1974 Super Beetle Project...in the beginning

My son is the one who got me started with this whole VW thing.  I wanted to get an economical car to drive back and forth to work.  I wanted something different.  I love old cars.  My son was talking about getting a beetle.  I ended up doing some research and getting onto a chat room called "the samba"  It is a VW chat room.  I started looking at the Baja bugs on the pics and reading about the builds.  Well, I am in the wrong part of the country to make a true Baja Bug and using it in the desert.  But I could build a vehicle that can zip down the gravel roads and go drive on the beach in the Outer Banks of North Carolina.  As far as off road, I have a Jeep for that.  I searched on Craigs list and found this beauty.  It was a 1973 Super Beetle.  I liked the Super Beetle due to it having better handling characteristics than a Standard Beetle.  The super beetle suspension is not suited for the punishment of hard off road driving.  Since it is for street, I laid down the cash for the car and put it on the trailer. This is what I brought home.

The first week was fun.  I ended up spending a lot more money than I thought to get it on the road.  The car needed a lot of welding.  I had to make a section of floor pan and a new carburetor. I traded some extra parts for the carburetor.  It took some tuning and some cleaning, but I got it running.  Now I needed a windshield.  Back to craigs list.  I found a 73 parts car near the beach.  The car had a standard beetle Baja kit on it and a good windshield.  The title matched the body and I bought it sight unseen.  for $150.00 it was a good buy.  I brought it home and took out all the glass.  Then I started to take the car apart.  I kept anything that I needed and sold some parts.  Once it was stripped, I cut up the rotted out body and brought it to the scrap yard.  I kept the pan just in case I wanted to make a trike or something later.

I ended up driving it for a while and enjoyed every minute of it. Then one day, I blew the engine.  I got another engine from my son in exchange for building him an engine for his bug.  I figured it was fair.  His car wasn't on the road yet and the engine was done.  Now it is time to make the Baja.  First things first.  What is a Baja.  A Baja is an air cooled VW Beetle that has high ground clearance and light weight.  They use fiberglass fenders or they cut away the steel fenders for bigger tires and longer suspension travel.  So I got out the sawzall and started cutting.  The guys in my VW club were cringing when I started cutting.  I wish I had a picture of them.  Some of them are "purists" that don't approve of anything but original.  I didn't get any pics because we had limited time to get the car done.  Once we were done, I didn't even get to drive it.  My son hopped in and went to the beach with his girlfriend.  He told me that it handled great on the beach and only got stuck twice.  That isn't bad considering that he never drove in the sand before with 4wd and he was doing it with 2wd.

Below is a pic of him on the beach.

Now it is time for the upgrades.  That was just the beginning of a fun process.