Well its been nearly 6 years now since ive last had a readers ride thread way back when avd first started so heres a new one
i got my 74 Lbug 8 years ago after i totalled my 71 Sbug and well its changed somewhat over the years since then

for those that have been following the supercharger saga the 1776 is back in now
i havent been game to leave town and really open it up yet but i did a quick blat down a "drag strip"......
hard to see with my shakey camera action but it pulls 0-100 in 7.5secs at 8PSI without really beating it too hard still needs abit of tweaking tho

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRRxqvWt_wQ 

Well anyway heres my bug in past lives

The Evolution of DUB74L


it was an innocent nanna bug when i got it
100% original even the paint cept for gaurd repairs and came with all the logbooks and papers etc
it had lived in canberra since new so it was rust free except for a hole under the battery
something thats highly unusual for a 70s bug specially an Lbug that still had its roof
so i snapped it up

circa 2000




Herbie look
this was just for shits and giggles for the first herbie parade in 2001
it was rather embarrasing so was very short lived




Resprayed in 2001 and back to stock.






my boy racer phase
Aww my gawd how embarrasement.....
18" zeptors, the token colour coded mono wiper, twin 4" cannons, under car neons and a $2.5k sound system that was 3.7dB LOUDER than a jumbo jet at 30metres

Im sure it impressed




wedding car time and time again:








present day:

ive done every single bit of work to this car myself with the exception of the paint and gearbox rebuild
ive painted a few of my other cars i hate spray painting and vw gearboxes are like a rubix cube once u get them apart
the only part left on this car that hasnt been tampered with by me is the dash fan lol and it needs to come out for new brushes
i had it resprayed in the original crystal white but in 2pac, i couldnt bring myself to change the colour as much as i wanted to paint it in ford shiraz or nissan electric blue
interior is just something i made up
front seats are gen5 celica,i redid the rear seat and door panels to match, leather Momo corse wheel, tarted up dash with carbon fibre dash panel, oil press, temp, boost, Air/fuel ratio gauges, white face indiglow speedo and a monster tach
a jvc mp3 head with MTX/vdo amps, alpine and kicker splits and subs and a 1.5F capacitor under the seat and a few other toys like remote keyless entry, alarm, quick shift and im installing power windows soon, im sick of breaking brazillian winder handles


ive put a fair but of work into the suspension and running gear
the engine is a supercharged 1776 with dhla dellorto, tighe cam, lightened flywheel, headwork yadda yadda ya....
its putting down about 100hp at the treads at 8psi, so its nothing real special but it cranks along very nicely
and is good for embarrasing all these dickheads in there falcodores and jap riceboxes
all she needs now is to be lowered 2" all round thanks to the smaller 17" rims not filling the gaurds like the old 18s did, but im not doing that till i get my new stainless A1 zorst
eventually she will be rolling on 18" porsche cup 3 turbo twists
front end ive made up my own custom narrow coil adjustable struts and strut brace, koni inserts, whiteline swaybar rear is pretty stock, gearbox is a fairly stock freeway flier with a 0.89 4th which sux when i run a stock motor lol

i dont think it will ever be classed as finished
im always finding something to change
Over the coarse of 8 years its had:
6 different engines, 3 different gearboxs, 4 different interiors and about 8 different stereo systems and god only knows how many sets of rims













my fully hektik home made strut brace




The cockpit






Bass in ya Face YO!
Subwoofer kitty approves.

