The Karmann Ghia - This photo of the Karmann plant which shows the Ghia and Beetle Cabriolet sharing the same assembly line at the same time always strikes me as proof of a bygone era when the assembly line worker was a craftsman and not a human robot in a repetitive job with color the only variety. The Karmann Ghia represents one of the last truly "hand-built" cars, manufactured in the same lead body solder intensive manner as the 356 Porsche (which discontinued production in 1965). The Karmann Ghia was produced from 1955 to 1974 with only minor changes to the bumpers to conform to governmental 5 mph impact requirements and tail lights for safety requirements. A total of only 19,406 Karmann Ghia sedans were produced in the 1967 model year and many 1967 features are one year only, making them a bit more unique and collectible.

Since I already have a Karmann-built Beetle Cabriolet, 912 and 914 it only seemed logical to add a Ghia to my collection someday. I had been on the lookout for a nice clean late '60s Ghia with the elaborate chromed bumpers that was original, complete and had never been hit (especially in the nose). Well, someday came out of the blue with a phone call from the mom of one of my favorite baristas, saying the Ghia I had been promising to help them restore when they got the money someday was now for sale and they would prefer it to go to somebody who would restore it right. So now $2500 lighter, I took it off their hands and will get it in good, reliable driving condition fairly quickly. There is a bit of the usual rust in the floorpans and rockerpanels but the replacement sheetmetal pressings are available and you know how I love to MIG weld! I drove it home (about a mile) under its own power and immediately loaded it onto the 4-post lift and got to work on it!

Entry: 8/18/10 - I think the first major repair on this Ghia should be the sagging driver's door hinges and missing check strap. I was prepared to beat the hell out of the hinge screws with a hand impact driver and hammer or at worst drill a couple out. Amazingly all 8 came out with only a large Phillips screwdriver with a wrench on the hex bolster on the screwdriver's shaft to give maximum leverage. It appears the A-pillar is extremely solid with any rust at the very bottom of the cavity.

I had the same luck with the hinge screws in the doors, coming out so nicely that all the screws can be reused. The challenge came with removing the upper hinge which bound on the door check strap roller pins. I had to use my air saw to cut the heads of the pins off and only then was I able to remove the old hinge.

I sourced a set of new left side, upper and lower door hinges through Karmann Ghia Parts & Restoration for about $80 for the set as well as the door checkstrap & roller rebuild kit for about $30. The reproduction door hinges look to be quite precisely machined and have additional webbing cast into them for added strength. I'm going to test mount the door to see if the new hinges fit and adjust before attempting any major cosmetic work on the door. I have high hopes this hinge swap is going to be a piece-of-cake.

Entry: 8/20/10 - My prediction that the hinge swap would be a piece-of-cake came true. The new reproduction hinges went into place without any major issues besides needing to grind two notches in the bottom of the hole behind the upper hinge in the door with my Dremmel tool to allow it to be installed with the checkstrap roller pins already installed instead of the nightmare of installing them with the hinge in the door. Once the hinges were installed, none of the modifications were visible.

Installing the door went pretty easily too, a few adjustments and a new rubber centering wedge installed on the back edge and I have no more sagging and the original "crisp" engagement with the latch mechanism has returned. The reproduction door hinges from Karmann Ghia Parts & Restoration are top notch! A few new door hinge screws to replace those with cosmetic issues needs to be put on the parts list for the next order. I'll remove the door, strip all the old rubber weatherstripping, repaint the inside, install new rubber weatherstripping next to complete the job.

Entry: 8/22/10 - The next problem needing attention on my new Ghia was the left front headlight. It doesn't take a trained eye to see that the car was bumped on the headlight just hard enough to dent the chrome ring beyond repair (it was found inside the car) and the headlight was damaged so after all the adjustments were at their limits, the beam shot out at about 11 o'clock instead of straight forward. There is quite a bit of BONDO around the headlight bucket on the fender which lets me know this will require some major reworking when I eventually restore the car someday. Removal of the headlight adjuster mechanism from the headlight bucket quickly showed why the adjustment was so far off, the little metal mounting tab holding the adjuster to the bucket was torn loose in the impact. I removed it from the adjuster, straightened it and media blasted it so it would be easy to MIG weld back into place. The holes where the spotwelds ripped loose can be seen at the 3 o'clock position inside the headlight bucket.

