VW Cruise in Louisville

Well, the beast made it out for the cruise. It received a lot of attention. Several of the guys there couldn't believe it was "that clean". By that, they mean it looks very original and has most of the interior intact and in great shape. It made me feel pretty good, especially after all of the work I have done. There were some pretty cool cars out there too. The cruise turned into a race, which Lori and I gracefully bailed out of. Good thing that I wasn't in this while I was younger and had the original GTI. There would have been no "bailing out" back then. Since I really haven't had this car much over 70mph, I wasn't about to experiment with it while Lori was in the car with me.

The turnout was great and it was neat to meet some other folks that are enthusiastic about their cars. Every stop light we hit turned into a chorus of gasoline and tire burning. It was pretty funny. It would go from several pitches of "wweeeeee, wweeeeeee, wweeeeeeee" to "SCREEEEECCCHHHHHHH!!!!" All of the motors sounded different, but rubber on the road still always sounds like rubber on the road. Here are some pics. You'll see one pic of everyone huddled around, admiring the beast.

Time for driving

Well, aside from needing a fuel pump, I'm driving this beast! There is a big VW rally this weekend that the GTI is going to put in an appearance. Check out where it is now....

A day in the life of Jeff

I have to share a round of emails I exchanged with a friend of mine to tell the story of driving in the GTI to work this week.

So...drove the gti in to work today for the first time. Pretty cool. We (boss and I with some clients) have a lunch meeting, which my boss always drives when we have meetings. I figured I wouldn't need the trailblazer, so I'd drive the GTI. He had to drop his BMW off to have some body work done, so we are rolling in the gti with no back seat, no A/C, no glove compartment, no radio and a windshield that has a crack over 75% of it. Who is feeling like a chump now?

Dude...It gets better. One of the guys there needed a ride back to his office. I still have the back seat of the GTI sitting in my basement. All of the carpet was out of the back seat. He had to lay across the bare metal and the gas tank. The rear view mirror fell off in my lap as he climbed in. Apparently, the glue was not a big fan of the warmer temps. He had to lie down in the back for the 5 minute ride. You couldn't script anything this ridiculous. Since it is lowered, it feels like we are rolling on the Flintstone "stone wheels" to begin with. And the guy that jumped in the back (notice no use of the word seat in this sentence) was no small dude. We were rollin low now! No A/C in the car and because I haven't replaced the fuel pump yet, I had to crank it for a good 20-30 seconds before it started up. Lovely day.....

And when I finally got into Shelbyville, the clutch cable snapped. I had to pop the hood, yank the cable so that the clutch was engaged and start the beast in first gear. It looked like it was having a seizure trying to get started in gear. I was able to rev match it to get it into third gear and drove it the last mile home in third gear only. I called a friend who got the garage door open for me and I pulled into the garage at about 15 mph. Needless to say, he has never seen anything like it. Our driveway has a 90 degree turn at the bottom of it to get into the garage. It is not often you can say you were squealing the tires in your own driveway and garage. I got her stopped about 2 feet from my workbench and rear garage wall. Not bad... I picked up a used clutch cable for $5 and already replaced it. It took me about 25 minutes and it is now running great again.

Licensed and Registered

Well, the GTI is on the road, and legally this time. I'll try to get some pictures on Sunday. I plan on driving this beast to work on Monday. That should raise some eyebrows at work.

Getting closer

Well, we are getting closer. I have temporarily put the dash in place to see what works and what doesn't. I have gotten most of the lights working and most of the electrical working. I still do not have windshield wipers, or any of the climate controls, but I think I have a lead on the situation and should be moving forward. I will try to get a picture of the dash in the car. It is really beginning to look like a car again.

Sealed and primed

I wanted to go with "primered" because it sounds cooler, but I'm not actually sure it is even a word. So, primed it is. Anyway, the vehicle is primed. Based on time constraints and such, I will probably drive it around in primer for a while. When in Kentucky...... Before I sink anymore cash into this project, I want to make sure it is going to stand up to my driving habits. Those of you that grew up with me know exactly what I am talking about. Clear the roadways for a little bit!!

Redneck Paint Booth

Well, I had a place to prep, paint and finish the car, but a friend bailed on me and changed his mind about letting use the booth. I completely understand him being a little uneasy about us using the equipment, but it would have been nice to know this a little earlier. Instead, the day before we were to begin to seal and primer the car, I found out my arrangements fell through. So, I had to go redneck style. Thanks to Josh for the loaner of a tarp, saving me a couple greenbacks. If "redneck"worked like the force, some short, fat little green guy in Texas would have been sitting on his porch, looking at two camaros on blocks in his front yard, saying "I feel a strong disturbance in the force originating from somewhere outside of Louisville, Ky. It may be the strongest presence I have felt coming from one individual in some time. The prophecy has been fulfilled."

Nobody builds a redneck paint booth like we do in Kentucky.

Back Home Again

Well, after taking it over to the shop and getting some more work done, we are back home and ready to go. We have treated everything we saw that needed treated, pulled off as much as we could to get ready for the prepping and hope to be hitting the paint booth on July 5th. You'll notice the bumpers, lights, grill, side markers and just about everything else are gone, including the moonroof. While I wait for that, I will continue to work on the electrical wiring as I can and hopefully will be on the road in the early part of July.

Notice the freshly primered hood? It is amazing what getting some fresh paint and primer is going to do to this car.

My Apologies

Sorry for the large lapse in posts. Things have gotten a little crazy and I haven't had much of an opportunity to update the site. So, here comes a bunch of updates. We have stripped all of the stripes and vinyl off of the car and ground down all of the spots on the car that showed signs of rust. There are one or two spots that are beyond grinding repair, but the rust has been stopped in its tracks. The black patches you see are spots that we have treated with a paintable primer. We hope to be hitting it with primer and paint on July 5th. You'll notice my friend Trent in there helping me out with the body work and paint.

