75 swallowtail and 79 rat

:mrgreen: just bought a new swallowtail and had it shipped from arizona to washington. it arrived today and got somewhat of a chance to look at it. ill be going thru it. im planning on doing a full resto on it with a few tweeks of my own. i bought it from a guy who said it was a 76 and the registration says its a 76 born in september but the car itself says 12/75. i was very pleasantly suppised. also in my possesion is a 79 white rabbit which i have been working with for a couple months now. i posted some old stuff about it a long time ago and just never kept it up to date. mostly because i was planning to get a swallowtail. anyways heres the pics.
the white 79 i have :then


:now





custome wheel 1/4 flares cut from a full. painted chrome but i think im gonna go back to black. same with gas cap.






and the swallowtail as it comes out of the trailer




stupid vandalism







literaly like 98% rust free. i love arizona cars. except the fact that i did find a black widdow. scarred the hell out of me. it was right next to my hand in one of the tarantula rims that came with the car also. ironic.


ill be posting a lot of pics and asking a lot of questions. hope you can help :wink:
fist things first with the swallow is to rip everything out and clear everything off and get it resprayed professionaly. im thinking white but am open to suggestions. because the interior has already been reupholstered once im planning on doing it again but want to have a good matching outside color. i was also thinking the original miami blue with an orange interior. like this one. except i could only wish mine was this good.

worlds your oyster with that matey, lovely condition by the looks of it, i love that under dash section is that a standard fitment in us spec??

Sweet car, miami blue sounds good too.

what happened to the spider did it get squashed lol

Love swallowtails, keep with your plans.

I'm jealous

nice cars you have there, and being from Arizona I bet the swallowtail isn't suffering much rust

I like the blue with orange interior idea, it would look good

I think the interior retrim would be sweet, especially as pictured in yer research!

Great cars dude, interesting to see some US members as I don't think we have many?

Mat

That's really nice - whatever colour you choose it'll look good.

I'm curious about the catalytic converter - I didn't know they were around as early as 1976, and I wasn't aware that VW put one on a Mk1 tintop at all. Is it an aftermarket addition?

Rich

the under dash section is standard for a lot of us specs. except that its not often that i see them. and buying one a rare find unless its on a whole car. at least thats what i have found thru my own experiance. the other color i was thinking was all white and paint the engine compartment 76 ball orange. the underside of the rusted hood on the 79 is painted that color and it looks really nice. also adds charicter. ill post a pic of it. or mint with a tan or brown interior. what do you guys think?
as for rust. there is vertualy none on both cars. the 79 has some in spots but no major stuff at all. except the hood :wink:
also if anyone has any lowback seats that they are willing to ship to me i would love to buy them. if i cant find any im going to buy some gti seats because the backrests dont narrow at the top and im planning to cut the headrest off and reupholstering them that way.

not too bad? what do you think?

Hiya

Look forward to seeing the progress pics!  8)

Swallow tails rock
How expensive and/or difficult is it too import from states?

it cost me 800 to ship it from arizona to washington which is ablout 3000 miles... and thta was just on a truck. you would need truck, boat, and truck to get it from the states. im assuming it would be expensive but i have never checked.

im waiting to get my camera back. then im takin pics. me and a buddy tore everything out of the swallowtail and its lookin nice. i found a little rust. the air conditioning tube leaked or something and over time rotted a small corner. very easy fix. i took the seats that were in it appart and am going to put them in the rat. also stripped the steeringwheel that ill put in the rat as well. ill have pics in a day or two.



booyacha

concunningham said

Swallow tails rock
How expensive and/or difficult is it too import from states?

Look on some bus forums for info on this - people do it all the time with type 2s etc…

That is a sweet find and I'm loving your ideas on which way to go, well thought out is a way to save on headaches.

Looking good mate

liking the 79 too.. almost as ratty as mine!! see link below, i got all those stickers including the Ding Dong one.. ebay LOL

washington sucks to work on a car without a garage.
its pourning down rain


check out my new seats.
and new carpet




i need a new camera to take better pics of stuff.



so, on to the swallowtail, this is my workplace




i was going to take off the wheels and discovered they had these stupid gorilla nuts on them that im not sure how to take off.



are the brake lines supposed to go inside the car? never seen this before on any car


and there is my rust. the car has ac. is that stock for a 75? crazy. anyways there is a little drain tube that i think was just unhooked for a while and it drained on the floor. there are two spots where the rust goes thru, easy fix. there wasent even any rust under the window sills when i took the windows off.






i was researching popouts and i think im going to do a custom popout on all my windows. im planning to buy the side popouts on ebay, but im going to get stuff from old bugs to put on the rear windows and then im going to put them on the bottoms of the rear hatch to pop out the bottom and then im going to look into doing the same on the front window at the bottom to pop it out forward like this



just a little
also does anyone have pics of the original colors for the swallowtails?

still un decided about the color and im going to be getting ready to sandblast and paint soon. i need to make decisions
 8O
and if anyone has lowback seats for sale, i want to buy them

think early cars did have brake lines inside car.

Do you know you have a Wolf  8O in your yard that likes being photographed with MK1s :dontknow:

wow couple of nice mk1 there mate
like the plans for the swallow tail

Yes early cars have brake lines routed through the body.

Those wheel bolts look like you need an allen key - or have I missed something?

Out of curiosity, are American VWs put together with metric or imperial bolts?

Rich

yeah everything is meterec the same as all othes. its funny because a 10mm socket seems to fit everything on my car