766 replies to this topic

[mini danny]

They look great I have never had a bad thing from m-machine they are good panels... :)

Cheers dude and ya m-machine make great panels !

Dan

[mini danny]

Well yesterday didn't go to plan... Went to a friends house in the morning... And ended up buying his beetle !!


She's a 71 with a 1600 engine. Was to cheap to say no to !! The body or fairly solid all heater channels ect look good, from what I can see she needs a patch to the floor, only came off the road 3 years ago, the new t4 came in handy ran home and grabbed the trailer, so unfortunately didn't get anything done on the van


Here's the beetle










Will get some done on the van hopefully today


Dan

[minimissions]

Wicked !! Always wanted a beetle nearly bought one a few years back :)

[mini danny]

Cheers man she's a gem!! Got her up in the air and well it's had a front floor pan badly put in but apart from that it's completly rust free under neath !! Everything on the underside works ! All it would need for an MOT is a steering arm!! Can't believe how good it is !!!

Anyways need to crack on with the van !! Will be done here tomorrow night, as tonight need to hit the gym


Dan

[minimissions]

Cheers man she's a gem!! Got her up in the air and well it's had a front floor pan badly put in but apart from that it's completly rust free under neath !! Everything on the underside works ! All it would need for an MOT is a steering arm!! Can't believe how good it is !!!

Anyways need to crack on with the van !! Will be done here tomorrow night, as tonight need to hit the gym


Dan

Fair enough dude..... also makes me wish my t4 wasn't so unreliable back when i had one... would have make  great work horse now. Yeah always toyed with a beetle and for some reason always went and bought another mini lol but hmmm maybe one day... Glad its so good mate sounds like a gem... whats the plans for it? or you putting on back burner while some minis get done?

[DaveJH]

Just spent way too long reading this at work. Top work! You're almost building your own van from scratch with the work that's going into this! Looking forward to seeing things progress.

[mini danny]

Ya the t4 is a great workhorse ! And beetle is last inline got a few cars to do first.

Just spent way too long reading this at work. Top work! You're almost building your own van from scratch with the work that's going into this! Looking forward to seeing things progress.

Thanks mate really appricate it!! Glad your spending work time wisely ;) and more updates this week hopefully if not the weekend !


Dan

[mini danny]

Well progress has been slow, weekend before I went out for my mates 21st and woke up and felt like the walking dead, so didn't get a fat lot done, was out working the other day, and it hit me....I've got less than 12 weeks now !!

So time to get my arse into gear and crack on big style !!

I repaired under the drivers rear back light... When I noticed that the piller width under the light seamed to look more narrow than the passenger side, so got the old tape out and had a measure and it was out 1/2 inch I checked the measurements on Estate which told me which side was out I've no idea when this happened, as I've not played around with the width here, this corner had been in a accident before, so guessing it was from that, also measure the door aperture top and bottom and also along the diagonal and was exactly the same to the mm.so I had to cut,hammer,weld and repeat until I was happy with the width, it was as if the load bed was to narrow, so flipped the van over, and had to use a lump hammer and block of wood to reshape the vertical bits to the right angle. Once this was all sorted and into place the corners was missing the lip as the lip was to short so had to extend the lips out to make it look neater. So a 2 hour job turned into a 2 day job of head scratching and working a way to make it work.

Door pillar widening and repairing got no pics of me cutting and widening completly forgot as was to worried ahah

Got a pic of it welded up, not the best job I've ever done but works, looks like a patchwork quilt lol



Ground down







Because of how far over the panel had to come the load bed lip wasn't long to so had to extend it,





Other side welded up,



Ended up with a 1mm lip this side, so seam welded the back panels to the load bed, then ground it down and made a lip to make it look factory

No lip



Now with a lip, like the factory intended



Also made my self a heater/log burner, it got so hot yesterday I had to open the window!! Got no excuse to say it's to cold!!



Nice and toastie



Now Onto the rear doors, fit the shell perfectly








Couldn't resist a pic with a bumper on haha







Also started to repair one door, will finish this in the week,

Cut the bottom out and tacked the new section in

Bottom off





Repair tacked in





That's all for now folks.

More updates soon, as I really need to hurry or she won't make l2b

Dan

[minimissions]

Wicked work mate this is really coming together now!

Love that heater it looks great always wanted to have a go at making one of these :)

[mini danny]

Cheers man, can't messa bout anymore full speed ahead !!

And there awesome and easy to make well worth it !

[Carlos W]

Cheers man, can't messa bout anymore full speed ahead !!

And there awesome and easy to make well worth it !

 

Don't rush, it'd be better to miss L2B than mess it up.

 

There'll be another L2B next year

[mini danny]

Cheers man, can't messa bout anymore full speed ahead !!
And there awesome and easy to make well worth it !

 
Don't rush, it'd be better to miss L2B than mess it up.
 
There'll be another L2B next year

Yup that's true, ild rather not mess it up, we shall see how it goes, if not deadline with be for MITP in August.

Dan

[mini danny]

Well guys I've not updated this week, just because of the fact I've been a busy boy !


Van is now primered underneath, seam sealed and also raptored the underside and looks amazing if I do say so myself !!! Subframes back on tonight !

I had to weld up some of the water drains on the floor, also welded the tabs for the wings to a-panel, and put a bit of weld the wings to scuttle underneath. Also welded in the battery tray and the spare wheel wedge along wiring loom tags on inner wing. There's only 2 bits left on the shell to weld and they won't take an hour ! So just front doors now !

Ohh and she's going Saturday




Off to bloody paint !!!!!




Few pics of the work done !





I mounted the tray further back than standard, so the battery is more hidden away





Also luckily I noticed that the seat belt bracket under the van that holdes the seat belt stalks in...well it wasn't there ! So made one out of 1.5mm and luckily had the correct nuts to weld on



On to the important bit !!











Now seam sealer







Now the raptor going on. !









Close up on the texture it leaves



Tonight steering rack and subframes are going on, hopefully get some done on the doors and finish them off Friday night :)



Thanks Dan

[DaveJH]

Wow, amazing progress Dan. The underside is looking great! Can't wait to see it in paint

[minimissions]

Looking awesome cant wait to see this in paint! bet you cant wait then its time to get your build on in time for l2b :)