Steve Carters Beetle

This car has now been sold, I'm now building a 1973 1303 Beetle using a lot of parts from this car

The 1972 Superbug was purchased by me when it was only 6 months old in 1973. Some factory options have been fitted to make the car stand out from the crowd pop-out 3/4 windows, intermittent windscreen wipers, night and day interior rear view mirror and heated rear windscreen

The car has recently undergone a full restoration; an Aerolook kit supplied by Vintage Vee-Dub Supplies has been fitted to give the car that German Look / Kafer Cup look. Kurt Martienson from Precious Metal (02 4294 2455) who is well known in Hot Rodding circles has given the bug its new lease of life, Kurt was very impressed with the lack of rust in the body and also the fact that it had never been involved in a serious accident despite having travelled in excess of 420,000 kilometres. Kurt took the car back to bare metal and file finished the whole car, that's enthusiasm for you. A louvered front apron allows airflow into the radiator.

The powerplant caused the most radical change to the car. With a little creative engineering this Beetle was to house a 2.1 litre water-cooled Kombi motor purchased new in 1988. The 2.1 litre water cooled Transporter engine, is a DJ engine number type 10.5:1 compression & 112 BHP. It originally ran with 46 IDA Webbers and a Gene Berg Hydraulic 110 cam, as seen in the left hand image. In preparation for the turbo the motor has been decompressed to 8.0:1 and the cam changed back to standard. The 1.4 rockers have been retained. I also did away with the water cooled oil cooler and fitted a front mounted air cooled oil cooler with a Setrab thermo block.

Heads have been reworked by Henry Spicak and have heavier dual springs and use 1.4:1 Gene Berg Ratio Rockers

The Autronic SMC programmable EFI system is used and is running superbly thanks to Leigh and Quick Fit Motorsport in Hornsby.

Inlet manifold is standard Wasserboxer/Vanagon with a Nissan Skyline throttle body, Ford Falcon idle control valve, 410 cc VW Type 3 TLE injectors (too small) and a Bosch blow off valve from a Saab turbo is also fitted.

Exhaust is a 4 into 1 extractor, 1.5 inch pipes and a 3 inch system all the way to the tailpipe and was ceramic coated by Competition Coatings in Sydney, the muffler is a Hooker Headers Aero chamber and is very quiet.

The turbo is an IHI RHB6 Turbo with a water to air intercooler made by Dave Stocker from LMS Engineering, a Grooco agricultural pump moves the cooling water for the intercooler to a heater core in front of the radiator and then to a motor bike radiator under the left rear mudguard behind the wheel, this radiator also retains its cooling fan and gets airflow from the rear wheel.

In fitting the cooling system all of the standard Kombi cooling parts were squeezed into the rear of the car and the water pumped to the front via stainless steel tubes mounted under the floor pan. A modified Ford Transit van radiator and V8 Davies Craig thermo fan take care of cooling the water at the nose of the vehicle. Cool air is brought into the radiator through a factory louvered front apron. A modified Mercedes thermostat controls the water flow, which cuts in at 85c degrees instead of 87c.

Original heater channels were retained and warm air is directed from a Toyota troop carrier heater core under the rear seat to the interior via an early Audi 100 brake cooling fan.

The gearbox is 3.88 ratio from a 1976 Beetle with Albins ratio gears, 3.55 1st (taller), 2.00 2nd (taller), 1.30 3rd (lower) and 4th is also an Albins gear but is the standard .93 ratio. A Quaife LSD is also used. Axles are by Superboot and use Kombi CVs. Locating the gearbox are original trans mounts and a home made front mount. Additional rigidity is also achieved via a brace connecting to the chassis forks and rear luggage area, read more about this here.

On the rear are adjustable Porsche 944 trailing arms and spring plates along with 23.5 mm VW Type 3 wagon torsion bars with Koni Sports shock absorbers.

Rack and pinion steering from 1975 (L) 1303 has been fitted. Whiteline sway bars are used all round, the front having adjustable caster and rear adjustable stiffness. The wheels are17 x 8 and 17 x 9, 3 piece replica Porsche alloy wheels shod with 215/40x17 Falken GRB 2 tyres and 235/45 x 17 Falken Azenis ST 115 tyres.

The wheels where made in Japan and came beautifully boxed with the following inscription on the side.

Super Weapon
Advanced technologies are symbol of richness.
For them, to seek richness, new five spoke wheel.
Super Weapon is born from first.
In the future to correspond with high-powered car, the history of Super Weapon happened.
Fashion is repeated but technology never returns forever.

They must have used the same Japanese - English dictionary as the developers of Playstation's Gran Tourismo 2

Brakes are 4-wheel disc, Porsche 996 rear Brembo 4 spots on the front with 911 Turbo cross drilled & ventilated rotors and ventilated & slotted 944 Porsche rotors at the rear with Porsche Brembo 4 spots rear callipers from a Boxster, no power assistance is necessary, see some early photos of this conversion here

The interior houses Recaro Concord front seats and a matching re-trimmed rear seat. A re-trimmed leather Momo "Jacky Stewart" sports steering wheel is fitted. Stewart Warner and some VDO instruments are used along with a Autometer shift light which is controlled by the Autronic ECU, in the interest of keeping my license an after market Dana cruise control is fitted.


The alternator is moved to the left hand side of the motor, the Saab blow-off valve is now venting back into the air filter and the Ford Falcon idle control valve can be seen in top RH side of the engine bay.			The exhaust is up very high, the tramp bar is a little low.
At the rear is the Ford Transit van radiator I'm using now, then the oil cooler and at the front a heater core used to cool the inter-cooler water.			Sorry about the poor shot, the inter-cooler is behind the rear seat.
A slightly better photo of the inter- cooler taken from inside the car. The coolant reservoir was also relocated behind the back seat to allow more room in the engine bay.

	Left is the strut brace, this incorporates a mounting point for the spare wheel which is mounted on top of the fuel tank. the diagonal arms on the brace bolt to the chassis. Front suspension is lowered with McPherson struts up front that have been shortened 4 inches to allow the fitting of Mazda RX7 Koni Sports shocks. The front struts also feature adjustable lower spring platforms, smaller diameter 150-pound springs allow the front wheels to have sufficient clearance for the Porsche alloys, Vintage VeeDub Supplies supplied the springs. Read more about this conversion here. The photo on the left is an old photo taken before the bake upgrade and car restoration.