70 rota bug
ive had this 7 years now it was an old cal looker back in the day
it had 6volt gaurds and engine lid, massive rake, black and chrome porsche fuchs and a 13B rotary POS in it
its been pretty reworked underneath and the usual cal tricks on the body
my plans were swap it to EJ20T do up the body and go racing, it was gonna be a german look track car
well i got as far as doing the body work and giving it a quick paint job
im trying to find someone who;ll finish it off atm cos ill never get a chance to








heres my 73Lbug and 75 1300 pov model standard bug
the red one i was gonna baja but just never got around to it
its pretty solid and original, has an almost perfect interior and wait for it........
yes it had a 61 model stale air 40hp 1200 what a speed demon.....
the Lbug is ratty but very solid too










it was a bit rough inside thou





Lbug convertable
i had some very big plans for this one
i was gonna turn it into something really special and have it ready for dubs by the pub 07, yep last year.....
well as it goes with convertables it just had to many hidden sins and ive raided to many bits and pieces to do what i want
so its still in the planning stage at this point in time




A good mate of mine picked this ol girl up from freinds way out west of moree where it hasnt rained for the last 5 years
its been out there most of its life so its rock solid, just severly sunburned
i wanted to make a rat out of it but theres just to much work in getting it back on the road
i was thinking put its body on the black bugs floorpan but thats ruining 2 cars
so for now shes sitting in the back of dons shed patiently waiting for her moment






heres my first daily
i decided on something sensible
i was looking at a WRX but my family and freinds threatened to disown me if i got it
and my inability to drive sensibly in anything with too much power would have surely ended in heart ache
i wanted something that has all the toys and gadgets a new car should, has plenty of balls but runs on the best part of f**k all fuel
i looked at a few ST N16 pulsars but i found this and fell in love with it
it still drives and smells like a new car, the spare tyre has never even been bolted onto the car LOL
so heres my first green mazda that thinks its a ford

i told myself to keep it standard for a daily driver but like all things with me it snowballed
first went on the rims, then to compliment that needed some lowered springs, then the extractors and sports exhaust, tint, stereo....... and on and on it goes











more Bass in ya face YO!






this is my other green mazda that also thinks its a ford.....97 festi, also FUCT




i needed a little pussbox for my little brother to learn in cos hes not going anywhere near my others and mum or dad dont have the nerves to teach him
he gets it once he has his Ps
it parks anywhere and runs on the sniff of an oily rag but geez chuck in 5 ppl and crank the A/C is like kicking it sqaure in the balls
i think the stereo pumps out more KW than the engine
yep even more bass in ya face....







this is the work hack/VW recovery vehicle
03 D22 navara turbo diesel tipper

Holly sh#t. Firstly, I have never had a car that long and the amount of changes over the years, wow. AND, what about how many cars you have?? I wish I had a few cars and the space to put them. Would love to come see how your s/c motor goes, and well done with that. I use to have a s/c toyota with that s/c and you have addapted it well.

Keep up the good work and look forward to the next version of your car.

Kev

Lol hopefully one of them will be mine verryyyy soon :P. Love the s/c 74 joel. will have to take me for a ride in it one day.HOT

very impressive Joel

That s/charger is just brilliant

your a big fan of the fatgirls Joal.....can I have your oval ?

Those new rims really set it off. Very nice ride!

Simon

hopefully wont be to many more changes now
ill have to call it bipolar bug

im slowly culling the car count down

but yeah heres a few more past and present

this is the old mans VW
its a 1997 bon trike
its fully imported from germany
it was one of the first batch brought over b4 they started building them here
its only 400 odd KG so it doesnt need much power pushing it
engine is a 1600 just with a few hand me down go fast bits from my bug






and this was the bug that kicked it all off
it was my christmas present from my parents when iwas 13
i spent a few years doing it up for my licesnce





but yeah typical P plater
drifting in the wet one night a tree jumped out at me
RIP Lucy






theres been a few other bugs come and go too
that ive wrecked and parted out over the years
yellow 1300 was daisy the funbug LOL
i scored for $100 with a reco 1600 engine, rebuilt brakes, new shocks and solid panels and a set of hotwire mags. just had rooted floors
its gone to VW heaven now

hi dub 74l do u have any details on how u built your ustom coil adjustable struts??? i would like to make some for my 71super thanx

PM sent

cool story dude, imagine if everyone did there own story ?it would take weeks to look through ,but very cool

yea thats me always gotta be different

so yah apoligies to ppl on dial up LOL

Interesting to see them all!
I didn't know about that ratty oval.. pretty cool!

