General: The Sleeper's Sleeper

This weekend, I move my 1958 bug to its new home in Valley Stream, NY. Finally, my complete project has been moved to New York. No more driving to New Jersey on Saturdays to work on my ride. My last arrangement was very complicated, as the shop was open only on Saturdays. During the work week, I could not make it in time to work on my car for 1 or 2 hours a day. Also, paying $6.00 day for Holland Tunnel fees was killing my pocket no matter how much efforts I put on my car. My project has been running for almost 4 years because of this arrangement. Sometimes I was only able to work on my VolksRide 1 time per month, but I was still paying a regular monthly holding and shop fee. Let just say, it has added about $8k to the cost of my project and I am glad to be in NY, even if it is not in Brooklyn. Who would have ever guessed that moving to NY would be cheaper, saving me $1,116 per year. So now the Sleeper can sleep like a New Yorker. :-)

General: The Homeless VolksRide

I am looking for a new home for my 1958 project. Yesterday had to be one of the most disastrous days of my life. It was not of global proportion, such as the destruction of the World Trade Center, but on a personal level, it was indeed an act of terrorism. Had this been pre-911, I would have found myself at the Promenade in Brooklyn gazing at the glory of Lower Manhattan's skyline to calm my soul after what happened yesterday. Over the past few years, I have been working on my car project in rented space across the Hudson River in New Jersey. I rented shop time from a VW specialist who has been working on VW's since not long after the social program Kraft durch Freude (KDF) had been adopted in Germany. Four year ago, when I purchased the car, I went on a quest to find as many NOS (New Old Stock) parts for my project as I could. Everyday, I had searched the web for people parting from their precious holdings of New Old Stock parts. Three years ago, I found a completed NOS set of rubber floor mats for my 58 project with the correct VW part number on them (113 863 712A). In the past, some of my parts came up missing, which slowly increased my overall fustrations. These were parts that I took off the car 2 years ago. They had been shuffled around the shop or lost only because the owner took the small boxes (while I was away for one month) I was using to hold my parts to complete his own personal storage agenda. He wanted to store his shop parts in an uniformed wall of Natural Springs water boxes - Go figure! If that was not enough, when I seen one of my rear NOS mat hanging across a latter cut in half, I fell apart. I few off the handle. Bad words had been exchanged and out of pure emotion, I announced that I would be leaving the shop. Thank god for Craigslist, I have found private garage space in less than 24 hours. The deal is not final, but I will hopefully have a private space for the same price, minus paying Holland Tunnel fees when I return to New York City. Some times bad thing happen for a reason. I'll have my own key and can work on my project more often than Saturday. Rock onward, minus the NOS part.

General: Website Lettering Design

I am trying to come up with a kewl theme for a Vintage VW Site that I'm building. I am artistic, but I have never been able to mix my artistic talent with technology. I suck at Photoshop and GIMP. I might resort to the old fastion illustration way and then scan it in. Let me think about that one. I am willing to pay someone $50 dollars to create me a slammed Beetle that could hang off the left side of these letterings. What type of service do you think most VW sites are lacking? Please do comment.

Headliner: Screw up

The last picture shows how I cut the fabric. The fabric was not set up correct for the bottom. Trying to get the whole cut before it was glued at one end makes matters difficult, if not impossible to get a smooth finish.

Headliner: Install failure - Wat da fau?

On Saturday I made a crucial mistake in my headliner install. I had finished installing the padding, but I made one cutting mistake on the rear window piece. I am going to contact my vendor to see if I can buy only a replacement rear window piece or if I will have to repurchase the whole kit. In either case, I have up to four times to completely screw up. The kit cost $98 plus shipping. The cheapest install price I had received for the install was $500. I will upload pictures later and I'll explain my mistakes. I will be a professional before this is over. The old saying is true, an education always cost money. :-) The vendor said they do not sell pieces of the kit, but does sell the cloth by the yard ($34 per yard). All I have to do is send in a swatch sample and they will send it to the manufacture for a match. This is going to prolong my project, as the rear pieces must be installed first. The vendor is Wolfsburgwest. They are awesome to deal with when you have a problem.

General: The Original

Now looking back on my dear car before I started the restoration project, I feel it would have been OK had I left the car ratty (Rat Rod). It blended in nicely on the streets of Brooklyn. It already had its share of traditional NYC bumper and body dents. I think I might leave my Oval window Rattish. Rat cars are becoming increasing desirable these days and definitely cheaper. :-)