I prepped the area around the mounting tab in the headlight bucket for welding with a grinder bit on my Dremmel tool prior to some creative use of a sheetmetal screw attached the broken mounting tab back into the correct position. A long machine screw of the correct metric thread size was inserted into the mounting hole to give me something to clip the welder's grounding cable to. A couple quick tack welds with the MIG welder and the mounting tab was back in business.

The old headlight adjuster mechanism is still a bit bent after my best attempts to straighten it and the adjusting screws are stripped but I did what I could to make the beam shoot straight forward. I had ordered an inexpensive reproduction headlight ring from California Import Parts (of Canada... LOL!) for less than $25 and mounted it in place as well as I could given the damage to the existing adjuster mechanism. I'll be scrounging for a complete, undamaged used "Hella" marked headlight assembly to use eventually for when I repair the fender correctly during the eventual complete restoration. For now it looks fine for a "driver" and doesn't draw attention to the hack BONDO work it covers.

Entry: 8/23/10 - Fixing the broken checkstrap in the passenger side door was today's project. The only way to get the old checkstrap out was to remove the entire door and then remove the upper hinge the same way I did the one on the driver's side, by sawing off the heads of the checkstrap roller pins with my airsaw. Once the upper hinge was out I removed all the checkstrap pins by sawing them off and then driving them out using a small drift punch. A quick media blast and coat of white rattlecan paint preceeded installation of the new checkstrap and rollers I sourced from Karmann Ghia Parts & Restoration. Reinstalling the hinge with the pins already installed required cutting two notches in the door sheetmetal as I did on the drivers side. Now I'm ready to address cosmetic issues with the doors so I have stripped the weatherstripping and begun to prep the inner door and door jab on the passenger side for a fresh coat of brite white paint to match the outside of the car. I'm also cleaning and lubricating the latch mechanism to see if I can get it to work correctly too.

Entry: 8/24/10 - Today's task was accessing and arresting the rust in the floorpans, starting with the passenger side. Removing the tarboard insulation and scraping and vacuuming up all the rust scales revealed that the pan ahead of the seat is quite solid and the area under and behind the seat has rotted through on the sides where water has pooled in the low area over the years. Once I removed all the scales using a steel wire brush, I gave the area a liberal coat of SEM Rust Converter which seals the rust and converts it to an inert substance that won't rust further. The good news is that the heater channels are still very solid on this side. I will attempt to patch the holes in the rear section using fiberglass and wire window screen to seal the bottom of the car from further moisture penetration until I completely replace the pans during the "body off" restoration someday. For now I'm pleased to see I have something solid enough to drive safely.

Entry: 8/28/10 - I happened across an unissued, 1967 model year owner's manual on eBay for my Ghia and snapped it up so I have the perfect reference manual as to how the car is supposed to work and look. All the warranty coupons are still in the manual, which makes it quite collectible and a nice conversation piece to go with the car. I'm continuing with the cleaning and rust arresting process on the driver's side floorpan and find the area under the seat is just a bit more advanced than on the passenger side. Still nothing too bad to make it unsafe to drive but a bit more patching will be required to keep the moisture out.

Entry: 8/31/10 - I was able to make a little forward progress on the passenger door's cosmetic work today by completing the paint prep work and giving it a coat of rattlecan white paint to freshen it up and match the outside of the car. You can see the two notches I made with my Dremmel tool in the bottom edge of the door checkstrap hole behind the upper door hinge to accommodate installing the roller pins before installing the hinge. Everything looks nice and fresh and new rubber weatherstrip and new black vinyl door panels will look very sharp against the fresh paint.

The driver's side floorpans got a coat of SEM Rust Converter after the scraping and wire brushing was completed to remove all the major rust scales and see more rot than I had first thought. Looks like my plans to fiberglass the holes shut is a bit optimistic and a more thorough approach is going to be required.

