Tired and worn looking door panels on your Bay window – this blog post shows how we made our Camper look clean and refreshed with a pair of ABS werksberg door cards. Read the rest of this entry »

Vent windows, quarterlights, smokers windows – regardless these are the small opening windows at the leading edge of the front doors. They’re great for ventilation, don’t make that wind buffeting noise that is common on modern cars. Read the rest of this entry »

Want a primer paintjob but also want something waterproof – Epoxy primer is a perfect solution. Here we put DragBus through a bodyshop to get flatted back, skimmed and painted with Sherwin Williams E2A933 Primer Gray. Read the rest of this entry »

With the bumper off and a cut off wheel we strip away the old rusted out panels and show the typical new replacement panels we used. EarlyBay to later Bays had slight changes to the front of the Vans – early bays have low indicators, larger badge sitting on a flat panel, wider air intake and a flat non ribbed front valence. Add to this no-one makes a complete early front panel and you see why some restorations have later noses on earlier Buses. Read the rest of this entry »

If you have small pinholes in your rocker panels there are several options to repair, either cut out the whole rocker and replace the panel or if the holes are small why not weld them shut again and avoid the bondo body filler route. Read the rest of this entry »

Our VW Buses are now over 40 years old, and this in the lifetime of steel that can corrode is a long time. Some of the sheetmetal steel can be replaced, for example rocker covers or sills etc, here we take a quick look at a Brazilian made rear apron for a 1966/67 Volkswagen Camper – sometimes also called a rear valence. Read the rest of this entry »

A Rat style Bus would not be Hoodride unless its lowered and this was on the plan from the start. So out with the old gearbox and in with a upgraded Beetle based gearbox. Read the rest of this entry »

The dampener material is a heavy sticky bitumen like substrate that adheres to the surface of the panel – it adds mass to the sheet metal and thus increases the natural frequency of the vibration – thus reducing the drum sound. The aluminium layer is what you see after applying the dampener.

Now that the sound dampener is in place time to look at the sound absorber. The absorber soaks up the sound as it passes into the material and slows it down – absorbing the sound energy and translating it into heat. The mat we chose also had a thick layer of rubber bonded to the top surface which acts as a reflector to bounce the sound back into the foam to be absorbed. Read the rest of this entry »

How we made our campervan a little quieter

VW did not really spend much time or money making the Split Screen Camper quiet from the factory. Their efforts extended to some thick rubber mats up front and in the middle and then in the most important areas they splashed out on some thin strips of ‘material’ above the engine at the back of the bus with a loading mat on top. Not quite up to modern day standards and definitely not enough to have a conversation in the front of the Bus without shouting. Read the rest of this entry »

Early VW Campers from 55 or so through to 1963 had front door trim panels with pockets – small packets for maps and other necessary VW related equipment – big enough for a torch or a map etc. In 1964 the pockets were deleted in favour of a door detent arm arrangement – the two interfering with each other meant the pockets were no more – or that they were a cost saving. These pockets were, like the original panels, made from fibreboard, and over time they absorbed moisture and will gradually deteriorate until they cease to function. Read the rest of this entry »