So i purchased a 1972 type 3 Squareback off a backpacker who drove it down from sydney to melbourne mid this year.

the car was awful rusty and every bit of mechanical needed an overhaul.

the plan is to turn it into an honest daily driver and hone some skills im going to use to resore my 66 and 54 bugs i swapped my 72 low light kombi for after i rolled it that was my first car and my first ever resto.

Cool - this should be fun watching your adventures

so here it is.. well the side of it anyway

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not sure why each image comes up twice!

anyway so far i have actually done quite a bit:

engine came out for rear main seal, new flywheel and clutch, new throw out bearing, rebuilt twin carbs, heads off for clean and inspection, full degrease, new pushrod tubes, straightend out all the old tins and cleaned them up, bascially just a major service to an old engine. not shiny and new just cleaned it up and made sure it will hold for another 50000km

swapped out the front suspension for a less worn unit, new tie rod ends, repaired some minor rust on the mouunting brackets, new calipers, disks, lines and bearings.

new brakes on the rear with new drums, cylinders, beaings and regreased and replaced a couple of cv's

now i still have to replace a broken torsion bar and a gearbox mount both of these jobs i hate so ive started on the body work.. just today so i have plenty of pics

so here are all of the pics i took of the car before i started

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so this is where ive started my body work because it looked the worst someone had welded a peice of stainless in to cover the rust

so now that you kinda have an idea of how rough it is ill show you what ive been up too today

first i needed to cut out all the old rust i could get too, its so tempting to go overboard i just want a daily runner afterall.

then i had to make a new inner skin
a quick fold and then lots of shrinking to make the right curve

then weld it in place and trim it to size

now i need to make the outer skin that will become the new wheel arch and firewall.

this is just after ive had it on the roller and im checking the shape

now that im happy with the general shape, the piece needs to be folded twice to make the original style contour where the fender bolts up.

i used a sheet metal folder to get the general shape then some quick dolly work to make the tapered edge just like the factory panel. well my best effort anyway.

now i need to fill the hole at the end of the heater channel, i just cut up a small section of steel and folded it.

so what ive done here is trace the contour of the heater channel onto the metal while holding it in place.
what your looking at is me comparing the shape ive traced to the hole im trying to fill. its a mirror image

im nearly happy here. i was just using tin snips to cut it down to size

lots of tac welds and its in

just a quick check before i cut my outer skin. the small cylinders are very strong magnets.

so a great tip i have learned is to put the panel your going to use in place with a magnet or tac it whatever. then mark out the lines your going to use to cut the panel make sure its bigger that the hole in the original body you have already made. when you make the cut the result is two panels that match up correctly with a perfect gap just the thickness of a blade between them. the gap you leave allows the weld to get the best possible penetration and your life a whole lot easier.

and that was all i had time for today tomorrow ill be doing another couple of hours of work on the bonnet area its like swiss cheese all around the fuel line and the drainage points. im not sure ill be as productive as today but who knows.

Oh i wont be finishing off the welding on the patches just yet i want to do all my fabrication as quickly as possible i going for a christmas deadline welding isnt that time consuming

well done mate looking good, i wouldnt say thats a super rusty fatty, id say its rust in the normal spots

Great work! I've had mine for a year and haven't done nearly half as much work as you've done in a few days! However it looks like you know what you're doing.... Especially with the metal work side of things!
Your rust is in all the same spots as mine. Including the bumper brackets and water drains under the bonnet.
Will be keeping a close eye on this thread and learning a lot.
Good luck!!

Cheers Guys! i only got to work on the car for 2 hours today and im off for the weekend for a mates engagement so i have to wait until monday to get my hands dirty again.

anyway excuses aside today i started on the rust i have around the bonnet seal and near the petrol filler. this area had been poorly fixed in the past and someone had riveted bit of an old fridge to cover it up.

in this first picture you can see the seal lip that i have cut out to replace. the seal had been removed and dirt and leaves had been sitting wet for long enough to turn it to powder.

the small section i have taken is now trimmed to size.. oops too small!

ive tacked it in place but i need to fill the gap ive made by cutting it too short. to fill it ive just taken another smaller section from the same piece.