Uh...Decision Made

Ahem....OK, the decision had been made, the coupe would be 'vert fodder. Hard to see in the pic, but the chop had begun.

I acquired the coupe in about 1992. By late '92 I'd finished my graduate degree work and was in the process of changing jobs. Ghia work was slow and came in fits and starts. In early '94 I was placed on on-location assignment in Augusta, Georgia. In late '94 after that assignment ended, I was offered an assignment in Manila, Phillipines. No chance to work on the Ghia there, either. I had to make a decision with regard to the cars. I had been shopping around for someone who knew metal work since it was clear I was not going to take on this work myself. Eventually I located Schirmer Welding shop in Norwood, Ohio (a so-called suburb of Cincinnati - which is actually completely surrounded by the city). The Schirmer brothers had lots of experience salvaging rust bucket older generation VW's as well as other hobbyist cars like Mustangs and Corvairs. The Schirmer's are knowledgeable, honest, down to earth, hard working and are just as interested in talking to you about your baby (your kids, too) as they are in doing the work on your car. I also considered, visited and spoke to Mark Schlacter of Metalkraft Coachwerkes, which is just down the street in Cincinnati. Mark seemed more interested in dissuading me from engaging his shop for my needs (by impressing me with all the work/money that was going into the Classic/Vintage VW's, Porsches and Mercedes in his shop) than in discussing my humble Ghia project. I'm sure Mark does A-1 quality work, but I wasn't dissuaded from the amount of work/dollars, just his approach! If you've got a high end German resto and the requisite disposable income, Mark's your man. At that time, I was on the learning curve and wasn't up to being patronized.Next move: I toted the 'vert's body and the new old pan to the Schirmer's shop, and hauled all of my others parts and the coupe to a storage locker up the road from their shop. This way, they could have access to the coupe and any necessary parts while I was on assignment overseas. I really trusted these guys that much and I can say now, they didn't let me down. I have been under and around every inch of the car recently and all of the work is as good quality as I would expect, solid work with no corners cut.

You can see here that by this time the rear end of the coupe has been cut away. The Schirmers needed access to all of that coupe metal in order to be able to piece my 'vert's undersides back together. Turns out that they took the vert body, cut it in half along the rocker channels (what was left of them), turned the halves upside down, and proceeded to do all of the under body metal work from below (kind of like having a car rotisserie, if you have seen that approach, but with out the actual device). Then they set the halves back down on the pan and proceeded to piece the rocker channels back together. Incredible!

To Coupe or Not To Coupe...

Here you can see my so-called 'parts car' with a test fit of a driver's side tail light patch piece. Note the rust. I don't recall where I got that patch piece. This was still in the phase of the project where I was considering whether to restore this car or not. Learning curve stuff here folks.

More Pan

Another pic of the pan. If you look close you can see the torsion bar spring plates resting on the tunnel.

Moo Goo Gai Pan

I found this pan less than half a block from my house, from a former Ghia owner. What a find. I had it chemically dipped and it had only two minor holes, easily repaired. Progress. This shows the pan after dipping and some welding, at the shop.

Some Comments

First, even though you can see some pretty drastic rust in the few pics of the '70 'vert that I've posted here, the situation is actually even worse than what you see. Many areas under the car, not visible from above, were also rusted through. For example, on both sides of the car, the outer/exterior quarterpanels were rusted both fore and aft of the wheel wheels, front and rear. This generally meant that the inner quarterpanels were rusted as well. Now, you can purchase after market the outer panels from several places like KGPR, but it's tough to find the inner sections. Fabricating them from plate stock would be a task for a master metal working craftsman, which I certainly am not, and didn't aspire to be. That was one justification for seeking a parts car, and that'll become more clear in later posts.

Second, if one were to have made a closer examination of the condition of the '70 coupe that I intended to use as a parts car, it could have been argued that this car was actually the better candidate for restoration. At a minimum, an alternate candidate for a sacrificial parts car could have been found. I'll admit that I did chop up a reasonably intact car, and purists might vilify me for that, but what's done is done. At the time, I was on the learning curve and made the decisions I made with the information that I had at that time. Had I to do it over again, I would not have made the same choice as I did, knowing what I know about Ghias now. Alas...

Third: viewing the 'vert, folks may ask if it was really the right thing to do to plunge in with this restoration. Given where I am now in 2005, it's certainly been worth it, not only from what the car will look like when finished, but for what I've learned in the process. Hindsight is 20-20, and had I to do over, this would not have been the car that I chose to restore. It would have been more prudent to suck it up and make the trip the Southwest/California to seek a more reasonable candidate. One with, say, some metal on it. At the time, making that trip was beyond my means and real knowledge of the hobby car and Ghia market specifically had to offer. Having said that, I have what I have.

And they don't call Ohio part of the Rust Belt for nothin'. Once again, kudos/props to Parts Place for all VWs, for their inspiration via their mail order catalog.

Hope...In the form of a Parts Car

I'd been talking up my new project at work. As is usually the case, everyone had a VW story.

Including Jim 'Mel' Flowers, the Piping Dept. lead. In fact, Mel had TWO Ghias just sitting in his backyard not too far from where I lived. And ONE was a 1970, a coupe, but it was an Automatic Stick Shift.

After looking the car over, a deal was struck and, in this case, I drove the car home. My wife was loving every bit of the collection I was assembling, as you can imagine. Here's the coupe parked out in front of my garage...with the 'vert's body just behind, and the pan behind that in the rear of the garage. Was this progress? It was for me.

The coupe was actually a salvageable car, but I didn't know better and wanted the 'vert going a lot more. The strip down had already begun by this point as you can see the bumpers had been removed.

Reality Sets in...and some Hope

Front of the pan from the passenger side. Things look so much better from over here. Does anyone have a small handgun so that I can shoot myself right NOW?

More...well, you know by now

Looking at the head of the pan including the H beam and front suspension. Just more rust and dirt, mixed in with brake fluid.