Project car T34 Karmann Ghia a.k.a Rustbucket

Started by 80 Vert, January 28, 2012, 08:29:00 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

80 Vert

#540
I'll try and catch up updating this thread when I can but the reality is that I've not taken many pictures as I've gone along since the point where this thread was left.
These days it seems like forums are no longer the place for build threads but to try and help revive the forum I can do my bit in the hope others will also post their projects no matter how big or small they may be.
I completely gave up updating Thesamba thread due to getting stonewalled constantly when I needed help because a lot of people with the knowledge just won't help you if you are "modifying" a T34 as I am so I decided I'll just do it for me, my way with or without any help.

I finished this thread on the bumpers and I'd been quoted $3k just to re chrome both bumpers but most of the parts needed repairs as well so when I heard of a company in Vietnam starting to make stainless steel ones I found there was a group order being done by a KG club in the UK. An email later I was on the group order list with mine being shipped direct to NZ from Vietnam.
A few months later brand new hand made bumpers showed up for less than half the cost of chroming my originals and these will never rust again.
Other than a couple of pre production sets going to the UK for test fits and adjustments I was the first to actually recieve my bumpers which was very cool.
Obviously being pretty keen to see that was what I fitted the rear bumper that night which fitted like a glove and looked fantastic, the following night the front bumper was not so good........... :'( the shape seemed ok but sat far to close to the ridges in the nose even though the irons were pulled right out.
I was about to start grinding material off the back edge to create a bigger more acceptable gap when I emailed the guy who organized the group buy in the UK who was quick to point out that i check the bumper irons first.
I had straightened  / repaired all of the irons before powder coat and in doing so had made them "too" straight, the ends where they meet the bumper were supposed to point down a little which meant that the bumper sat on the body lower making the gap exactly what it should be so the front is now also perfect.
In all these Harrington bumpers are fantastic quality and great value for money considering the cost of chrome these days.



2010 T5 Transporter TDI  Tuned by Superior Tuning NZ
2003 Jetta Coupe soon to be R36TT
1991 Golf GTI 2.0 TSI swapped
1963 Type 34 Karmann Ghia, turbo 2.0
1990 Porsche 964 911 Carrera 4
1980 1303 Beetle vert, under restoration

brian

Škoda Fabia 1.0 TSI Race Blue

80 Vert

I'd forgotten how frustrating it can be updating these threads, you've just typed out your novel and poof all of it disapears!!!
Start again.......... ::)

Way way back I'd found a supplier for a particular vinyl which was a 99% match to what VW used for their front and rear trunk liners in Type 3 and Type 34 VW's and even though I wouldn't need it for years to come I bought some quick smart. When restoring a T34 you buy parts / materials when they are available, not when you need them.
True enoug this stuff was just about a perfect match and with the exterior nearing completion I spent a few weeks making new templates for the front and rear compartment sides / floors.
The insulation pad in the rear above the engine was completely destroyed on my car like everything else and this is something you can't buy anywhere so I looked at all sorts of materials coming up with a solution by combining 2 types of materials to do the job and this was painted to match the colour of the original pad.
The "open / closed"  logos were embossed on the original so having a stencil cut which I used to paint the logo in black was as close as I could get.
More to follow........

2010 T5 Transporter TDI  Tuned by Superior Tuning NZ
2003 Jetta Coupe soon to be R36TT
1991 Golf GTI 2.0 TSI swapped
1963 Type 34 Karmann Ghia, turbo 2.0
1990 Porsche 964 911 Carrera 4
1980 1303 Beetle vert, under restoration

the phantom

great to have this back John, the bumpers do look excellent
Land Transport New Zealand, taking the fun out of driving since August 2008

Lee

Thank you John....Really appreciate this build....

mark2 golf

89 mk2 1.8t
97 mk3 gti 1.8t
90 190e 2.6
17 Amarok v6
09 golf gti

GolfJon

A great build thread and glad its been revived, love reading about this.
Mk2 Golf CLi Auto-. Manual 020 conversion...done but still in bits...
2005 VW Lt35 campervan-high emissions diesel!
Wife's car '71 1302s Super Beetle
'08 Mk5 wagon 2.0 Tsi

le mans

QuoteI'd forgotten how frustrating it can be updating these threads, you've just typed out your novel and poof all of it disapears!!!
It is appreciated John! When writing long entries it can be worthwhile using a text editor/word processor and then pasting into the thread so as to have your work saved if it all goes pear shaped.

