TheSamba.com :: View topic - '63 Panel Camper to Deluxe conversion project

Sun Aug 18, 2013 6:25 am

heres the work on the short rocker panel:

notice the gap/hole in the corner where the rocker meets the panel:

here it is closed up:

ground down:

cleaned up:

next is the passenger side rear wheel well, that will be the last of the panel replacements.

Sat Oct 03, 2015 4:34 am

lots more work done... almost ready for paint

Thu Oct 08, 2015 12:10 pm

Today's work:

Thu Oct 08, 2015 12:37 pm

here are some catch up pics (ive been bad about updates)

welded up all the hacks/holes in the dashboard

The passenger side door has been repaired. its odd that my doors rusted on the lower rear part of the bottom, and the front lower parts are rust free. the bus must have been parked uphill with water in them.

I opted to sandblast the lower windshield sill section and patch up all the holes with little pieces of metal (and some patience) as opposed to replacing the whole thing. The metal was pitted but saveable

I ordered a new drivers (left) side door from the classified. I orignally was going to weld up the large 14"x14" square hole in the roof but I think I'm going to install one of these instead:

from here http://www.vintagetrailersupply.com/Metal_Roof_Vent_p/vts-280.htm

I've read the tin top campers can get toasty inside without a roof vent. my van is a panel but a walkthrough and they didn't come with the rear vent slats that non walkthrough panels had.

I still have to fix the drivers side wheel well, fill some screw holes in the interor....buy a new front emblem and rear bumper and then shes off for paint.

Wed Oct 14, 2015 3:03 am

...the other side. I thought this one wasn't as bad as the passenger side...

...but it was worse

rust all cut out:

test fitting the patch. I used 14 gauge steel for this part on both sides.

welded in.

welds grounded down

A few nights earlier I finished the engine bay. I had to drill out the broken bolts for the gas tank straps. The dove blue paint I used was way off...its much too grey. it has almost no blue in it. glad i tested it here first.

Mon Dec 21, 2015 5:51 pm

tons more work done... but most of it is too boring for pics. I spent a silly amount of time restoring this:

Mon Dec 21, 2015 8:17 pm

very nice , I like the mileage
edgood1 wrote:

Tue Dec 22, 2015 9:08 am

Sheesh, how'd you get the face so perfect?

Thu Dec 24, 2015 12:36 pm

BarryL wrote: Sheesh, how'd you get the face so perfect?

Lots of patience.it Took time to mix up matching paint. I used an airbrush and fine brushes on the face to touch up areas that needed help after cleaning.

There are some great threads on here describing how to disassemble and repair these

Thu Jan 07, 2016 2:01 pm

slowly but surely crossing things off my checklist, today I installed mounting points for 3 point seat belts. I'm going to use vanagon seat belts.

ground the finish off some washers and welded on nuts with the oddball thread size that the vanagon bolts use

drilled a hole

cut out a tab that I could bend back

welded the nut plate in. I cut two holes on the pillar to puddle weld these in but I found that I could get enough access from the tab I cut out to get a good weld from the back side. I used that information when doing the other side.

gave it a good weight test and then welded up the access tab

welds knocked down

rinse...lather ...repeat (on the other side)

heres the vanagon belt installed

With the little time I have to work on the bus (i have two small kids) I've been doing all the small tedious stuff needed to get the bus ready for paint.... ive spent a lot of time getting the front door window frames ready...getting all the old original rubber out of the grooves has taken several hours. I have all the major stuff on my checklist complete, which is a good feeling.

Wed Mar 30, 2016 10:53 am

I towed the bus around to body shops yesterday. see more on that front here: http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=651446

I had struggled in the past to get various buses up on the vehicle trailers that uhaul rents. I came up with this:

I flipped the mounting plate to my harbor freight 5000lb winch around and bolted it to one of the bumper brackets. It worked like a charm. For some reason my phone didn't save the pics with the winch on it but hopefully you get the idea:

Fri Apr 01, 2016 6:59 am

So what was in the OG gas tank that made it so heavy????

Fri Apr 01, 2016 7:02 am

twistedbug wrote: So what was in the OG gas tank that made it so heavy????

it was some sort of sludge. I think there was sand and old gas in there and then newer gas on top of it. The outlet was completely clogged with crud, I think someone put something in there to try to free it up??? who knows.

I actually cleaned it out and gave it to someone who needed a tank.

Wed Apr 20, 2016 11:18 am

After deliberating for a few weeks, I decided to start doing the body work.

