end?

Something exciting to come in the next update. Ill post it up this evening. Should have you all up to speed this week

No, waiting for it to start
It has started now, but my enthusiasm left before the customer arrived

[glassee]

Great topic! I've Always liked fastbacks
Keep the updates comming!

Yannick

[broady]

Nov 19, 2018 10:36:28 GMT luckyseven said:

This thread needs a poll and a prize for the correct guess... maybe a an empty gas bottle or roll of welding wire. Something like

"As a percentage, how much of this car is still VW as opposed to hand-crafted in a shed in Lincolnshire?"

* 10%
* 5%
* less than 5%
* less than 1%
* none at all, don't be silly
* Ferdinand's ghost is weeping tears of blood in Heaven


I remember joining VZi and seeing photos of you re-creating floorpans from bits of KG and optimism. I remember thinking "Christ, I'm out of my depth here"

Haha, there cant be much left and loads of people have said I'm mad. But its very much a case of "well ive come this far, why not go a little further?" I must be one of the last two options in your poll, but its not for me to decide

Nov 19, 2018 10:47:47 GMT johnthesparky said:

Nov 19, 2018 10:31:20 GMT broady said:

Waiting for the working day to end?

Something exciting to come in the next update. Ill post it up this evening. Should have you all up to speed this week

No, waiting for it to start
It has started now, but my enthusiasm left before the customer arrived

Customers and Mondays will do that to you!

Nov 19, 2018 11:29:10 GMT glassee said:

Great topic! I've Always liked fastbacks
Keep the updates comming!

Yannick

They are clearly the best of the type 3s. Which is why is was the last model to be made, clearly they weren't happy with the notch or sqaureback. Tune in these evening for the next installment

[broady]

Right lets hope I didn't over promise on that exciting update then!

Back end of June 2018

There was a lot of chat on the other form regarding colour, trying to help me make my mind up.

And then we go to this

I feel I owe you an update then, not too many photos to be sharing this time. But I got myself some wing fastener seals made.



I figure that the body sanding and shaping is going to get boring so Id do it abit at a time. I then found this as I started.



So thats another repair ill have to repair. Though at least its not my old repair this time

The next thing I have to do was choose a colour, or to be more specific a shade. I could put it off no more. I went to the local paint suppliers and they dug out the original VW colour chips for me. I had a look at marina blue, this cars original colour. While I was there niagra blue caught my eye, I bought a couple of test pots and marched on home.

A quick rub down of my wings, followed with some high build.



The left is marina and the right is niagra.





This confirmed to me that I don't really like the marina blue, which is a shame. However I did like the niagra, but it wasnt jumping out at me as amazing so I was left with a bit of a deflated feeling.Nnot knowing where to go with it, I left if out of mind for a few days and then returned to looking at that filler flap, its just a bit darker and a bit greener. Over a lunch time pint a friend suggested to me that if I wanted to say in the 70s VW colour world, why not try neptune blue. It doesnt seem to be a photo friendly colour. None the less I went to the paint shop and looked at the chip. Its near enough the same as the filler flap. I bought myself half a litre as i was quite taken with it and painted half a wing against the marina blue. I was convinced, this is straight from the gun. Once polished this it will look fantastic.



With that big decision out the way, ive finished the seam sealing, started to shape up the repaired rear wing and been working my way along painting the underside in Neptune blue.

That's all for now resto fans

[jim]

You made the right call on the shade of blue

[broady]

Nov 20, 2018 13:04:16 GMT jim said:

You made the right call on the shade of blue

Cheers muckka!

Back to the big stuff. First week of july

Havent touched the ole banger for a week, been away on a tour and at a concourse for work. Got to have a good dribble over Nick Masons 250 GTO!

A little while between drinks, mostly the same and same and same. So there arent many photos to show.

Its just been a case of shaping up.

My first focus was this little number on the front end.



And as there was plenty to do I worked on the rear wing as while one was curing the other was being sanded.