same old story when it was forsale noone wanted it when it isnt u could sell 500 of them

Nice work Joel
Your car has gone through many changes by the looks
I like the way it is now. Nice and neat with a touch of toughness. Nice work

wow old thread

been a few more changes since, ill do an update later

its funny this thread wasnt all that long ago but since then ive sold all the other bugs so for the first time in nearly 10 years theres only 1 VW in the shed

Great story, mate. I actually find all this stuff really fascinating - especially the changes people make that they end up not liking. I'm really looking forward to seeing this car one day.

not really much to update
as u can probably guess by the title ive been playing around with LEDs

ive replaced every single bulb in the car now with LEDs with the exception naturally of the headlight bulbs but im planning on installing some 8000K HIDs and the oil and charge light need to stay normal bulbs to work properly
it took some hunting but i managed to find LEDs for every size bulb in the car

one of my pet peves with VWs is really yellow parkers
u can see b4 and after the difference white LEDs make there not really as blue as my shitty camera makes out



ive also done all the rear lights and front indicators as the coloured bulbs were ruining the effect of my new clear lenses





LEDs also only use 10% of the power that a normal equivelnt bulb does so its taken a real load off the electrical system

aside from that havent done much really
i did an illegal tint job (15%) on it a few months ago, got my power windows installed, german look mirrors on and finally set it at a ride height im happy with and is somewhat functional when it comes to speedbumps and driveways



ive got a few new gadgets still waiting to go on
as many of the SBO members know i got a rack and peanut front end waiting to go in



plus a few various engine goodies to play with, the most exciting being a new hair drier



and a rear disc brake kit also waiting to go in too

hi Joel,beautifully presented dub,just looking through old posts,and saw the black 70s rota bug,recognized it from ebay last year ,is it still for sale ifso im interested
i just live up the road at cawongla ,good to see vdubs alive and kicking in lismore regards Steve

Hi Steve
good to see another local on here
let me know if your interested in the northern rivers Klubvw, we have our next cruise on sunday

it killed me to do it but had to part with the rota bug after 7 years of inactivity

its now down in sydney with another forum member being finished off

Thanks for the quick reply Joel im interested, do you hold regular meetings and runs ,how many members .Just started doing up a 64 bug ,early days yet,im doing a ground up rebuild ,severe rust in a pillars,built a type4 2lt with dtm fan shroud for a buggy i built and then striped "sold the body and chassis to another aussiedub member " philsmanx
and kept all the good bits , anyway it should be about 6 months"more like a year" till she's up and running,so ill definitely be looking at coming to a meet then.
keep an eye out and ill post some picks soon

Hi Steve
yep we have club runs every 2 months
currently we have about 35 members but always looking for more

if ur looking for parts one of the members has a 67 beetle theyre wrecking thats been in a light roll over

come on Joel where r u hiding your wrx bug

dont laugh mr bad influence but i was talking to a guy yesterday in byron who is parting out a subi and jokingly said to him how much u gonna sell me the engine for??

dont know why i had to go and do that cos now i cant help myself specially at the that price

maybe a talking to from the old man will snap me outta it

Looks good man. I like it a lot. I love seeing the work some people put into their cars. I wouldn't have the patience.

Hey nice ride. i like the stages its been through.

I myself are going through the boy racer stage and as wondering how you ran the dual cannonns and where you got all the led lights?

hey josh good to see ya found the place

the cannons were a similar setup to dads trike only mounted lower to clear the body work of a bug
they were painfully noisy, had sweet FA ground clearance and killed low down performance so i took them off

Now as most know the subaru conversion is underway so i should be out driving it heaps enjoying the last few weeks of VW powership but as usually its tucked away in the shed under its blankee and hasnt moved for over 3 weeks

Oh no.
Another dude whose "changed teams".

Batting for the "other" team....

such a sad day.......

HA! the irony

yea yea its true,
my engine bays lookign alittle japanese influenced these days

say konichiwa to engine #7