I hauled the bus to 9 different body shops for quotes on bodywork and paint. they ranged from $12K to $35K and most shops wouldn't touch it. I was looking for someone to do "economy" body work. but i guess nobody does that anymore except maaco... and the only macco I trusted apparently burned down. All the shops i took it to wanted to strip the whole thing to bare metal. I guess I understand that, but they wouldn't even consider working over the existing paint and bodywork. I understand why, just kinda a bummer.

I'm about 16 hours into sanding and there's going to be a lot more of it.
My plan is to scuff the existing paint, going down to bare metal where needed, do some filler work on the repaired areas and hit the whole thing with epoxy primer, then do a guide coat to see where I'm at. continue with any more filler where needed then start with build primer and block a few times....then paint. I'm very anal about getting the filler work right. I do several coats and then block it with 120 grit and coat and block again if needed. I like it to be really close come time for primer.

I started scuffing the existing paint with 80 grit on the nose and passenger side. I hand sanded all the door jamb area. and crevasses in the pillars. I also did the interior cab area last week...lots of work. after the 80 I'll probably go down to 120-150 before the epoxy/filler primer.

The more I dig into this the more it seems doable. It is a ton of work but not impossible. its just a matter of finding blocks of time to do it.

Materials:

I'm going to go with SPI epoxy primer. I have experience with that and have had good results with my limited experience. I might also try their 2k primers which I haven't tried yet. I might seal that with reduced ex epoxy (i'm pretty sure their epoxy recommends doing this but I'll obviously check)

In terms of paint, I'm up in the air. The shop I used to buy PPG paint from has long since closed so I'm researching. I hear that PPG doesn't sell the "concept" line any more and that was what I used to use.

I know napa sells Martin Senor paint and I can order from TCPGlobal. They only sell the Deltron line in terms of PPG and I think he said only BC/CC. I want single stage. They also were touting their own "restoration shop" paint as an alternative to PPG Concept. I'm reading what people have to say about it. They quoted me $140/gallon for dove blue or silver white and $45/qt of activator. that seems pretty cheap so I have my doubts.... I dont' want to skimp on paint but if theres a good deal out there I'll give it a shot. I'm sure its a rebranded version of something else...gotta find out what.

One reason I want to go with PPG is I have a PPG recipe for dove blue that I like. The standard PPG code comes out way to Gray. I'm not sure if that recipe would carry over to different brands. would it?

I'm open to any ideas or suggestions. Its been a long time since I painted a car and could use any advice. thanks!

Fri Apr 29, 2016 7:25 am

well... i'm into the bodywork now

Wed May 18, 2016 9:58 am

spent 2 hours today sanding down the engine lid. small progress. there was some dove blue hiding under there...and some old body work.

I'm noticing a bunch of layers of paint. theres a thin brown layer on the metal which i think is factory etch primer or something like it, then factory gray primer and then the dove blue. Then theres a slightly darker shade of blue on top of that which might be a respray? then there's a layer of white (primer I think) then orange, then a very very thin dark gray primer and then the blue flake paint on top of that.

On the inner cargo door someone painted "1973" in orange, but it looks like cheap rattle can paint and might be different than whats on the outside.

On the inside of the engine lid there were some compression numbers and mileage dated 1980-1981 and another from 1989.

Fri May 20, 2016 5:21 am

That's cool!

I can't help you but keep on good work!

Wed Jun 08, 2016 12:40 pm

more sanding/scuffing. still have to do the other half of the roof, the front doors and the interior. doors might come down to bare metal.

spent a lot of time on the rain gutters, hit them all around with a wire wheel and then sandblasted a few bad spots. no rust through, thank goodness, just some minor pitting. it looked worse before attacking it.

Wed Jun 08, 2016 2:13 pm

edgood1 wrote: got some donor parts to convert the hacked panel to a kombi/standard window van:

I have a set of westfalia windows in awesome shape which I will use once this piece is sectioned in.

Are you still planning on adding the Kombi window clip ??
Your work looks great, tough to carve out the time w/ little ones.....

Wed Jun 08, 2016 5:54 pm

crukab wrote:
Are you still planning on adding the Kombi window clip ??
Your work looks great, tough to carve out the time w/ little ones.....

I want to if I can find the time. Part of me wants to just get it into paint and reuse the cut-in windows (they need a lot of work). The other part of me wants to use the prestine westy windows I have and weld that clip in. I fear though, that If i weld in that clip I'm going to want to make it a 15 window.... and then if I get that far, i'll want to turn it into a 23 window.