Thanks guys!
I'll update more tomorrow about why the car hasn't had much going on in this thread over the last month and a half...but I'm hoping the reason why will be worth photos. In the meantime, I started playing around with a few things tonight. First up, was the Hargett Precision shifter. The shifter is designed to bolt over the-brake handle on a 911, so for visuals the tower begins between the front seats and points forward to the dash. In my case, I want to put the tower starting under the dash rising back towards the seats, as I think it will look visually better. Well, that and the seats are so darned close together in the beetle. The first step is to flip the shift mechanism 180 degrees in the housing, which means drilling some holes.
The Hargett shifter has adjustable stops for the L-R action of the shifter, which are adjusted using two 1/4-20 bolts on the side of the housing. Flipping the mechanism around means drilling two new holes...and the fun task of figuring out where they should be. I measured it up, and then cut two templates on the vinyl cutter. Lining up the holes on the factory side confirmed I was spot on, and then it was just a matter of laying a template down on the other end:
With that done, I started to figure out where I wanted the actual shift knob to end up. Mounting the shifter is going to require quite a bit of work in the beetle chassis. I'm going to need to create some mounting plates at the front, welding them onto the tunnel to make a flat surface. The e-brake assembly is going to have to be removed, as the shift rod will now travel down on an angle from the shifter to the transmission. The fun part is going to be measuring and figuring out just where the hole needs to be for the rod to pass through the top of the tunnel. I break out in a sweat every-time I start thinking about it!
The Canadian Rally Season is half-done at the National Level, which means wheels are starting to get scrapped over at the local rally shop. I've always wanted to put a proper set of motorsport wheels on the car, but hate the thought of buying them. I'm so cheap when it comes to wheels! The cheapest way for me to get a set of Speedlines is to piggyback at the beginning of the rally season when the team buys a lot of them. Problem is, I need to buy Subaru fitment. Well, now I have a couple of scrap wheels to play with to work out the fitment. These ones are 8" wide, which is far too wide for the bug. Once I know the widths and offsets available to order, I'll cut the back flange off on a lathe and adjust one to be my 'front' tester, and one to be the rear. I have some long-term brake ideas, and will add this project in with them.
-Dave