Notice the one red wheel? I am in the process of swapping someone for a black one. One of the wheels I got from a guy was bent and probably wasn't going to balance. I found this one for a couple bucks and am going to swap it with someone for a black one they have. It is amazing the parts you can find around here. Kentucky truly is the barter capital of the world.

Finally Home

Well, I finally got the car home. It wasn't as smooth a ride as i was hoping for, but we made it. I didn't have 1st or 2nd gear, but that is just a minor adjustment away from being fixed. The other problem was that I didn't really have any brakes. I would rank this up a little higher than the 1st and 2nd gear thing. The vacuum line for the brake booster had an issue, so I had no brakes. I have already found a used line/fitting and should have that resolved shortly. I am debating on whether I want to pull the motor out, repaint it, replace the timing belt and address some other maintenance issues, then drop it back in. I am a little nervous to do that, since I keep having some problems with some of the fittings and bolts. Everything else seems to be working fairly well and I don't want to make more work for myself. We'll see how it goes. I still need to get it prepped to paint, which will take some time.

The Weakest Link

The Weakest Link in the fuel system, or at least my fuel system. I got it ordered and it should be here tomorrow

For Mike!! Guess what I found

Mike--No more complaining about how it looks with those wheels on it.. :)

Time for some pictures and updates

Well, I have been having fun with the brake lines and the fuel lines. Just as soon as I feel like I am coming down the home stretch, I find out I have several more laps to go. The fuel lines and the brake lines proved to be a lot of trouble, as did the rear-end of the vehicle. After creating some major work for myself, I got it all worked out and back on track. If all goes well, I should be driving it back to the house tomorrow night, without fuel or brake fluid leaking down the road. I had to order a specialty line for one of the fuel lines, but found it very cheap online. I usually try to support the local businesses around town, but nobody seemed to have it. Hopefully, it will arrive tomorrow without a hitch. As you'll notice, I was able to get the fuel tank out. The shift boot also needed replaced, as you can probably see in the picture. That has been done as well.

Rust is not my friend

Sorry I have been a little slow about posting the last few days. We went out of town for the weekend and then I have been tied up with some other things. Lori is out of town this weekend, so I am going to be hitting it hard. Now for the bad news...The body seems to be in good shape, but all of the bolts, nuts, screws, fuel line connections, brake line connections, etc, etc on the underside of the car all seem to have a healthy coating of rust on them. What does that mean to me? Crap is breaking and stripping out of the welds and bolts are snapping off. This isn't a big problem for the stuff that is exposed, but some of these are welded through the frame and I need to be able to get these things loose. I have the rear end of the car partially broken loose, but now the bolt is spinning and to access it, I have to get into the frame. Rumor has it that there is access cut through the inside of the vehicle, but I won't know until tomorrow night. I should have some good pics for you tomorrow evening.

To see what I am shooting for

Just to give everyone an idea of what I am going for, here is the original GTI I had WAY back in the day! The scan didn't turn out all that well, so I'll update it when I get a chance. But for now, enjoy!!

It's a dog eat dog world and I'm wearing milkbone undies

Some days you're the fly, other days you're the two day old doggie poo. Either way, you're in it up to your....Well anyway. I think I am getting in some practice for my new career as a professional gasoline thief. In order to drop the fuel tank and remove the fuel lines, I needed to get all of the fuel out of the tank. Mind you, these things are not easy to get to. I finally got one of the lines off, but had the car jacked-up to get to the tank. All of the fuel was at the wrong end of the tank to drain it out. So, it's siphon time at the makeshift GTI repair shop. Can you see where this is heading? First off, gasoline still tastes as bad as I remember it tasting. Secondly, I watched the stupid thing siphon at a snail's pace because the only size hose I could fit through the lines to get into the tank would barely allow a BB to pass through it. Staring at it for 10 minutes straight, I figured I was in the clear and could move on to the next task. I guess it was right about time to add another item to the task list. I left it alone for no time at all, but apparently, no time at all is exactly the amount of time it takes to make a solid effort in filling up one side of the garage with gasoline. You guessed it, the hose slipped out of the gas can I was using to drain the gas into and decided it would have much more room to spread out and stretch it's tiny little petroleum based arms across my garage. Needless to say, the tank is still where it was hanging last night and the fuel lines have not budged an inch.

Vroom Vroom

Well, I am amazed to be able to say this at this point. I got the car running. It has a fuel leak and can't be driven, but it started and ran. Somehow, I got lucky with some of the wiring and was able to finally get power to the fuel pump. I also was lucky enough to give the garage floor a good "gasoline bath"--Not part of the original plan tonight. The PO had mentioned that when he loaded it onto a trailer, he thought that he might have snagged the fuel line. He was right.

The next step is to get some fuel lines and drop the fuel tank. I'll keep you posted.

Cleaned up a bit

It looks a lot different after a little cleaning

May 17th

Well, it looks pretty rough. The electrical system was toast due to getting some water behind the dash. The Previous Owner (PO) had picked up another fuse block and a wiring harness from somewhere. The fuse block is not exactly the same, so this will end up being a lot of fun. I'm not sure which car it came from, but it isn't a GTI. My initial thought is that this is going to require a TON of patience. As far as the car goes, the PO has been working on it for a couple months, and possibly living in it based on the cans and junk in it.

The fuel tank needs replaced, which the PO provided. The rear shocks need replaced, which he also provided. I have some work ahead of me, but I am excited about the possibilities.

A friend of mine is going to help me repaint it. I can't wait to see how it turns out.

Just brought it Home - May 17th