By Lance Plahn, Australia
You can read about Lances buggy here.
Working as a mechanic at a VW repair shop for many years, with the beach on one side and farming/cattle properties on the other, I got the chance to work on all types of VW's including the VW Country Buggies and an array of registerable beach buggies. One thing you quickly notice with the beach buggies was that they were a fad toy (buy - play - sell) with the owners spending little or no money on maintenance or enhancement. They had no brakes, stock 1200 brakes that needed a full rebuild, complete with poor handling mainly due to tired and weak chassis (these vehicles were only on the road when they crossed it)
A little while ago I purchased a very tired Kalita beach buggy, requiring a major rebuild and extensive fiberglass work. I checked out my old VW books and manuals, even the web. Spoke to many beach buggy owners, drawing on my own experiences, then mapped out a plan of attack. I wanted to build a beach buggy that was reliable and fun to drive, but at the same time functional and practical. There is plenty advice and information out there, but you have to find and collaborate it. Below is a list of improvements/modifications I did to the Kalita during the rebuild. It's by no means complete and only list of improvements/modifications, but a good starting point.
ENGINE
Just a couple of issues that continually occur when using a VW engine
Fit all the tinware VW made for the engine, including the two rear tinware pieces around the pulley. This may slow the entry of foreign material into the engine by the crank pulley scroll, and offer some protection for the fan belt
I made and fitted extra tinware to the outer edge of the cylinder cover, to prevent water from splashing onto the spark plug and leads.
If buggy extractors are used, make and fit extra tinware to fill the void left by the absent heater boxes, to retain air pressure and flow, plus protection for the push rod tubes.
Consider modifying the dog style fan housing to accept the wider seven-row type4 oil cooler as opposed to the stock five-row oil cooler.
Weld a washer to the centre outer tappet cover to enable you to tie wire the tappet cover clip to the washer, reducing the chance of an object unclipping the tappet cover.
GEARBOX
In the centre at the top of the gearbox selector housing is a breather hole, it may allow water to enter the gearbox while negotiating water crossings. Thus requiring the gearbox oil to be changed, at worst harming the gearbox. To reduce the possibility of water entering the gear box, drill and tap the vent hole, screwing in a steel brake line fitting, with a straight section pipe welded to the fitting, then bend the pipe to desired angle, fit a length of rubber hose with a fuel filter at the other end, securing in a high dry area. Of course the selector housing should be removed to carry out this task.
Wheel hop is a situation that occurs from stock beetles to all out drag cars, but in a beach buggy negotiating a loose embankment it can be intolerable. To eliminate, first check the basics, gear box mount in good order and tight, torsion bar rubbers good, and flexible clutch tube having sufficient bend, 38mm deflection is required. Many owners fit strap type supports, most do little other than come loose. The system I prefer requires a 6mm plate bolted to the four lower gear box to differential housing bolts (use cardboard to make a template) welded to pipe that extends past the horns/frame, a bracket is welded to the horn/frame with a Kombi gear box mount (P/N 211599481) at each end, between the two. But it does hang down a little, so I made mine to go over the top.
FRONT END
There is much written about Caster, and how it affects the Beetle's handling, causing it to wander when owners lower the front end. It is the same for buggy owners that raise the rear end, especially by using very large rear tyres. Standard caster is 3 to 4 degrees, but aim for around 6 degrees. To adjust, you fit Caster wedges between the bottom beam and bulkhead; this tips the beam out at the bottom and increases the caster to eliminate wandering. Caster is a Feel angle and does not affect tyre wear; caster is like the angle on the front forks of a pushbike or on the wheels on a shopping trolley.
When browsing through a VW parts book on the Type 181, I noticed VW fitted a brace between the shock tower and top beam. If VW do this as standard format on their off road vehicles, maybe buggy owners should do it too. I cut 200mm of 50mm x 50mm x 3mm RHS diagonally in half, giving a brace for each side, then welded into position, along with seam welding the shock towers.
Front-end adjuster or cutting the beam and rotating the middle torsion bar anchor will raise the front. Replacing the outer double torsion bars with one solid one (next one in, from another front end) will stiffen up the front and raise it, but the front end no long supports the heavier steel Beetle body, a stock front end usually works well.