I struggled like curse word with the wing. It was wither the right shape are the bottom, or the top. After chatting with a friend whos pretty handy with the body work he asked what I was doing. Id been using a foot long velcro backed rigid sander. He said a how maid sander will be loads better.

A slice of hardboard, double sided tape and a roll of 80 grit later.



And a decent smaller version on some firm firm.



I havent got any further photos of the wings yet but they're much more the right shape. Ill snap some pics tomorrow. I try not to handle my phone when my hands are covered in filler dust. Here is the front end.



Corners coming along well too.



And I knew it was coming so last weekend I put the podcasts on and sanded the roof down.



And just about smooth. One small depression which I have filled. (the blue patch just above the B pillar)



Ive also set about the rear valance and its coming on so much quicker than I had hoped. But the down side is the 944 seems to have a poorly engine, so I pulled the front axle off that and got the sump off saturday morning. Though I still don't really know whats wrong with it

Starting to find it a pain to work on the roof panel at such height and getting a little fed up with the small casters on my dollys going any which way and struggling with the load. I need to start hanging panels on to check ive got the shaped up nicely, so it was time for the body to come back down to earth. For this to happen I needed to build up the pan.

I was met with this from my old handbrake cables when I pulled them out, so it was easy to do I put a new pair in.



The new (4 year old less than 1000 miles) axle boots on the offside had both split. Top quality stuff ive bought there!





So that was removed from the car and bench built, fortunately I have a few original drive shafts with nice original boots, which aren't perished and still supple. I removed two of these and installed on the car.

I threaded various other cables through with lots of lovely grease, to get to this point.



This was just a bit of a fun, the earth strap was very grotty, before and after photo here. I put it in a jar of diesel over night, then spray with brake clearer and it looked all nice and coppery again. I know it wont last 5 minutes once it rains, but hell it looks nice for now.



Before I went any further, I wanted to check everything was suitably protected. It was then I noticed the two rubber bungs in the shock towers and realised a that cavity projection wouldn't hurt in there.



My inner chimp took over though as one of them simply wouldn't come out and i ended up pulling it with pliers, which I'm sure you guess has torn it in two. So if anyone has any of these grommets I'm happy to buy a few off you, ive been through my stash and I only have the bigger diameter ones. Typical eh!





With my inhibiting completed I set about fitting the pan seal. I arsenal was as follows.



With it all trimmed to the fit the corners I put a few dabs of tiger seal on the contours it didnt want to follow, laid it on and held in place over night with pan washers.



The following day this meant the moment was upon us, I cleaned up the various mounting rubbers, sleeves and fasteners. Then aligned the body and the pan.



I tried to lift the back and manually but I simply hadn't eaten enough wheatbix to be able to do it. So I took a risk and used this block of wood and my trolley jack.



The front was easier as I could lift it manually and lower on to the body.



A couple of hours with a tin of copper grease and a selection of bolts so it all fastened down for the last time, I hope!

I thought it was time that i finished the repairs to the body.



As expected I found a rotten drain pipe, which the previous person who repaired this didn't bother to fix so its rotten through again.



With this handy hack saw blade I managed to cut the rotten bit out.





I then got carried away, I replaced the rotten section with a piece of house pipe and tried to seal up the panel. But I hasnt worked very well, so I think its all coming back out this evening to be improved.

[Deleted]

Once again great update. A Master at work👍👍

[mungo]

bolting a body down to a freshly restored floorpan is one of the best bits of the job.
Proper satisfying when it's suddenly a car again....

[broady]

Nov 21, 2018 8:28:39 GMT @hotrodder said:

Once again great update. A Master at work👍👍

Very kind words, far from a master, but always willing to get stuck in and try to apply what ive learned over the years

Nov 21, 2018 12:43:56 GMT mungo said:

bolting a body down to a freshly restored floorpan is one of the best bits of the job.
Proper satisfying when it's suddenly a car again....

It certainly did feel good, though its a feeling I miss right now. Ive just come inside, its 4 degrees in the garage!

Lets have a little more to round of Augusts work

Lets close this off then. Having cut it open again I took one last photo.



