1969 Empi Imp

The History of the IMP

The EMPI Imp was a fiberglass dune buggy manufactured by EMPI of Riverside in the mid '60s through the early '70s. It and the Sportster represented EMPI's attempt to penetrate the highly lucrative dune buggy market popularized by Bruce Meyer's Manx.

The Imp was constructed of a fiberglass body and two piece hood/dash bolted to a shortened Volkswagen Beete floor pan. The floorpan needed to be shortened by 12" (30.5 cm), but otherwise everything else remained stock VW. This contrasted with the majority of dune buggies being manufactured at the time, as they all used a floor pan shortened 14" (35.6cm) to 14.5" (36.8cm).

As this is an air cooled site and all ive done is post about water cooled dubs, i thought i'd better start a thread about the Imp......

We restored it about 10 years ago and had our fun with it, but tbh its really starting to show a few battle scars and in despirate need for some tlc.

So in the near coming future its over due a good strip down and rebuild, including new engine, colour, and interior,

the pics so far.......























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such a rare kit mate, soooo rare. love it

Ditto, I totally love this Buggy. Are you doing it period correct or with a bit more of a modern twist??

well i think the plan is to get rid of the pink, spray the body cream with red detailing, then spray rims red but with white wall tyres and the chrome dishes in the centres. After seeing Jamo's van me and dad are thinking subaru engine would be easy enough. But who knows yet.

So i guess its kind of in keeping with the date of the kit, but with a modern twist without ruining it too much.

scooby in a beach buggy that sounds mental as fook

Dub Mayhem wrote:

scooby in a beach buggy that sounds mental as fook

i raced against that yellow scooby beach buggy at bugjam on the pod mate. It did a 15.1 1/4 and i did a 15.3 in the golf. Was highly impressed.

Dont really want to spend too much money on the buggy at the moment so will just have to see what happens in the new year.

Dad decided to make the rear end a bit more original and build an engine cover like it would have had from the factory

Using wood and filler he made a Cast to create a fibreglass mould





Painted and sealed the cast to prevent fibreglass sticking to it









Once hardened, next job will to be sand down and shape it a bit better before preparing to paint

Just thought id bring this thread back to life now that work has started on the imp again.

Been quite a while since the imp has seen the light, but now other projects and commitments are out the way we can start the re-spray and tidy her up for the summer! Yay!

started repairing the fibreglass as it had all cracek and spider-webbed.









The buggy has always suffered from the front wings flapping, so we made up some webs to hold the wings rigid.

nice work dude , what colour is it gonna be ? ......any flake going on her?

I LURVE this Buggy!!

well we are still undecided about colour, keep changing our mind.
The current suggestion is Subaru blue with gold flake in the laquer and some gold pin striping, but im worried it will look a bit tacky. Hmmm choosing a colour is by far the hardest thing to decide when building any project.

Base Coat




Then flatted back and added a white pinstripe to enhance the body shape.





Welded a Mini Filler cap onto a neck we made up




As the buggy never had a real interior before we decided to make one, starting with some side trims cut to shape. These will be carpeted at some point.




We still need to flat the paint down a bit as its still got some orange peel in it, then its the crucial bit. We are going to put Gold metal flake in the 1st coat of laquer... we'v never sprayed this before and are unsure on how much flake to mix up. If we add too much then it could ruin the whole paint job.

Awesome work dude!


BTW, metal flake rocks!!!

We sprayed the Flake earlier. I will get some pics up 2mrw

Looks ace!!

SimonABT wrote:

We sprayed the Flake earlier. I will get some pics up 2mrw

Looks ace!!

Right then, we sprayed the Gold Metal flake last night and soooo pleased about the way it has come out. Unfotunately the photos dont show the flake in the paint... must be the way the light reflects of it or something.

But you can kind of make it out i guess....











Still needs another coat of laquer as you can feel the flake when running your hands on it.

The deadline to get the imp finished is Bristol Volksfest so its going to be a close one... we are despirate to get a fuel sender if anybody knows of one?? If worst case we will have to order one but time is of the essence

Love the color/finish one day my kyote will get the attention it needs

Nice one dude , ....I put about 6 coats of laquer over flake last time i sprayed it ,to stop the 'feel' of the flake .....but you need to let it dry first or the flake will surface.

nomates wrote:

Nice one dude , ....I put about 6 coats of laquer over flake last time i sprayed it ,to stop the 'feel' of the flake .....but you need to let it dry first or the flake will surface.

yeah its had 3 coats already, we have enough Laquer and hardner for one more coat hopefully.

metal flake ROCKS!

I've got a Woody!!!!!!!

cool as looking awesome.

loving it, be nice to see this at the bristol show!!