My other 1303 GL

[dub_crazee]

cracking car and love the colour choice lol

[Steve C]

Hi Guys

Thanks for the kind words, still lots to do.

I decided at the beginning of this build to fit early Golf (later Mk1) switch gear and to mimic the wiring layout of the same model Golf with 16 fuses but the blade type.

The ignition switch / wiper & blinker switch housing fitted with a bit of fettling, the wipers feature electric pump activation and variable intermittent wiping and the blinker feature Euro parkers (side lights) i.e. when you leave the blinker on with the motor off the parkers come on, on that side of the car, not sure if this is a good idea or not.

The Golf switch gear feels much more modern as well. I also kept the old lock barrel and door handles from my old yellow bug when I sold the car as I had just fitted Audi lock mechanism to them, these feature reversible keys, as in you cant put the key in back to front, good when your getting old.

The mudguards I'm using are Aeros like I used on my old 1302, they take 911 headlights, I bought these headlights from Design 911 in the UK when the AU$ was OK against the pound.

Fuel system is a Carter lift pump with a Injection Perfection surge tank and a 044 main pump, the main pump is controlled by the factory Subaru boost sensitive pump speed controller, this area needs finishing off in the boot, I had to get the car running meet a local registration deadline.

Steve

[Steve C]

Hi

I had my friend Westy make up a 3 inch exhaust for me. It has a high flow cat, 3 inch hot dog and dual pass muffler that has a 180 degree bend to turn the gases around again, its reasonably quiet.

Its a pretty trick bit of work and it only takes about 10 minutes to get off.

Steve

[Steve C]

Hi

Ricola (user on here) did a similar thing to me, but much more well thought out than mine.

Steve

[70Turbobug]

Nice project! Everything is well done,looks great!

[Steve C]

Hi

I've been a bit slack with my bug, no excuses but frankly after the setbacks I had with our local registration people I lost interest.

I'm back into it now, I took the car out for an inspection by an accredited engineer. He only had verify that my brakes were OK.

Just a reminder of what I was using for brakes, I was using a stock 19mm master cylinder with, 996 rear callipers on the front with Porsche 930 rotors and 944 rotors on the rear with Boxster rear callipers.

I had used these very same brakes on my old 1302 and they worked fine. The accredited engineer found that my brake pedal was spongy when stopping from higher speeds, I've never driven the car faster than 80 kph, he was doing his tests from 100 kph.

There was two issues, he felt a bigger master cylinder was needed so I fitted a CSP 20.64, this improved the pedal dramatically, the other thing he pointed out was that at the spot where the brakes were meant to operate the pedal pivot point was going over centre.

This was caused by the master cylinder being slightly further away from pedal cluster owing to the thick plate I welded to chassis when I moved the master cylinder 25 mm away from the clutch pedal so that I could fit clutch master cylinder in next to the brake master cylinder.

I remade my brake pedal and pointed the pivot point a few degrees further back towards the driver.

So I took the bug out to have it rechecked, it passed with flying colours and using his very sophisticated testing equipment it recorded 1 G reading under brakes. The engineer will post me the report and then I can get this thing on the road.

Steve



I fitted much larger reservoirs

[cookvw]

i just looked thru your build thread. awsome build. where can i get one of them rear spoiler/ whale tale wings? and how much?

[Steve C]

Hi

Thanks coming from you that's a real compliment. I think I paid about $800 for the whale tail, you can get them hear http://www.beetleracing.com.au/home.html

Steve

A couple of camera phone pics

[cookvw]

thanks, im no one special tho. just a young guy that loves tinkering with VW's. thats not a bad price for the wing. i just got done putting in a WBX 2.1 into my super. im soooo happy i did it too. now if i can just get the megasquirt issues i have figured out, id be really stoked!!! lol heres a pic of mine as it sits now. future plane are to put a suby wrx turbo on it, and intercooler, this winter will be body work and paint, then drive the hell outta it.

[ricola]

Congratulations on getting through all the red tape Steve! Now get out there and scare yourself silly!

Rich

[Joel]

You would not believe the rings of fire they make us jump through to get modified cars here legalized but it does have it's good reasons.

Helps to ensure that the cars on the road have been modified in a safe manner.
It would be hard to feel safe out on the roads with some of the aborted backyard hacks I've seen people driving around overseas

[Steve C]

Hi

Well I finally have the green light from the powers that be.

The car is having blue slip inspection on Friday, this is a bit like an annual roadworthy inspection but a bit more detailed, then I pay about $1000 to the insurance company for 3rd party liability & the RMS (roads and maritime service) and then I can drive the car.

I have been trying to get the car passed since April this year, the car has undergone another two inspections by the RMS one to check that all defects have been cleared, over track, wheelbase too long, only one catalytic converter etc then an almost 2 hour inspection to make sure the body wasn't a Mexican one, they suspected this as I fitted new wind-up Mexican windows in the doors even after I pointed out to them that the other 6 windows contained Australian and German glass.

I cant wait to finish the car but I found a noise in G50 which will need to be attended to very soon before too much fun is had.

Steve

[oasis]

Originally Posted by Steve C

... then an almost 2 hour inspection to make sure the body wasn't a Mexican one ...

I don't understand this. Mexico never manufactured or assembled a 1303 (or a 1302).

[Dub_Life]

Hi Steve, man that sounds like a headache, and a lot more dollars, cant wait to do mine now. What did you change to overcome the wheelbase and track issues?

[Steve C]

Originally Posted by Dub_Life

Hi Steve, man that sounds like a headache, and a lot more dollars, cant wait to do mine now. What did you change to overcome the wheelbase and track issues?

Hi

I fitted caster bushes back to front and fitted K=Mac strut tops to fix the wheelbase issue, I was 30 mm over.

The rear track was the issue, it was only slightly over, I bought some $400 18x8 57 Et Porsche Cayenne alloys on eBay, these reduced the track by 34 mm.

Steve