Front beam mostly built up today and fitted my 2.5” lift spindles from NB Restorations. Superb build quality and attention to detail on the spindles (2nd pic shows the bug at stock height for comparison).
Painted up a nice new set of brake drums and the old tie rods. Hoping to finish up the last little bits on the chassis next week and then move onto starting to prep the body for paint (few odd welding jobs left too).
Got the Baja’s arse back down on some wheels and started to build up the front beam.
Made a good start on the chassis rebuild today. Fuel line and gear shift rod installed. Rear brakes rebuilt and new bearings pressed in. Loosely fitted most of the rear suspension components. 😁
Running gear and a few chassis bolt on panels for the baja all painted on a gloriously warm day. It’s starting to feel like spring!
Should be able to start chassis reassembly next week now.
Carried on with sorting through the Baja’s suspension components over the weekend. Knocked the old bearings out of the trailing arms and started shot blasting a few bits ready for paint.
I need to weld on some new bump stop mounts but overall they’re in good condition considering they had an ants nest living in them when we pulled them out of NOSVW’s dub graveyard!
Few bits left to sort on the Baja suspension before I can shot blast and paint it all.
Fully welded on my brackets for the front tube bumper and added a strengthening plate to the base of the shock tower.
A stock beetle beam doesn’t have a lower bump stop so I’ve added a hook and rod to hopefully save my shocks from any heavy off road use.
Got the rest of the baja chassis painted over the weekend.
I can now start cleaning up and bolting bits back on to build up a rolling chassis.
A good start to the New Year on the Baja. Seam sealed and Raptor coated the underside, framehead and framehorns. Colour coded in Savannah Biege, or as Max always calls it “Bundy Biege” 😳
Finished up the passenger seat back today and did a trial fit. Love how these have come out. A lot more complex than any of the other seats I’ve done so far but well worth it!
Sometimes things don’t quite go to plan.
After epoxy priming the chassis last Friday I was planning to seam seal the whole chassis the next day, only to find the paint was covered in wrinkles and was still wet in places. Thinking that perhaps the cold weather might’ve affected it I left it to harden for a week.
When I went down Friday the paint was still wet so I knew something had gone horribly wrong. I double checked the data sheets and discovered that my paint supplier had sent me the wrong hardener! My chassis was coated in a useless mess.
Cue 2 days of stripping the gloop off with a wire wheel and repriming it with some of the old epoxy primer I had left over from the van.
I’ll now erase this whole fiasco from my memory.
