Wednesday 19 August 2015

Sam's Beetle - Upgrades! Part 1

After a little use Sam's Bug had a few engine issues, so we thought a Subaru upgrade to match the Bus was in order. We also decided to do our own Front and Rear Disc Brake Kits, too.
Easy Job!
We found a great Forum Post by an Australian guy which gave us most of the help, but the install really did turn out a lot easier than anticipated, so if you have been worried about doing this yourself, don't!

Sam's brief was to not cut big holes in the '67 to retain it's original appearance.

We went for a 98 EJ20 again, They are the same size as the VW engine across the valve covers so it will go in without cutting the bodywork or removing the rear valance.

This is all we had to remove from the inside of the rear valance on each side.


As with the Bus, Richard at RJES would be our main source of VW/Subaru conversion parts.
We used a Kennedy Adaptor plate/Flywheel kit that came up on eBay, but I beleive RJES are doing them now. The Throttle Body Reverser, Fuel Pump/Filter, Throttle Cable and Wiring Loom were all taken care of by RJES. A stage 1 Kennedy Clutch was aslo installed on Richard's recommendation.

New Gearbox mounts were installed along with one of our Gearbox Cross Member plates from our Split Screen Rear IRS Kit, as no other engine mount was being used we thought this 6mm thick item would give extra bracing.







The engine first trial fit went like this...


With the Generator off and the cam end covers removed it when in just like a VW!

For the Radiator we used an Alfa 33, as recommended on the Forum, and 2 9" fans.
We cut the bottom off the spare wheel well dropped it 40mm and used the shaped panel to make an intake scoop. The panel at the back of the radiator was cut out, but we left the area around the body mount to retain some structure. It is stood on two bottom plates bolted to the sides of the spare wheel well an held at the top with a single bolt through the Alfa top mount hole. It sits so the bottom is no lower that the front of the framehead.