Son's '73 ghia - a distraction

[d3ghia]

I know that is the proverbial question......

But it is raining.....

In Arizona? WTF?!?!?! Totally uncool and I hate the rain!

Hopefully by this weekend I will have made some more progress.........

[d3ghia]

OK, it's not raining anymore....LOL! Softball season came and went though, I sorta forgot how that stops everything else for four months. Have made a little progress while being away from here for the past couple of months. Will have pictures up soon. I guess I didn't meet my March deadline? LOL!

[Double D]

I don't think we ever do meet the deadlines we set for ourselves!
Welcome back!

[d3ghia]

Thanks D! good to get back in the rythm again. Softball was a good season this year. One of my daughters plays, and I have coached her for six years now. Now she is helping me to finish her brother's ghia so that we can start her '63 ragtop. It is the next one in the line of projects.

[wccr_engineering]

Awesome! I love family affairs! looking forward to seeing more progress!

[d3ghia]

No new pics to post... Nothing exciting going on. Finished cleaning up all the front end (suspension, beam, backing plates, steering box) and they are ready for paint.

Working on the rear end now.....40 years of road gunk to knock off so that it is ready for paint as well. Hoping to finish the pan this weekend so the body can go back on and we can paint it.

This was supposed to be done before our summer vacation, but life has a way of slowing down even the best laid plans.... (and these weren't the best, lol!)

Our summer vacation was going to be to Georgia too, but even that changed. Rather than go see my two best friends from the military that live back east, we went to see my Dad in San Francisco.

Hoping for some pictures on Sunday.

[59CaliforniaDays]

Restoration so far looks good!! I've wanted to restore a Ghia myself, I suppose this thread will come in handy when I do!

[d3ghia]

So since Feb, the pan pretty much has looked like it did in that picture. I trimmed the new pan halves and was nervous about welding them in.




I finally had a friend come over two weekends ago to help out. Well, after welding half of a pan in, turns out he was still a novice with his TIG welder and had blown more holes in the pan then actually good welds. I appreciated his efforts though and am grateful that he comes over to help me out. He is a really good friend.

So this past weekend, I cut that pan off, ground everything down again, and started over. Turns out my MIG skills are better than his TIG skills.

Finished welding in the pans, minus three "seams" that were supposed to be welded up before delivery (relief cuts for the forming process). One side had them welded, the other didn't.



You can't tell, but in this photo Snooky Pryor is helping provide motivation. Ended up finding all my old blues cassettes and have been thoroughly enjoying some Chicago blues







As soon as my copper backing plate shows up (should be Thursday), I can finish welding those seams up. (They are in the rear, where the pan drops down low behind the back seats).

I also mounted the front beam (with new needle bearings installed). Below are the rest of the front end pieces ready to go back on the car. The new brake system, new pedal assembly (we converted from autostick to manual, so needed a new pedal cluster) and assorted seals are in the living room (yes, I have car parts throughout the house - I have my turbo exhaust in the bedroom - only place to keep it rust free and out of the way)



Here are the rims that we want to use. 20 years of sitting did not help their appearance any. These are the before pictures.







I am about a third of the way through getting these dialed in. I am trying for Wednesday night, so I can get tires mounted on Thursday.

Alot is happening this week, as I need to have the chassis done by Friday (I will tell you why later )

Thanks to everyone that keeps me motivated!!

This last photo is why I love Arizona and monsoon season. This is indicative of my views from my garage EVERY night, and something that I try not to miss!!



My suburban is Sammy, the Dually is Clyde and behind Sammy is my friend's truck.

Getting closer!

[d3ghia]

So I didn't make my Friday deadline. But I did make progress.


Rear end back together



I was waiting for some copper backplates to fix these



There are three of these seams that weren't done from the repro guys. I tried to do one without anything behind it, and got this



a couple big holes. So, I decided to wait for the backplate. They came in today, but I didn't get home from work until 9 pm and I have to be back at work at 5 am. I just wasn't feeling it.

I am also going to fix this. Welding up the passenger side, I got a little crooked. So I plan on cutting a relief cut in the "dog leg" and getting it to line up. Then weld in place and fill in my relief cut.



This was what I was trying to make room for. Now the garage is uber crowded!






Now this is right in front of the pan that I am trying to work on....I am going to have to move some more stuff around!



Anyway, I am waiting on a suspension leaf stack for the front, then it will be ready to be put back together. Seems the PO took some leaves out, or the mice took a couple of leaves for a teeter totter or something!

[hotrodheb]

Nice looking oval there! Pan for the ghia is looking good too! Keep it up!

[d3ghia]

Front end is back together.

Pans welded on, sealed and painted.

Rear end WOULD be done....forgot to order wheel cylinders. Those should be in this week so I can replumb all the brake lines.



Notice the little pedal car in the corner? Grand daughter's first birthday present maybe......

[d3ghia]

I need to update this project too. The progress BEFORE the toyota showed up in the garage:

Mounted the transmission, plumbed the brakes and attached the axles.





I was waiting for this. It is the one on top in the photo.




Scottrods sent it to me from Texas, (thank you very much!) I have to clean it up a tad and grease it then install. You can see that it is just a bit longer, needed to convert from autostick to manual.



