1973 V8 Super Beetle Front Engine Conversion - 283 SBC

[volkdent]

You DO NOT want the radiator in the rear unless you've got a great idea for lot's of ducting. Find another radiator that is the size you need it, my advice comes from others failures with that concept.

Jason

[V8SuperBeetle]

Originally Posted by volkdent

You DO NOT want the radiator in the rear unless you've got a great idea for lot's of ducting. Find another radiator that is the size you need it, my advice comes from others failures with that concept.

Jason

Thanks for the advice! I do have a good idea for ducting the air. Basically it'll pull the air from under the car through the radiator. I've seen a handful of V8 conversion pictures done that way, or similar.

[V8SuperBeetle]

Last night I tack welded the "mount rails" that bolt down the heater channels of the body. This weekend I'm going to finish the metal work on the fenders and start laying some bondo, well, that's the plan.

[V8SuperBeetle]

Got some work done to the bug. Actually, I put in about 10 hrs time, but it really feels like I didn't get a whole lot done. Getting in the coil springs, even with a compressor, was a real pain without the full weight of an engine or the vehicle to help, but I got it done. That took up most my time.

I sand blasted the front leaf spring mounts.




And some misc. parts.




Misc parts painted.




I didn't realize just how bad the cabinet sand blaster at my work was clogged up until our engineer saw just how slow the process was taking. We filtered out the beads, put it back in, and it worked like a champ. I kinda thought it was taking forever and it wasn't really doing a great job of removing all the rust, but what do I know? I don't do this everyday and can't really complain because my work allows me to use some of their equipment. Any who, it works much better.

Here's the steering linkage sandblasted.




Linkage with new tie rods installed and painted.




Leaf mounts painted. You can see in this picture just how much I had to cut out of the heater channels. Quite a bit.




And here's the frame as of this weekend. Control arms installed with new bushings and ball joints. Coil springs painted and installed. New shocks installed. Lowered 2" spindles. Sway bar painted and installed with new bushings and new sway linkage.




Thats about as far as I got. More later.

[V8SuperBeetle]

Alright, alright...(in my best Matthew Maconha voice) Progress.

Sandblasted the diff cover inside / out and the shock / u-bolt mount.




Drained the gear oil, which didn't look too bad, and added the new stuff after scraping away all the old gasket, on the diff cover and matting surface, with a gasket scraper.




I sand blasted the diff cover at work. Here it is installed. I used some of edelbrock's gasket sealer on both mating surfaces to ensure it seals up nicely.




Here the rear is after a good wire brushing and painting with some Master Series. It came out decent even though there still was some build up I couldn't remove. Seals still must be good cause there was no leakage after it staying like that for days.




Painted the shock mounts, leaf springs, and shackles.








Here's a picture of the completed rear. Well, minus the shock tower bolts which I later added. Everything is hand tight for now cause the rear will need washers or something to make up for the extra space left by the .5" narrower leaf springs. Once the body is secured and I have the 18"s on I'll do a final setup of the rear diff.




I had decide that I would move the front leaf mounts forward and move the rear back on the leaf springs to make up for it. I did this to help keep the shackles away from the fenders. They were an inch away from the fenders with the way it was previously setup. Well, that didn't work out so well. Here's the front mount moved forward 2". I drilled 1/2" holes to secure the mounts and drill an over size hole so I could mount the Isuzu leafs. The 3/4" were not cheap. They look manly though.

[volkdent]

Originally Posted by V8SuperBeetle

Thanks for the advice! I do have a good idea for ducting the air. Basically it'll pull the air from under the car through the radiator. I've seen a handful of V8 conversion pictures done that way, or similar.

Did those pictures include a comment about the temperatures running cool? Don't mean to bug ya, but just because it was done doesn't mean it works. It can work, BTW, but you have to have a good grip on airflow and especially making sure you've got all the air bubbles out of your system.

Jason

[V8SuperBeetle]

Originally Posted by volkdent

Did those pictures include a comment about the temperatures running cool? Don't mean to bug ya, but just because it was done doesn't mean it works. It can work, BTW, but you have to have a good grip on airflow and especially making sure you've got all the air bubbles out of your system.

Jason

Hey Jason,

There's a guy on V8bugs.com that has a rear radiator setup and he has no problems with cooling. Just gotta make sure there's enough air being pulled across the rad.