80 Vert

So late last year I got all of the engine components back from Bob Mead the engine balancer meaning the long block could finally be put together with the new turbo cam I'd got for it.
We also installed some piston oil squirters from a VR6 engine as these are about the smallest I came across reducing the amount of material removed when the main bearing saddles were drilled for them.
Set the compression fairly low due to turbo charging but in saying that I'm not looking to make epic power just a reliable driver with plenty of torque, probably run around 10psi boost max.

Long block together I made plans to make the exhaust system over the Christmas holidays which sort of worked out, starting from scratch and making every single thing from stainless really took a lot of time but I'm sick of rusty exhausts on old cars and even HPC type coatings don't seem to last so stainless is the only way.
Managed to get a few laser cut head flanges but not enough to do the job so made the rest myself as well as the mounting flange for the turbo and turbo outlet flange.
The turbo i'm using is a K24/26 from an Audi 5 pot so keeping it in the family, I had Steve Murch rebuild it for me so no doubt it will be done right and it was actually him who suggested using this turbo for this car.
Test fit in the car with the header and turbo in place, worked out great as I'm able to remove the whole engine with header and turbo on the engine which makes it hugely easier.
Still have a W/G to plumb in somewhere as the turbo is not internally gated and space is very tight for this but where there's a will there's a way.

Motor back out again and back on the bench this time to make mounts to support the turbo, oil supply and drain lines etc.
Test fitted all of the engine cooling tin and fan shroud also realizing that all of the internal flaps and thermostat were missing which were fun to find!  Luckily I found about 90% of it locally and just made the rest of the pieces needed but unfortunately it all eats valuable time.
Over the years many people binned all of these components thinking they are not needed yet now everyone wants them again as they realize the factory engineers were right after all!  ::)
Decided to use a V band on the muffler side as i wasn't sure if the muffler would need to be removed for engine removal so rather than having to undo the whole thing at the turbo a V band makes this a snap, dropping the whole muffler / tailpipe in one go.
As I said not as many pictures but you get the idea anyway.
2010 T5 Transporter TDI  Tuned by Superior Tuning NZ
2003 Jetta Coupe soon to be R36TT
1991 Golf GTI 2.0 TSI swapped
1963 Type 34 Karmann Ghia, turbo 2.0
1990 Porsche 964 911 Carrera 4
1980 1303 Beetle vert, under restoration

RS ZWEI

What type of external wastegate are you going to use John?
1980 VW Golf GTI Track Car
1995 Audi RS2
2003 Mini Cooper S (Written off - rear ended)
2005 Mini Cooper S
2006 Skoda Octavia vRS Combi
2009 Renault Megane 230 R26 (Written off - rear ended)
2013 Renault Megane RS265 Redbull RB8

80 Vert

2010 T5 Transporter TDI  Tuned by Superior Tuning NZ
2003 Jetta Coupe soon to be R36TT
1991 Golf GTI 2.0 TSI swapped
1963 Type 34 Karmann Ghia, turbo 2.0
1990 Porsche 964 911 Carrera 4
1980 1303 Beetle vert, under restoration

le mans

#551
That exhaust is a piece of art.

gti vr6

1986 Mk2 Scirocco
2021 T6.1 4M LWB Transporter Trendline

spooln

x2. Can wait to see it belch flame on overrun...cos its vert
77 CS1 Fiat Spider. 78 Mk1 Scirocco. 83 Mk1 GTI. 12 Abarth 595C Competizione. 18 Golf R. 20 Kodiaq vRS

00quattro00

Quote from: 80 Vert on April 10, 2016, 10:42:33 AM
Probably a Tial or Precision 38mm

I think ive got a spare kkk one if you want it to match
Land Rover Discovery 300tdi
Land Rover 110 4bd1t

80 Vert

#555
In with the motor for another test fit and to finalise the muffler and tail pipe, I'm only using one resonator all be it quite a big one at 500mm long and can only hope that it will be sufficient to quieten it down enough but the turbo should also help as it cuts up the sound quite a bit as well so here's hoping because I don't exactly have a lot of room left for all the other gubbins which has to go under the car.
The whole exhaust has worked out really well with hardly any of it visible from the back, one of my pet hates is to see the exhaust hanging down for all to see which in most cases ruins the look.
I should be able to remove the motor complete but the Vband makes it cery easy to drop the muffler out first shoud that be needed.
The next job is going to be to drop the motor and get it ready for its first start, I decided to do this on a test stand rather than in the car and also its first run to break in the cam will be done on carbs due to having to start it and get it up to 2500rpm right away so don't really have time to stuff around getting the injection sorted first.