I've ordered a set of rear floorpan sheetmetal patch panels from Karmann Ghia Parts & Restoration to replace as much of the rotten metal as possible without removing the body from the floorpan (I'll reserve that for the eventual total restoration project). These smaller floor pan panels are made to fix this common problem and can be grafted in with a little creative trimming, we'll see how much of the original pan I can keep intact and still have enough "meat" (healthy steel) left to MIG weld to.

Entry: 9/2/10 - The passenger side door is pretty much wrapped-up and ready to be set aside. I cleaned and lubricated the sticking latch mechanism and reinstalled it along with the new door centering wedge with new screws prior to gluing in the new weatherstrip. Good old-fashioned wood clothespins are the perfect clamp for holding the weatherstrip in place without marring the paint. I used Wurth rubber cement to bond the weatherstrip to the door after removing the white powdery release agent from the rubber with mineral spirits on a paper towel.

I sat the new TMI reproduction black vinyl door panel in place with the door release handle and window crank to get an idea of how it contrasted with the new paint and I think we have a winner! I still need to rehab the original '67 model year only arm rests with a coat of black vinyl dye before they are ready to install.

Entry: 9/8/10 - My set of rear floorpan sheetmetal patch panels from Karmann Ghia Parts & Restoration arrived today with a free gift! Dent in the middle of the front bumper? What dent in the middle of the front bumper? A Washington State collector vehicle license plate is only used on the back of the car so removing the old front plate revealed a little dent that is now hidden by this sweet little European-style oval license plate. I'm thinking of adding a small "1967" to it.

The floorpan sheetmetal pressings are very substantial, perhaps 19-gauge from the way they look. I'm starting to evaluate my options of how to weld them in without removing the seat tracks since they're still anchored to nice solid sheetmetal.

Entry: 9/9/10 -Cutting out the rotten driver's side rear floorpan was today's task and my pneumatic airsaw (at the bottom of the photo below) made quick work of it. I wanted to start by making the most conservative cut, removing the minimal healthy sheetmetal so I could set the rotten piece I removed on top of the new sheet metal patch panel and establish a "footprint" for deciding how much of the new panel to use. The front part of the new pressing is identical to the original pan so it should graft easily but the back section is deeper and seems more Beetle-style (for holding a battery) so it will take some major fitting work but it will work. The good thing is that all the floorpan metal left in the car is very solid and easy to weld to so this will be a very solid patch once it's all in place. Another good thing is all but the section below the rear heater duct tube can be welded from the top side, MIG welding upside down is nearly impossible since the "puddle" drips! Cosmetic work on the driver's side door is also making good progress towards paint.

Entry: 9/20/10 - After studying my options for modifying the generic "Beetle" floorpan sheetmetal pressing, I decided to shorten it by cutting out the corners and moving the bend in the bottom forward about 4". I used the rotten section as a template to determine the correct positions of the corners and traced them onto the new sheetmetal. The first cuts were made in order to straighten out the straight section at the back and rebend the bottom edge to roughly the same radius as before.

The next steps were cutting out the corners from the original pressing and relocating them in approximately the same location as the corners on the rotten orignal. A lot of careful cutting and fitting ended up with some very nice fitting corner pieces.

A series of tack welds on each side of the sheetmetal using my MIG welder ended up with a nice solid pan again. I'm not worried about welding them up water tight, I'll use seam sealer to accomplish that.

The original rotten section was once again laid over the new sheetmetal pressing and all but about a ½" allowance was cut from the excess material on the new pressing to allow for fitting the new piece once in the car.

Finally the new patch was test fitted in the floor of the car and it is quite close to the final size. I'll need to clean up and straighten the cuts made to remove the rotten section for cosmetic purposes. A little more fitting and prepping the old metal for welding and the new patch panel will be ready for welding in.