Then inside the boot on each side I drilled a 10mm hole through which I can spray dinatrol. VW seeminly never created a way to get in here and its a water drain! What did they think would happen? Once waxed up ive got a couple of grommets to seal these off.



Once id welded up the skin I started shaping the filler. Between working on my rear valence. And I must say this has come on quite well, still one or two small ripples to remove, but its 90% there.



Otherwise ive just been going over the hold body starting at 80g and getting finer and finer. at 240g now so not far from 400 then I can think about some primer!

Progress was slow for some time, down to my lack of skill/knowledge. Something was telling me to check this rear valance because it doesn't feel right, owed to doing it over about two weeks I rather lost track of how much filler I have used. I put the rear wing on to check and........well its rather embarrassing. Not only is it miles about theres a door wedge of gobbo in there.



Id much rather have something more like this



So having lost my way, moler of bestvolksrodever fame came round for a spot of guidance and motivation. His first idea was "use a better sanding block"
He gave me this piece of noodle. Ideal for getting the two opposing curves in one stroke.



Next tip was to make profile gauge from the other end of the panel.



Armed with my new tools I removed all of that filler and went back to the start. The third and final tip I was offered, filler the wing and valance as one. Then separate and treat the edges.





I then ran a hack saw blade up the panel gap and removed and filler which made it between the two panels.



Wanting to feel a little progress the drivers side rear wing needed little work so I decided to spend a couple of evenings on this. After and hour my reflection in wet primer was this.



Obviously hard to tell without any gloss to get a reflection but this is how the wing ended up.





Who wants to see "bestvolksrodever?"

[johnthesparky]

Saw it at VW action then went and found the thread, as wanted to do something similar with the mudguards on the Fug.

But yes, it’s lovely, so happy to see it again

(Great work again)

[broady]

Nov 21, 2018 21:54:09 GMT johnthesparky said:

Saw it at VW action then went and found the thread, as wanted to do something similar with the mudguards on the Fug.

But yes, it’s lovely, so happy to see it again

(Great work again)

Glad someone knew what I was on about, ive been helping motivate him to get it repaired after his adventure with a lamp post.



And a little bit of September action for you.

Not much to update on, I will do my best with the photos but its hard to photograph a panel that's been sanded and filled and make it exciting!

I havent worked in any particular order, just picked a panel and got on with it, both doors needed a clean down, they were degreased and jet washed. I wasnt happy with previous filling work so it was removed with a strip disc.

I will admit to one tiny bit of welding (I thought id got it all) This door seal strip werent pretty.



And then it was



The nit picky stuff of running down the inside faces of both doors ate up a sunday morning, then I returned to the bit that will be seen most often and made it flat once more.



Several strokes of a sanding block later



As a short mental break I found out what the correct boot light should be for the car as mine was never fitted with one. I wrongly believed it was the same as a beetles interior light. But it seems it actually from a 356. So take your couple of quid from the autojumble life a chuck it, you're paying Porsche tax. 35 of the queens pounds and 2 of our earth days later this arrived.



Still doesnt seem like ive had £35 worth but maybe on a dark wet night when I need to fettle the engine at the side of the road I will think "that £35 was well worth it just to see what I was doing" I will let time be the judge.

The next item on my list was a small dash blank, you may remember some pages back my rectangular dash hole had been enlarged by a previous owner, thanks to moler measuring his, I welded mine up to the same dimensions. And after a couple of months searching, the ever kind purplepeter manage to rustle one up for me when I made the trip to bath at the weekend for the garage sale, and here it sits in its rectangular glory.



And what do you know, it fits.



I have continued to work my around the car, tidying small details as I spot them, sanding the air vents in the scuttle panel. I mange this about 5 at a time before I stand to loose the will. I also been trying to get the C pillars something like. They are certainly close, but not quite there yet.





