Hi

I need to replace the rain gutters on my 1960 bug has anyone done this and would advice tips and photos cou
D you share with me to enable me to do this?

Thanks heaps

Hi Culo,

The rain gutters are not as easy as just replacing. They are made up of a pressed combination of the side panel and the roof panel combined. This is of course done at the assembly line. The only way would be to cut that area out and fabricate new inner and outer gutter sections that are made out of the roof and side panel, curved and shaped, then weld in. The other option is to cut those sections out of another Beetle.

If you have rust in the rain gutter I think you may need a new body as there will be rust in other places

very difficult job as per above

Over 50 years ago, when working as a panelbeater at a VW dealer, I replaced quite a few of those bastards of things. We called them "Banana Rails", and they went from just above the front quarter window to the engine lid opening. They were welded to the inner and outer rear quarter panel, and at the front, behind the windscreen pillar. Not the most pleasant job, but if done correctly, made for a very good repair. It was common to need 1 or sometimes 2 of these rails when fitting a new turret, after a roll-over, as they could get 'ground away' from sliding along the road! The partially-formed drip rail was hammered over the new turret rail...I've still got my 'special hammer' that did a perfect job on the drip rails. If done properly it was virtually impossible to 'pick' the repair.

Would cutting the roof off and welding a new one on be possible?

The roof is part of the front and rear window openings. It is all one outer panel from the rear of the bonnet to the front of the engine lid. Then there is all the inner panels, side panels and pillars. A roof is really hard to replace.

as said before you have to have MORE rust elsewhere

have a GOOD look

I've done the repair and it's very time consuming to do properly. You'll need an injection nozzle to shove up the roof channel from the engine bay and with the headliner out you can inject into the inside of the inner roof channel. Do it a few times over a good few days in warm weather so the rust cure can dry out properly.

Then to repair the channel is dependant on how far the rust has eaten into the roof skin. A roof cut from the same vintage Beetle is the easiest way to repair but it must be the same year because as the variatons occurred to the windows etc then the curvature of the roofs swage line changed too. So a later roof will have less of a radius to it compared to an earlier model.

Making repair pieces isn't easy as the channel swage area curves in 2 planes and you then have to make a curved bend for the drip rail lip. So for a beginner I'd try and find a roof cut

Ive seen people do roof swaps, cut the body through the pillars and weld another roof on

Have you check for RUST in the rest of the car

if the roof has gone then other areas will be also GONE