Entry: 9/21/10 - Prepping the metal around the opening in the floorpan was pretty straight forward. Outside the car; remove the undercoating around the outside edge with a wire wheel on a drill, about a ½" wide where the patch panel would make contact. Inside the car; grind the edge back about ¼" to remove all the rust and expose bare steel where the welds will be made. Welding went pretty quickly too, making tack welds with my MIG welder, successively closer to each other, alternating sides to keep any heat from building up and warping the metal. Each weld was about an inch apart and produced a solid bond, no need to make a complete bead due to the risk of fire from a spark igniting the carpet padding or headliner.

From the underside you can see the welds made good penetration and the white ash is the weld-thru primer burning off. I'll fill the seam with a thick coat of 3M seam sealer from a caulk gun and smooth it to hide the overlapped patch panel prior to a thick coat of undercoating. A secure and watertight patch is completed on the driver's side, now on to the passenger side.

The pneumatic body saw made quick work of removing the rotten section and it's a mirror image of the driver's side but with a bit less extensive corrosion.

Deja-vu all over again but a mirror image. I should have all the floorpan work done within a day or two, given that the second time doesn't have all the analysis and planning, just repeat what I just did.

Entry: 9/26/10 - I'm a bit large for curling up and crawling into the back of my Ghia to strip all the carpet and padding out from behind the back seat and parcel shelf and sealing any rust I find. But with a big hole in the floorpan behind the passenger seat, yet to be filled with new sheetmetal, I can stand on the floor and work quite comfortably! So over the last couple days I've pulled out all the old carpet and jute felt padding and exposed the painted surfaces below. At first blush, it looked like there was a lot of rust but in reality it was only on the surface and any scales quickly removed with a wire wheel on my drill or 80-grit sandpaper.

Once all the rust scales and dust was all vacuumed up I gave the entire surface a good coat of SEM Rust Seal, just like I did to the floorpans. All the original padding is in one piece and will work perfectly once re-glued. I'm actually quite pleased with the overall solid condition of the areas prone to rusting through. For a 43-year-old car from the Pacific NW, this is a really solid little car and now that the rust has been arrested, it is preserved for decades to come. Now welding in the new passenger side floor patch is much safer too, since there's less flammable material inside the car looking for a spark to land in it.

Entry: 9/27/10 - The second floorpan installation on the passenger side took about half the time. I started cutting down the new pan pressing about 11 AM and had it completely welded into the car by 5 PM! The finished product is an exact mirror image of the first one but with a lot less steps because no experimenting was required. All the seams and welds will be hidden under tarboard insulation so not much need to dress the welds.

From the bottom of the car it won't be obvious that the pans have been replaced when I get done hiding the seams with 3M seam sealer and a thick coating of high-build undercoating. A little dressing of the welds where I grafted the corners in the back of the pan to shorten it will be necessary but that should take all of about 5 minutes. Now I can concentrate on the headliner and dashboard next. Nothing much is happening on this project until I finish construction on my new shop and move in.

Entry: 9/30/11 - Wow, it's been a year since I had a chance to work on the Ghia! Good news, I've finished a "revolutionary change period" in my life and it's time to start working on the Ghia again. In the last year I've moved to a country acreage, built a new, bigger "facility" for my hobby, and am finally all set up to begin restoration work again. My new shop has 50% more floor space at 24' x 36' and I've built in the necessary work bench and cabinets to keep my tools out of the dust and mess that comes with media blasting and metal working. Like the Three Little Pigs, this, my third shop is the culmination of years of thought and planning and it is a joy to spend time in when the gloomy winter weather sets in.

Separated by a wall from the shop is a 36' x 60' climate-controlled "showroom" where I display all my projects in one place; the future, in progress and completed ones. Above the showroom is a loft of the same dimensions to serve as a warehouse for organization and storage of all the parts of the dismantled projects since I usually have a couple going at one time. It's been a hell of a lot of work to get this done in a year but my productivity and enjoyment of my hobby should be greatly enhanced. Life out in the country is pretty great too and I have immediate access to some beautiful country roads without having to drive my classic old cars on a freeway to get to them. Not a bad way to start a new chapter of my life and I hope to be blogging frequently again soon.