Once the initial 20 min break in is done on carbs the motor is essentially ready to go in and stay in, I can than set up the fuel injection and get it running on that making its first test drive a very close reality.
I'm having a crack at using all MK4 GTI ECU and sensors on this engine, few issues to work around but don't really see any reason for it not to work. Best part of it is most of it is free and the ecu is pretty tuneable.

2010 T5 Transporter TDI  Tuned by Superior Tuning NZ
2003 Jetta Coupe soon to be R36TT
1991 Golf GTI 2.0 TSI swapped
1963 Type 34 Karmann Ghia, turbo 2.0
1990 Porsche 964 911 Carrera 4
1980 1303 Beetle vert, under restoration

brian

That is pretty snug under the rear but looks absolutely fantastic
Škoda Fabia 1.0 TSI Race Blue

kiwihigh

BUILT not bought

80 Vert

Having done all of the interior work to date myself I didn't feel the need to learn how to sew and also potentially mess up the original repro material I had sourced for the seats.
There's so much potential for it all to turn to custard and the seats being a pocal point it needs to be 100% right so I've again called on Ian Goodwin Car upholstery to do the seats for me.
I've used the same guy for 20 years and have always got what i expected from him be it seats or headliners etc, started out with the rear jump seat which I made a new base and backrest for as the old ones were...........you guessed it, completely rotten!
Marine ply cut to match which was originaly covered in horse hair but we've ditched that in fabour of modern foams which just makes much more sense, back seat complete and in pretty much how it would have been in 63.

The front seats were torn apart a long time ago and I've had the frames sandblasted and powder coated which as the next things being done right now, had a hard time finding replacement knobs as a couple were broken and they are not reproduced.
One in particular is only produced for a couple of years but got one in the end so I have everything ready to go now once the seats are done which will pretty much finish the interior.
2010 T5 Transporter TDI  Tuned by Superior Tuning NZ
2003 Jetta Coupe soon to be R36TT
1991 Golf GTI 2.0 TSI swapped
1963 Type 34 Karmann Ghia, turbo 2.0
1990 Porsche 964 911 Carrera 4
1980 1303 Beetle vert, under restoration

80 Vert

This post sort of brings me up to the point of where I picked this thread up again, doesn't seem like a lot has happened looking at it but there's a bunch more stuff I just haven't taken pictures of. With most of the underbody stuff sorted out I had quite a few weekends of "what am I doing today" with the net result of little or nothing getting done at all so i thought it prudent to make a "to do" list.
Now I can just glance at the list and pick what I'm going to tick off which is usually a case of cross one line off and add 3-4 more things back on  ;D You know, one step forward, three back kind of thing.

With the motor back in for its 2nd test fit to make the muffler part of the exhaust it seemed like the perfect time to test where the wheels and tyres are at, 3 different sizes on the front have finally resulted in the tyre I'll run, not a lot of choice in 16's but I ended up with a 195/50/16 in the back and a 175/60/16 in the front.
I don't much like the little front / big rear tyre look so wanted something as close as possible to the same rolling dia front and rear and a 195 just isn't going to fit on the front at all.
Fitted the front wheels and lowered the front end down only to have a whole lot of brake fluid come out of the chassis at the front which can only mean one thing, leaking master cylinder.  Damn Porsche parts!!  ;D
Anyway, took that out and apart to find some corrosion around the front seal which luckily was easily cleaned up and put back together. Re bled the brakes and all seems fine so far.
Front and rear wheels on the car goes back on all fours the first time in many years and I really like what I see, fair bit of rolling forward and back to get it to settle as much as possible but I'm diggin the ride height, front is a little high but a tank of gas will solve that.



The more I looked at the wheels I felt something was missing then my wife suggested they needed some black, of course if I detailed them then the black would tie in with the black roof.................
2010 T5 Transporter TDI  Tuned by Superior Tuning NZ
2003 Jetta Coupe soon to be R36TT
1991 Golf GTI 2.0 TSI swapped
1963 Type 34 Karmann Ghia, turbo 2.0
1990 Porsche 964 911 Carrera 4
1980 1303 Beetle vert, under restoration