The Body Begins!
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I started sanding with the trunk area, the goal was to get it down to bare metal to make sure that there was no hidden surprises. Schnitzel has been painted only once during his time on the road other than the original paint. The paint in the trunk is mostly original, except for where I had holes welded up from a gas heater. One of the nastiest spots in most Beetles is the brake fluid area, here I have it cleaned and the metal derusted.
Another tricky spot is the tire well, almost always a rust covered spot. Here is has been cleaned, there are two drilled holes in the bottom of it (to drain water) and a crack in the metal running between them. I am just going to leave the crack in the metal as it is. There are also several dents in the bottom from the past drivers and whatever they ran over, these wounds will also be left as is.
The front firewall area is in fine shape, not a sign of damage or rust. Just a lot of dirt, undercoating and old paint to sand off here.
I was really impressed with the front apron, I kept expecting to see something covered up here. But nothing showed up here, just a perfect front apron. Even the seal clamp all the way around the trunk is in perfect shape with no rust.
The fender wells were equally impressive. First I stripped the undercoating off with chemical stripper, it only took a few minutes to brush it on and wipe it off with paper towels. The undercoating comes off very easily, then I sanded it down and viola! A perfect fender well!
On October 4th, Schnitzel had some visitors stop by! Rick and Renny from Pennsylvania stopped by to say "hi" to Schnitzel in their red Convertibles. Someday Schnitzel will be intact again and cruising about, too!
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Coming Soon Schnitzel's restoration continues!

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