Bella - 1958 Australian Beetle

Not bad for a old banger..








Fooking love it and you know it

I love this car!! Glad you are now starting to enjoy it Luc'

Cheers guys


I'm very glad I'm starting to enjoy her too! I was very worried that I wouldn't be able to get to grips with her once I got her on the road and that I'd end up selling her cos I daren't take her anywhere. But hopefully I've over that now - if she keeps on driving like she did today, then I don't think I'll have a problem


Altho I have to get her out of the habit of tearing my trousers! Every time I get into her, I she manages to rip the seat of my trousers! There's something spikey in the seat, and she's managed to ruin 3 pairs! Time to stick some gaffa tape over it methinks! Can't go around with my pants on show all the time!

what front beam did you use in the end?

The original one... Tom narrowed it, then Dave narrowed it some more and added shock towers:


And Dave added brackety things for the shocks to get them to sit at a proper angle, rather than being twisted at a weird angle which the original shock mount makes them sit:

Ahhh .......nice one ,those brackets are a great idea ......thanks tom .......does she scrape much over humps?

Dave did the brackety things.


I've not taken her over a speed bump (there aren't any in a 5 mile radius lol) yet, but she hasn't scraped on anything other than the bit of metal in the middle of the garage door for the lock to lock into.


Might take her to the next Wurrzel Dubbers meet if the weather is ok. Don't want to take her too far, still building my confidence, and Taunton is the next step

Ok ....sorry dave ...

(you may laugh but I have no idea who dave or tom are LOL)

Dave is Dirty Dave, Tom is Tomarse (VZi).

Ahhh ......thanks .its been a hard day

When I took her out last week I noticed that there was a gale force wind coming through the gap where the radio had been.... enough to be blowing the flowers hanging from the rear view mirror almost into my face! So I thought I should put something in the gap.... and what better than ratties?!





Hoping to take her to the Wurrzel Dubbers meet on Friday if the weather is ok.

....very cool

i love them

I've driven Bella a few times now (and even without a support vehicle following her!) and she's running very nicely. The longest journey she's been on so far is to Taunton and back - which is about 12 miles each way.

Now that it's got colder and the roads are dirtier, I've tucked her up in the garage. We've managed to get her and Joey in side by side:




Which means there's lots of room to work in at the back.

And I've come to the conclusion that a new gearbox was needed. I looked around for an age related one, but couldn't find one within a reasonable distance. A 72 1300 gearbox came up locally on ebay, and I won it (thanks Opal). To fit it to Bella I need to remove the 'long' axels which are on it, and fit the 'short' ones she already has. I also need a Splitty nosecone and hockey stick, so I shall be looking for one of those. M7 list them but they don't have them in stock at the moment and don't know when they're likely to, so I'll probably have to get one from America instead.

Anyway - here is the new box:


Oil drained and axel tubes removed:


Axels out and cleaned up:


And the top half is now nice and shiny!


Gotta wait for that to dry, and then I can clean the underside up and give that a coat of paint too.

Do you teach people to drive in Bella now?

I wouldn't have any customers left! She's scare them all away, not before stealing their blood and ripping their trousers!

can I have your garage

no

Why do you need a new gearbox nose cone? Can you not just swap over the one from the old gearbox you are removing?

I'll make sure the old one isn't a Split one first. The nose cone might be, but I don't think the hockey stick is because it's completely the wrong length - hence all the selection problems I've had with her.

Bella has mostly been sleeping since I last took her out, but on new year's day we took her and Joey out to the local classic car run near Bridgwater. It was my longest journey in her (around 40miles for the day) and the longest blast in one go. It was also her first go at the motorway. So we wrapped up warm and out we went. All was going very well - both vehicles were running perfectly and bopping along the roads nicely - till Bella found out what ice was.... que brown pants moment as her back end slid around at 40mph! Not an experiance I want to repeat tbh! Joey didn't seem to even notice the ice, so we've put it down to the extra camber Bella has and possibly the fact that she's not used to ice and he's 'grown up' with it!

Anyway - at the meet she seemed to confuse a fair few people and got to meet some fellow Dubbers too.






Anyway - I was very pleased with the way she drove (sliding aside) and she didn't have any trouble getting to 60-65mph on the motorway with more speed left in reserve. But sliding around on the ice at 40mph with one hand on the wheel and one hand on the gearstick wasn't fun - so replacement gearbox it is!

Today Steve helped me get her engine out, and I'm letting the oil drain out of the gearbox over night.





More updates on the gearbox swap when they're done!

Lovin the bonnet crest! is that one of the rarer Ausi rocket crests rather than the flaming logo?

did look really cool on new years day

Cheers! it was nice to actually get her out and about!



It's a rocket emblem I think. It's a repro one - genuine ones are pretty rare and very expensive! You can get them here: http://aircooledaccessories.com/#/bonnet-emblems/4536127111

Today Steve helped me remove the gearbox and I've started stripping it down.

Out:


I belive this is a Split nose cone, which makes things easier as I don't have to order another one:




I removed the nose cone and had a looksie at the hockey stick... new one on the right, old one on the left:




Hopefully the (lack of) bend is the reason she was difficult with the gears?

I don't know if this is normal, but the tops of the gear selectors look a bit burnt?


Anyway - onto the gearbox strip down. I know other people have covered this in pics (see Jinx's thread), but I figured the more pics the better to help anyone else who is about to do the same.

First you have to undo the bolts holding the the bearing cover and backing plate on. Make a note or take a pic of what way up it goes on and the bearing spacer behind it.


Then you're left with this:


You can now see the rear wheel bearing. You can get internal pullers for this if you're just wanting to replace the bearing, but I wanted to remove the axels so got a more widely avaliable and significantly cheaper external one (this one is from Halfords. I did get one from Toolstation but bent it getting the axels off the other box... new one is much stronger). It comes as a 3 or 2 legged puller - I found it fitted better as 2 legs.

Anyway - before you can pull the bearing off, you need to undo the bolts (13mm) holding the axel tuble to the gearbox:


Once they're undone you can fit the puller and start pulling:


You might find that as you tighten the puller, the axel spins with it - if this happens the puller won't actually do up. I placed a thin screwdriver through the holes which the split pin normally goes through to keep the hubnut on:


A bit of winding later and you should be able to pull the axel tubes off. You're then left with the axel itself. As you can see, despite me leaving the gearbox to drain overnight, it still makes quite a mess!


Then you can pull the spacer gaskets off. Make a note of how many. Then the plastic flower comes out:


The next job is to remove the circlip which holds the axel in. You can just about see it, hiding in there:


Circlip pliers (Halfords again):


And out:


Now - Steve and I spent ages on the other gearbox trying to remove the circlip - I was squeezing the pliers together and he was trying to lever it out with a screwdriver - this doesn't work! By accident when I was rotating the clirclip round so I could get it in a better position to keep hold of it, it popped out very easily. I can only assume it was because of this 'layby' in the casting:


Anyway - once that's out you can pull out the spacer behind it and then the axel will come off:


Sometimes it will come out just on it's own like above, or with the fulcrum plates and the gear behind it. Just remember what order it all came out in.


I shoved a load of tissue in the gap so that no dirt could get in, and nothing else could fall out.

Anyway - I hope that is of use to someone tackling this job. It's really not that difficult - just messy. As with all jobs, it sounds scarier than it is.


I couldn't do the otherside as I have a rounded off bolt:


Which I hope to get some inspiration for soon!