Note, front sway bar should be removed for off road and sandy terrain
REAR SUSPENSION
I have found questions/request to raising the rear suspension are in the biggest demand. When worked hard they do sag quickly, requiring resetting. One big problem to cause sagging is rear toe-in being out of specification. Too much (toe-in) and big wheels drag the suspension down. Do yourself a favor and get the rear alignment adjusted, especially after resetting the rear torsion bars.
When resetting rear torsion bars, a hot tip is to fit the larger diameter torsion bars from the type 3 wagons. Also ensure the four torsion bars rubbers are in very good order, otherwise replace.
The rubbers are ok but wear quickly, I have used the urethane ones, but be warned they are Very Noisy and near impossible to stop them squawking when the rear suspension moves. It is hard to know what specification to set your buggy rear suspension to, i.e. heavier bars and now a lighter body, but I have found stock specification for that pan to be close. Always measure suspension height before and after and record that along with what degrees you set it to for reference if/when you do the reset again.
BRAKES
If you are using tall offroad wheel/tyre combination on the rear it is important to improve the rear brakes. This is achieved by using Type 3 wagon rear brakes.
STEERING COLUMN
Having the Blinker/Wiper switch controls from a 1972 Super Bug, complete with ignition lock, I decided to use it. With the super bug outer column being too short, I modified a 40hp outer column to super bug specifications. Topped it all off by using a 1500 steering shaft, thus giving a functional steering column lock, plus some safety with a collapsible shaft. All by mix and matching stock VW parts
ANTI-THEFT
In reality, if a professional thief wants a vehicle there is very
little stopping them from taking it. That is not to say we are just going to hand over our
possessions, no sir, we have to make it as hard as we can for joy riders and professionals
alike. By fitting one or more anti-theft devices, here are a few suggestions,
Kill switch - coil negative to switch to earth.
Steering wheel/pedal bar lock.
Fuel cut off valve - fitted between tank and engine, turn ignition on and it operates an
electronic valve, ignition of, turns the electronic valve off (no fuel flow). The
advantage being, a would be thief jumps starts the vehicle travels a short way and stops
because of no fuel, thieves do not wish to go to the trouble of finding out what's wrong.
Battery switch (suggest marine type) - fitted on the positive lead between battery and
starter and positioned between the seat, make it hard to by-pass. Also prevents flat
battery due undesirables turning on current operator in your absence.
ROLL BAR
The roll bar will have to be constructed to conform to the laws of your state/country. A typical set up would be a main hoop with two rearward braces, but this set up can be taken a couple of sets further. Where the rear braces mount to the body, plate both sides of the body (100 x 100 mm x 6 mm plate) then continue the pipe down, and mount to the chassis forks/horns, using a old tow bar clamp, thus mount the main hoop back to the chassis.
Fit a smaller hoop (height) under the dash, this will give a good mount for the steering column. The column can be made to be adjustable by slotting and shimming. It also provides a mounting point for an adjustable chicken bar (a T handle out of the dash)
With two hoops in place, one front the other to the rear of the vehicle, gives an opportunity to fit a side intrusion bar, a piece of pipe running lengthways down the outside of the body, under the body roll, mounting through the body to the two hoops.
JACK
Very few buggy owners give much thought to a spare, not to mention a jack. I made a roof rack for my buggy and fitted the spare to the roof rack. Retain the spare with a bolt through a 300mm disc 5mm thick; yes an overkill, but this disc doubles as a jack base if required.
A Kombi jack or 80 series Landcruisers would have sufficient lift, but I wanted a Hi Lift jack (to lift the big wheels out of deep holes) but being a true VW owner I did not want to spend much money. Having a few early VW jacks laying around, I thought it would be easy to make a hi-lift jack by replacing the shaft with a longer one. A careful look revealed the early VW steering shaft was the same inside and outside diameters, a very inexpensive but functional hi lift jack.
Note, if you wish to do tyre repairs and need to break the bead, you can jack the vehicle up on the tyre, then turn over and repeat, place a piece of wood measuring 10 x 20 cm (4 x 8 inches) between the foot of the jack and the tyre to distribute the pressure.
Trust the above information is of some help to you in building your buggy, if you have any comments or queries regarding the above, Please feel free to contact me by E-mail on lanceplahn@harveynorman.com.au
And remember to enjoy your beach buggy and keep it up right.