V8 1973 VW Beetle Project by V8 Super Beetle

6 minute(s) of a 270 minute read

Well, it was a great Christmas and I hope everyone's was a great one too! I got my parts from Santa, haha, and I spent all day Saturday going back and forth to get the exhaust work and plumbing done on the car.

These guys did a really good job. The son of the owner did the work. He's been doing custom exhaust work since he was 8 or so, seriously. I think he's around 19 now. They charged me $300 for everything. I provided the FlowMasters. Here are some pictures of the exhaust and plumbing.

He brought the plumbing right up to the pump. You can also see the replacement fuel pump (I changed out the one with the fuel return to simply things).

As you can see there is some pretty tight clearances. This guy worked wonders getting the plumbing around the engine and even around the oil filter. The only thing I'm bummed about is there's not enough room to add my stall dust cover. I completely forgot about that. Oh well.

Plumbing all the way back to the radiator.

Here's the start of the other side of the plumbing.

The exhaust was hung how a typical V8 S10 dual exhaust would be done, but instead of having him run the exhaust all the way back out the rear I had him dump it for simplicity sake.

And here's where the other side of the plumbing ends. Right up to the radiator.

Here's a pic with the new 750 carb installed. Looks great.


More to come soon. Hopefully a video of it running!!!

1-4-2010

I got some more work done this weekend.

I spent I good amount of time searching for the right radiator hoses to button up the plumbing on the car. I also got all the PCV, vacuum and rubber fuel line ready to go. I still need to run a gas line from the tank to the pump though. I also installed the steering box, the steering column (to see how things line up once again), and I mocked up my master cylinder, brake pedal and gas pedal (forgot to take pictures of that. I'll get some up soon). Last but not least, I got the starter installed.

Here are some pics with the hoses tightened and ready for the first start up which is yet to come.

Here you can see I need to get a different water neck because it makes it want to stick up. I found a 360º water neck from Summit I'm going to order. That way I can angle the hose further away from the engine and so it'll tuck under the hook nicely. I'll have to think of a way to secure it which wont be much of a problem.

Here's the 360º neck.

I installed the steering box and drilled a hole so the steering shaft came go through the firewall. The steering wheel mounts in the stock location.

Here you can see where the master cylinder will be. I was mocking up the pedal placement and found that because the foot space is so tight I'll have to gas with the right foot and brake with the left foot. That's how you power brake it anyways. I also plan to just completely cut out the wiper engine compartment. It's really not needed.

More soon.