This is my ride for the few months I'm back in wa. It's my old girls fun car:







From what I'm told it has a brand new 1800cc air cooled block in it. Carbs need a tune though. So I have planned: Sand blast and repaint the roll cage and re wrap in foam and get it appolstered. Tune carbs so she runs a bit nicer. get some more bucket like seats and new seat rails to mount back further so I can fit properly, current ones are rusted in place. A tacho so I know what revs it's doing and a service!

That's all for now, going to go ask questions around the forum. Cheers. Kurt.

Taipan

Serious? That's embarrassing. New to the vw scene so only going by what I've been told.

get some more bucket like seats

what's wrong with the ones in it?

The ones in it don't hold you in place much. Plus the seat rails are rusted so you can't slide the seat forward and the seat fabric is torn aswell.

So you will need seat rails to match the slides that are part of the floor pan or is that the part that's rusted? A lot of buggys are a bit hard to fit seats to as they are a bit narrower than beetles, I found that MX5 seats fitted well but I removed the rails that are part of the floor pan and redid it from the pan up

Are the seat rails apart of the floor pan? I'm yet to have a look. The seat rails are rusted and you cannot slide back and forth. I assumed they would be bolted down and I was going to remove them, find something that fits in the buggy and then make up some adapting plates to bolt down the new seats. I'll go pull one out later today to get a better idea. Cheers.

If its on standard VW seat runners then they are part of the floor pan, which means if they are rusted in place you will have to get them moving to get the seats out !

Looks like a Taipan, which is the WA version of a J&S. The rear and front guards are the same as a J&S, screen and bonnet are different. Although, I thought a Tiapan had a moulded windscreen surround where this one has the same windscreen frame as a J&S.

Looks good!!

It definitely looks good. A little tlc and it'll be a really nice ride. Ended up having a few beers so I'll have a look at the rails tomorro. How much do you think one of these Buggy's weigh?

mine weighs in at 530kg according to the rego papers, if the seat runners are totaled I have a good set of early types that I removed from the pan b4 I installed the MX5 seats

Awesome. If they are rooted I'll most likely use the ones that go with whatever seats I find. I will keep it in mind though cheers.

Had a look and the rails are bolted in. So it should be really easy to put new seats and rails in. Finding something that fits comfortably and isn't too heavy is going to be the hard part. That and they have to look the part and have plenty of adjustment back and forward! Not asking too much....

If you dont need them to be able to fold forward then SAAS make nice small based seats at a pretty good price. You then go to the wreckers and get seat rails off a van as they are low profile and then you make some adapters and bolt them in....easy !! :-)

I like your thinking! Im going to try find a seat that isn't too tight if possible, my step father cant fit in smaller seats. I'll have a look and see what SAAS have on offer though!

No luck with seats yet, however, hoping some of you fulla's can help me. I need to change the oil, but i am unsure on what oil to use as i've never dealt with a vw or a air cooled engine. And i also do not know the refill capacities, i'll change the oil filter while im at it too.

The other thing is that at low revs the car chugs a bit, and then once the revs build up a little it chirps along lovely, is this just a vw thing or is it carb related? Im thinking it either needs the carb tuned or the ignition timing adjusted? What are your thoughts? If you need more details please let me know.

Cheers once again.

Kurt, lose those wheel trims, it deserves better! ALSO if you get to lanclin about 10am 27/12 (tomorrow) there are quite a few buggy guys having some dunes fun, fishing, etc and a trip to wedge island. have fun! cheers jon

Ah serious? Is there a link to this? I was planning to go to Perth on the 28th. might sneak up a day early if i can find the apartment keys! Mum put the hub caps on, she wants me to track down some of the moon dish hub caps with the vw symbol on them i think. Cheers for the heads up

Some BIG carburetor there...

distributor looks like a 009 type..

timing at 3000 revs : 28-30 degrees BTDC
idle wherever it falls..

looks like a type 1 engine..

tail lamps same as a country buggy..
front blinkers aren't VW... MAN- Mercedes Benz trucks..

looks like it may be difficult to use a timing light on it with that HUGE exhaust...

someone spent a lot of money on the engine...

LEE

Yup, mum spent a lot of money on that engine.

Also, thanks for all the info. You sound like you really know your bugs.

Hi Kurt,

I got interested in Beetles when My Dad bought His first one in 1962...

I've had a few beetles and a type 3 wagen in the 70's

and now have a 1968 semi auto beetle which I've had since 1996

If You have DST in WA.?? its now 2012... lol

I did run one of those types of distributors for a few years but they aren't as good as the Single Vacuum Dual Advance distributor on standard types of carburetors..
and wouldn't work with Your Very Large Carburetors etc..

Once You get that carby going correctly, that Buggy will really get going... lightweight and BIG power...

cheers

Lee

Ah I can see how you know your beetles. I've been in the vw crowd about a month now. Haha. No intention to go bigger with the carbs. Should I be changing to the vacuum dizzy you mentioned? Or is the current one sufficient?

VWs that are raced etc or use large twin carburetors etc all use the NON vacuum distributor...

as there may NOT be enough vacuum there to advance the distributor...

so, the Bosch 009 is the distributor to use... although with the money spent on the engine, I would have thought it would have had an MSD Ignition system -dissy electronic-

that inlet manifold is HUGE.... lol

it looks like what someone would use for drag racing... lol

My Son has an 1835cc engine in His 55 beetle with 8 inch wide tyres on the rear, and He can spin them any time He wants..
He has twin weber carburetors..
from what I've read etc... twin carburetors are better than a a very large carby in the middle..

With Your set up... it may be like a rally car... idle at 1500rpm
or more so You really do have a lot of vacuum to suck the mixture in... when You touch the throttle..

that is one hot engine.... made to GO..

anyway, there are some very switched on guys on here who do race their cars etc... who should be able to help You..

The power to weight ratio of this buggy is going to be HUGE.. YIKES....

Has the engine been tuned lately? Do You know if the carby has been tuned for the engine?

IMHO... I would say a normal 1835cc engine with twin webers or even Kadrons would have that buggy really moving

cheers

LEE

Yeah I don't know the history to well. Only got second hand info from the old girl. Gonna get is all sorted out and running at its full potential ASAP. It has a fair bit of go as is but I can feel that it's not getting all it has!

Sooo.... been a while, purchased this off the old girl so i'm gonna slowly get it 100%. Turns out the sucker has been stroked out to a 2.2L with all the other bells and whistles done internally as well. Running really well now and go's like the clappers. Ordering a new clutch cable as the one in it has finally let go and the standard cables are too long. Didn't really wanna chop one like the current one was, so, i have sourced one at the correct length and that should hopefully be here mid week.

Any one know of any meets around Perth on soon?

Cheers.

http://www.sandscene.com.au/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=2890&sid=c06c...

Cheers. Waiting for my registration to be approved.