On the larger scale of things this leaves me with on rear wing to shape and both bonnet and boot lid need a rub down to key them up for paint. Then it will be a decent inspection for any off edges that ive missed and finally get it all sanded down to 400g. Paint certainly feels like a September thing

[broady]

Not a photogenic update, but more blocking and sanding along with some fibre glassing.

A little repair to the inside of the filler in the wing, the mount for the release mechanism has pulled through, so ive filled it all in with fibre glass and resin then filed out the holes.




Nothing too exciting here, door shaped up and offered up.




And because I forgot to post this when I did it.



The other rear wing is fairly smooth now too.





I needed a change of pace and as it would speed things up a little later in the month I did a little painting on the inside of panels

I set up a room suitable for some murdering.





I had initially just panned to do some priming, but decided that as things were going well id put the colour in the inside of the wings.





And just for some jolly and as there was little paint left I did the filler flap to see the colour with some shine and depth.



My sunday was broken up by the MotoGP but either side of that was sanding, the front wings, doors and one rear wing are now sanded to 400 and are ready for paint. The other rear wing is half an hour away. I made a start on the body too. The bonnet is shaped and ready to be made smooth. The boot lid requires a few dents pushing in and filling. I assume this down to the it being closed on things which didn't quite fit in the boot!

[broady]

I'm just going to tease you with this.

[broady]

Next ones a big one

[broady]

Now within 8 weeks of real time

So you are well over due an update, I didnt want to post half a job so this will be a big one. I needed to murder room the garage, I used a roll of plastic membrane I had kicking around to make a booth. So here ive starting making a booth and masking the car.



And the primer was on I flatted it off with 600g







With the garage at just about the right temperature I decided it was time to have a go at spraying celly for the first time in about 10 years.





You don't need to be a professional spray painter to know that it didn't go well. At least the roof didn't you already know the back panel looks fairly good.



The following day it looked like this.





And the scuttle panel had a lot of scratches in, I clearly hadn't preped this properly at all!



I had a good chat with a few folks I know who can paint, the problem was quickly identified. Two much air pressure and not enough paint flow. So with that in mind and knowing that the roof would need at least a week before i could rub it down and start again I set about the other panels.











The paint is much better, still got a degree in orange peal, but you can see I had improved. I wish the colour would photograph better, it look far too grey in photos.

When it came to revisiting the roof and scuttle I had really got my act together.



Here is the repainted roof It was time consuming work to undo the mess id made but I bought it up to 600g again before putting 3 more coats on.



This leaves just two big panels to do, I will have a few small bits and bobs to do, but in a decent effort to beat the drop off in temperature Ive got the bit stuff painted before the mercury dropped below 15c





And then I took a little step back and went pealy again.







Everything has had two coats of primer with flatting between coats and then three coats of colour.

Weve come along way but now it all needs some time to rest and cure. Ill start the colour sanding next week all being well.

Great stuff, nearly there!

Painting is really full of ups and downs! Not sure I could face repainting mine. Might see how much a decent respray is in the spring. But looks like you've got the kit and skills, and are nearly there. Well done.

Kit yes, skills, not really. Very much learning on the job it'll good enough to look smart as it drives past, but closer than a few ft and you'll see imperfections!

Great work mate keep it up

Certainly trying, now the weathers cooler off its hard to motivate myself to go and wet sand haha.

Right time for a few glory photos. Ive been flatting away, starting with 1000, I did use 800 in a couple of small rough areas. But largely its been 1000. 1800. 2400. 3200 using micromesh. First attack was the roof.



It looks reasonable in that photo, the reflection is well enough. But then turn and catch it in the sun.



This was disappointing, but it seems to have been down to my lack of skill with the MOP. I have since done some research and brushed up on my technique. Hopefully I can correct that tomorrow. I returned to the sanding, wishing to get as much done in the mild weather last weekend. I had the hose pipe with a constant dribble of water running.



Again I had the swirling issue as this was before id done the reading.

but the shine was half decent,





After flatting, but before polishing.



And after G3 followed by G10



I will take some photos with a much better camera tomorrow and try to pick out the imperfections, but if any people who have the know how see anything I'm doing which is obviously know, please tell me before i cock the rest of the job up

Your next update will not only been from this year, but this very month!

