Let me set the scene.....

It was a crisp spring Friday morning in 2012, Myself and the boys arrive at a small rural reserve in country Victoria.
Immediately after exiting our vehicles we are met with a visual and aural fest of automotive delights. The whole day was spent in awe of the men and women enjoying what seemed to be the best time of their live's. It was Chopped! A traditional rod and Kustom festival, music, dirt drags, show and shine etc!










The question was how can we get a piece of the action next year? We'd need the right vehicle. Volksrod? mmm maybe.

But it wasn't till we saw this thing roll by......



Then the penny dropped, it had to be a gasser! No, it had to be a Ghia Gasser!



Months went past and the we were all busy with other projects, then two weeks out from our Easter show, we realised we hadn't built that car. We always try and do something a little off the wall for this show, ie; slammed Country Buggy, Heb Coupe or Polizei Notch.

In Mick's words "Let's get a start on the Gasser!"
The breif was to have it running and driving for Easter, now with the deadline less than 2 weeks away we got stuck in.
One of the lads, Dr Pat, has had this imported Ghia Cabrio for a while, which has been through more than it's fair share of owners......




A quick look over deemed it suitable for the job, the first hurdle though was the dash and steering had been converted to RHD but the pan was still LHD, but there were no pedals for either configuation.

In a strange twist of fate I got a phone call from a local Hotrodder who is building an imported '59 Beetle Cab and wanted to buy some bits for a RHD conversion.

The answer was clear, LHD car with a RHD dash........




Mick and Fingers set themselves to work putting together the Baja beam and I ripped the heart from a lowlight bus of my Dad's........


A night's work later and the beam was in, It was decided that it needed missmatched rims, Mick had some 4 1/2" Mangles and Jase had the Mooneye's rims for the back.....


As you can see the rims looked great but the tyres were all wrong, I did a few calcs, and reckoned we could squeeze some 215's under the rear...

They just fitted with less than 5mm gap inside and out.

At the same time the smart car front's were swapped out for some tall 145's and the rear was dropped a spline.......


The look was begining to come together.

We knew the engine needed the heads tightening down, and a quick strip down found that every gasket was leaking. Once everything was checked over. Micked pulled a rabbit outta his hat in the form of some metalflake purple tinware. My boy Brodie got stuck in and finished off the final assembly........


Danny and the Jack (2Dots and the Prospect) had done a sterling job on a new loom and swich gear and with only a few days left to go I decided to take the Thursday off work and concentrate on getting all the little jobs buttoned up, steering, hand brake, pedals, clutch etc etc.

Thusday night saw us bolting in the donk, Jor-ge donated a fuel tank and we fired it up. Dissaster struck when the only thing heard above the open headers was a death knock. Hearts sank and we called it a night.

I spent friday pondering what could have been and thought what the hell we'll take it anyway, I fired it up again, did the timing and tuned the carb, still knocking badly.
I jumped in the seat to test the clutch/gears and couldn't help myself and gave it a couple of good stabs on the throttle, Well fuck me! whatever it was either disslodged or free'd up cos it was purring like a kitten

Dr Pat brought in a stash of lights to go through and came through with a set of blue dot tail lights, Jase found his set of T-bars. After a couple of celebration beers we loaded it up.

It was a real hit at the show, with most people not "getting" it and with some folk knowing exactly what was going on!





It couldn't have come together without the help of all the Squadron 8)

So that's the story up to 2012

Fast forward to this year, the gasser had been pushed to the back of the que again, but with Chopped now only a few short months away, we decided to give it a good push and try to get it there,

First paint











Man it's so time consuming!

More masking, more paint.....



Stoked with the copper!!!

It's been fun so far 8)



We're nearly there!!!!!

Didn't like the alloys on the rear, so made up some new back rims and ready for powder coat

And we're done.......

Finally got the rims and tyres sorted!
Plus got some old school hub covers and a set of wheel nut zinc plated.

Last month we threw the engine back in and rolled her out to a local restored cars meet (about 1200 cars) man it really pissed off the purists haha....

And that brings us to this week, with only a couple of weeks left to Chopped we're pushing hard to get it done,

Windscreen picked up.....


And made a start on the signage......

thats awesome!!!

Great thread. I have to admit that while I thought it was interesting, I didn't really get it. Having now read this thread, it brings it all into context, and while it is still not my cup of tea, I can see what you are doing, and I reckon it is great.

Good on you, and terrific that you are having such a great time with it.

I love it!

Noice.

Fanbloodytastic

Well done!

Wow... that thing is soo ugly - its fantastic.

I love it and one of a kind too.

Awesome job Rhett and the Benders boys

Thanks for all the positive comments guys
It's been fun doing something "different"
We got one side finished........

Good on you mate something different.
damn wish I had a ghia vert...

You got one week to go guys!
T54

love it dude... although you need more tyre for the rear and more poke

So how did it go? Did it get there?

No we didn't get it there
Still waiting for some important bits, will aim for a DOVW debut now.

I was talking to one of the guys at work about it, and he was going to chopped. Then he mentioned he saw a cool MGB gasser there before.

Got some parts back from the laser cutters this week







Very happy

Hey. Probably a stupid question but what is the tank on the front for?

Fuel

yellow tinted headlight glass?

Cool ride.

Got back into it last week.......


Screen is in

We had the VW Jamboree yesterday, so the last couple of weeks had a big push to get the Gasser all wrapped up to make it's debut proper........

Had my 7yr old daughter home from school sick for a week, so she decided she wanted to spend a few days with Daddy in the shed
Loved having her working with me, we did a bit of art class and came up with these cool doortrims.......



Brakes, door latches, trims, fuel tank, battery and back on the ground for the first time in ages! After a quick hose off she was all ready to go / /





Couple of pics from the show.............





Went down a treat

Mate that is absolute gold and my new fave Ghia

Made my day.