So I had these finally finished.

Reminder, before photo.




In progress.














Finished.









They still need a couple more polishing sessions, but I will do that when the car is together. The scratches, pits and major issues are worked out.


I had to mount them up to make some more room in the garage for the Toyota. Yes, I know that the cotter pin is not in yet. It is my "string around my finger". I have to final torque all the rear end once there is some weight on the pan.

For dented, scratched and dinged up 20+ old centerlines, they turned out pretty good I think. Took me about 10 hours per rim.

So that is it for now.

[1jarhead2]

Looking great and if you need the room I can come and get that oval window.

[d3ghia]

Originally Posted by 1jarhead2

Looking great and if you need the room I can come and get that oval window.

I do need more room, but since I waited over 30 years to get the oval, I am thinking that I will hang on to it for a bit. I am going to change the color though. Not reall digging that baby blueish color.

[1jarhead2]

I had a real nice 55 oval that a Army guy bought back from Germany. Wish I had never let that one go.

[HeidelbergJohn4.0]

Originally Posted by d3ghia

Front end is back together.

Pans welded on, sealed and painted.

Rear end WOULD be done....forgot to order wheel cylinders. Those should be in this week so I can replumb all the brake lines.



Notice the little pedal car in the corner? Grand daughter's first birthday present maybe......

looks similar to like mine. Nice work on the pan.

[d3ghia]

So I got the shift rod all cleaned up and installed. Then dug through the pile of parts to find the shifter and mounting plate. Guess what I found?

So the shifter has a pin and the new shift rod does not have the slot for it.

No worries, just adds a couple hours tomorrow to the build. I will cut the groove in the new rod

Oh wait..... I have to take it all back out again to do that

But isn't that the fun part of these old VW's? Working on things three times? Cleaning all the old rust and grit off of them? Cutting things, modifying things to fit etc?

I think half the time that I am not sane. The other half of the time I know I am not.

But....heh heh heh, I am one step closer to getting this ghia finished and one step closer to starting Vivian.

[d3ghia]

So the past six months have not gone as planned, but I am slowly getting some things done.

I have spent the past couple of months moving my ex girl friend out of my house. She bought a house that needed some fixing before she could move in. I really wanted my house back, so I had a pretty long list of things to do for her "new" house.

This weekend I finally got around to getting the shifter mounted and the pedals. I felt like a dumbass for an hour or so when the pedals wouldn't stay up. Had to go look at the pedals from another bug to see what the problem was.

Turns out that the new replacement pans don't have the "pedal stop" installed. So, I had to get one of those to put in...viola...problem solved.

Pushed the chassis under the body and then finally cleaned up the garage now that I had some room to move around in.

No pictures, nothing really exciting to look at. I am just happy that I am one step closer. Next weekend I hope to have a BBQ and get a bunch of friends over to put the body back on the pan. Then I will be ready to paint.

For you fellow Volksrodders up in Tucson...if you want a steak for some cheap labor, come on down! I am just down the road a bit (3 miles from the border).

[hotsauce]

Ghia is looking awesome thus far! Did you polish the wheels yourself?

[d3ghia]

yeah, those rims were a bitch. Had to do it all by hand - a sander or any type of machine would have rubbed the heads of the rivets off.

I started with a file to knock down all the deep gouges (they are a very old set). Then wet sanded with 220, 320, 400, 800, 1000, and 1500 passes. Wet sanding probably slowed down the process a bit, but after trying it dry, I got tired of breathing aluminum particles.

After that I used Never Dull, then Simi Chrome and then four more passes with an aluminum polish.

About 12 hours per rim.

[hotsauce]

Originally Posted by d3ghia

yeah, those rims were a bitch. Had to do it all by hand - a sander or any type of machine would have rubbed the heads of the rivets off.

I started with a file to knock down all the deep gouges (they are a very old set). Then wet sanded with 220, 320, 400, 800, 1000, and 1500 passes. Wet sanding probably slowed down the process a bit, but after trying it dry, I got tired of breathing aluminum particles.

After that I used Never Dull, then Simi Chrome and then four more passes with an aluminum polish.

About 12 hours per rim.

Holy shit! That's a lot of time to spend on wheels... Reason I asked is because I'm looking to polish my keg/gas tank. It's stainless as opposed to aluminum, but I figured same sort of process.

[Grimey1]

daaaaaaamn....those wheels came out clean! I would take a 20+ year used set that looked like that over a new set anyday! loving the build progress amigo!

[d3ghia]

Small update. Most of you know that life has thrown a few curveballs my way over the past few years. I know that many of us on here have had our fair share of things to deal with.

Well, I think I am gathering some momentum to finally get over the hump on this build and a few others that have stalled out.

I should have some updates in the next couple of weeks. This weekend I will finish the paint booth (finally - only been two years). The jeep cj5 should be sold next week which will give me the funds to purchase the interior panels and upholstery to finish this car off.

So, look for the body going back on the pan in the next couple of weeks - and hopefully getting some color put on shortly thereafter.

[1slo3]

I, for one, can completely understand. I hope the days with desire out number the days without it for you!

[V8Transporter]

Just goes to show that you can't keep a good guy down!