Ideas for total rebuild of an old VW bus?

[Flipper_1938]

Dad has a 1959 VW bus that was used as a storage shed for 40 or so years. He was going to sell it (if it didn't sell quick, he was going to crush it), but has since had a change of heart.

The frame is probably toast since it sat on the ground for a while (we robbed the front end and steering from it in the 90's)

Kinda thinking about modernizing it enough that it would be a fun daily driver....modern fuel injected motor, decent brakes, airconditioning etc. Not against the idea of doing a full frame swap (front/mid/rear engine). Steering seems to be the most interesting hurdle.

What's the most interesting bus transformation that you guys have seen/thought about?

This is what it looks like now. Only way to go is up.

 

[Arkansawer]

 

[Gastrick]

I like em with stock exterior......but really low.

 

[skull]

V dub

PLAN A; depending on budget and skill level, put a 2 X 4 square tubing chassis
under it with IFS rack and pinion in front and a 4-link panhard bar set-up
in the rear, nice small block (make of your'e choice) and a nice O.D tranny.

put in a new floor pan 4'' higher than the stock pan to get that low look with-out losing drivability. install good air conditioning and a few intiorer goodies and drive the heck outta it

PLAN B; find a sull size chevy, ford or dodge van, use the frame and parts off it.


Later[dr

 

[42chevy]

Rear engine with a V8, that would make an awesome sleeper

 

[CORPO]

I know i have a picture of one somewhere with a big mid engine diesel... Cant seem to find it tonight.. ill look again tomorrow.. unless someone beats me to it...

But you should definitely do something with it.. they look great sitting in the weeds

 

[Reign]

BAG IT!!!!!!!

ok now that i have that out of the way. rebuild the frame, bag it, find a nice porche engine to install in it. The porche engine is what all VW Bus owners go to since they are really easy to install in those and they are just great engines. there is an all black racing bus that races road course with a porche engine in it. i think you should go the route of nice engine and laying frame. i really like the second Bus in the pictures above.

 

[Reign]

ok here is the bus i was talking about

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XvjVvFdMIY&feature=related

i love watching him fly by all of those racing type vehicles like the Lotus and the STI

Here is another video for you

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/318228/race_taxi_in_spa_2006/

and the website for them

http://www.race-taxi.ch/indexx.htm

just an idea, but i think you should still body drop it and bag it along with a nice porche 993 engine in it.

 

[cycledog]

Lowered of course. There was a guy in town that had one on a tube frame and a 440 mid engine. It was way cool.

 

[Gregster]

Any way you choose will be cool , those are some neat old rides

 

[bullet]

 

[Shea Laking]

Low. Two-tone dark on top, light below, divided at the body line. Olds Toronado mid-engine with 455 OR Cadillac Eldorado mid-engine with 500.

Did I mention LOW?

If you used the Caddy driveline, you could rip off the big Caddy leaves and crest from the grille of some PiMp'S Escalade and swap it for the VW badge on the nose...

Pics are good, doesn't matter what you end up doing.[[P

Regards,
Shea

 

[cantwell.colton]

see if this works -- ive always liked this.

side not ... could always run an entire toyota twin turbo mr2 set up

 

[Flipper_1938]

I went and looked at the bus again today....

Y'all probably aren't gonna believe this, but the damn bus has less than 2500 miles on it!!!!

Dad said that the bus had a catastrophic engine failure real early on (less than 2,000 miles). It broke a rod and damaged the case. The dealership tried to weld up the damage, and did a ****ty job. The rebuild didn't last very long and the bus was parked.

My granddaddy bought the bus from the original owner when it was around four years old. He put a 36 horse bug motor in it (from tha 57 bug that my dad and his brothers killed by turning into a go-kart by pulling the body off and just running around on the pan). He drove it for a couple of years, but never drove it farther away from the house than he could walk back. He never trusted it

It got parked in the woods in 1970.

The 36 is gone, so I'm guessing it died.

 

[Sam_Fear]

Those are sweet stock looking. Low is good. Stock height is good. Ya really cant go wrong as long as you don't go crazy. Keep it simple.

 

[Hotrodsparky]

I love the pool table!!

 

[Reign]

I love the pool table!!

seems rather difficult to drive though

 

[LarryH]

They make adapters to adapt several different engines to the stock trans axle. Every thing from a Pinto, Subaru, V-6 to a V-8.

Two tone prime it (dark gray top, light gray bottom or red top with light gray bottom), slam it and drive the wheels off of it.

 

[Flipper_1938]

They make adapters to adapt several different engines to the stock trans axle. Every thing from a Pinto, Subaru, V-6 to a V-8.

I thought about doing an engine swap on the stock VW chassis, but I don't think the 1959 trans can handle that much horsepower.

 

[jfg455]

The only one I saw that was cool (just my opinion) was one in hot rod a few years back. It was all silver, 2"top chop, mid mout SBC, interior was all aluminum paneled and bead rolled, had a nice aluminum steering wheel from Speed way (the one with the nubs on the back). Sat low and ran 10's in the quarter. Windows were all lexan and the front door windows were split and slid. Just my $.02