[petervdv]

some time ago, i did my first spray paint job (the wooden trim panels) and went threw the same problems like you did: too much pressure, not enough paint and also did a fair bit of sanding and polishing which finally gave a very good result. For polishing, i found that the 3M mop and polishing compound gave better results then some other stuff. You will get there.

I watched several video on YouTube which were very helpfull and you could also ask grumpy Chris for advice as he is helpfull and knows what he is doing


Keep up the good work as its impressive what you are doing

Peter

[broady]

Cheers for the advice, it doesn't seem to be the polishing phase that was the issue. I seemed more that I hadn't given it long enough to cure and it was still too soft for sanding. Ive since knocked it on the head for the winter to focus on other things. As you say, ill get there. The longer I leave it the better it will be for polishing.

So here we are November 2018.

Nothing really to report, ive understood a lot more about the paint and have got this finish now.






After some research ive discovered that not all abrasive paper grades are the same 1500 is all the same, silicon carbide is more aggressive that aluminium oxide, so a 2000 SC is more like at 1500 AO. So Ive been flatting with far to coarse paper. Ive also been baking with an infra red heater for an hour or so before I start flatting.

Well as good as that rear panel looks, the rest of it is causing some bother. Still being left with scratches and swirl marks in enough places to upset me.

I flatted the boot lid right back once again. I expect its my last chance before I get through to primer!



Then after some time gently massaging it was G3 and then G10





The reflection is more than good enough for what I wanted to achieve, but take a look on the left there around the house roof, and then to the right near the tree.

Bit of a spoiler that! But as id not got it that good before Ive left it alone and decided to work on the bonnet so I can get that refitted. I'm acutely aware the longer the panels sit in the garage the higher the chance ill scratch/dent/chip one.

So the same as above, 1200/1500/2000 on blocks, spray bottle of water and a bucket of water. A hose pipe for washing off. I flatted it right back to dull and seemingly smooth, unfortunately the light was fading by this point, but none the less i polished it with G3 and it again looked half decent.



But once id taken it in the garage it really didn't look half as smart, id seemingly made it worse!



At this point I was feeling rather demoralized, it was time to stop adding brush strokes and know when to stop.

The paints had 4-6 weeks to cure nice and warm for the first two weeks, and averaging around 8 for the remaining. I will chalk this up to experience and assume the paint simply is still too soft at the minute, I have started to bake one panel at a time in front of my IR heater. I am going to leave the colour sanding for, well probably until next year. Giving the paint as much time as it needs to settle.

Wanting to recover some garage space and reduce the likely hood of bumping into a painted panel ive decided the gearbox and engine need to go home.

This meant the first job was to install the wiring loom and then any of the other bits and bobs which sit on the underside of the boot floor.

To quote Kirsty Wark "More on that story later"

[broady]

Shall we have a change of pace then, I know I need one.

I dragged the rats nest out of the loft.



It has all sort of splices and joins along with horrible modern connectors. I wanted all this nonsense removed, I have planed to simple cut trim and solder it all healthy.



Back in august danny lord put a box of wiring loom up for sale. It was a bit of an unknown with out getting my hands on it, I couldn't and just had to go on the photos. I thought I might get something useful and it was about £20 from memory. Once id unpacked it all I worked out it as for an injection engine late type 3. A good starting point, the wires seem supple and nothing looks heat/fire damaged. The section which runs from the fuse box to the regulator and then all the way to the engine bay and rear lights was all there and in unfettled condition.



The only fault I found was the diagnostic socket, its clip on cover had broken off. My original loom has this.





Before I got any more involved I sat and worked out if both looms had the same number of wires in the right places with the right colours.



With it confirmed that new and old were all but the same, I removed the socket from my old loom and cleaned it, the carefully marked out this pin diagram to make sure when I fitted this socket to my new loom it was wired up correctly. Ignoring the fact it will almost certainly never get used :lol: :lol: