Thought it would be better to continue this away from the original thread in the For Sale area.

Cris bought the bus as an imported but not registered rolling project about 10 years ago from a friend who he'd known for many years, he was selling it 'in lieu of debt'. Cris did the usual total resto, registered it and used it for 4 years. The van became the club's camp centre at many shows.

Snag was the friend turned out to be a total shark and had no right to sell it and Cris had to hand it to the rightful owner. Cris, at this point, vowed that one day he'd get it back.

He missed out on it twice after that, each time it was too expensive for the condition and each time it looked a little worse. It was last seen on the South Coast looking very sad.

Then it was found by rickyday33 and brought to Cris' attention by Dannyboy, one of his customers.









At this point we decided that we had to give it a serious go at getting it back. Cris rounded up a budget and we kept an eye on the Salvage website and on the various VW forums - hoping that most people would be put off by the pictures.

On the day there were about 3 other bidders and we let them battle it out. It went above Cris' limit but not above mine so I stuck my hand up and we got it.

At £4500 plus commission it's expensive for a damaged bus but Cris has been collecting parts for it since he lost it, has the facilities to repair it and has the personal tie to it so we weren't going to lose it this time. More importantly he had the wife's permission!

Brought home by Ross, Cris' brother in law who handily has a Shogun and trailer.



Cris set to as soon as it was home, pulling out a lot of the damage with the Shogun and some carefully choreographed driving.



Cris is only allowed one evening a week and most Saturdays to play on cars, he's got a wife and kids to keep happy the rest of the time, so that week he dived straight in...




There's been a lot of spot weld drilling, panel cutting, a bit of heating, a bit of beating and some pulling but it slowly came back out.

Back in the day, when it looked a lot better



Notice the fully working sunroof, no gummed up painted over mess here thankyou! Cris still has the lights, engine, spot lamp etc and it will all go back on. Unfortunately he sold the wheels earlier this year to a fellow club member so they'll have to be re-sourced.

We stripped out all the interior, put in since Cris had the van.

We did find some stragglers from the past though...

Capt Smilie was hiding behind some cloth, notice also the stainless steel foot rest Cris put in for Caroline, his mrs.



Cris has been collecting parts for this bus since he last had it.



Sitting, waiting, looks a little tatty but is actually better than the sliding door on the van. Was meant to go on last time around but never done in time.

Also meant to be repaired last time was the front valance/panel area. The damage visible at the front is on top of an earlier dent which needed/still needs to be done properly.



Managed to get the sides straight, well, the belt line at least. Lower panel is still rippled at this point.



Van has had replacement arch section in its recent past, will have to be done again. Cris has found many of his earlier hurried repairs still looking good, better than some of the more recent sttempts.

Van has also had Late Bay Window front trailing arms, hubs etc fitted to the early beam. Not very good, mucks about with the caster, affects the swinging geometry and leaves you with non-matching wheels.

Stock Drum brakes will be going back on...

Deep breath, and cut...



Because of the lower damage the van is being rebuilt from the top down and the right hand side before the left to allow careful gradual lining up.

Replacement tailgate in place, allowed new slam panel (between tailgate and engine lid) to be fitted. Once the tailgate and engine lid are in place the right hand side could be lined up.

Inner panel behind light unit back in place.

Luckily a couple of our club members also have Splits so Cris has been able to take measurements and reference photo's.



Which could then be skinned



Big thanks to Josh who's awesome at fabricating repair panels, not bad for a chippy!

The damage to the roof, mentioned in the sales info, is a mixture of old and new.

When Cris was restoring the van there were a series of dents which, after a bit of thinking, turned out to be from dropped cable reels back in the day when it was used by a German telecoms company (not Dutch as I previously posted).

There are more, newer dents that appear to be from a badly fitting roofrack, lining up with distortions on the gutters - too square/regular to be part of the accident damage.

Luckily there are very few panels that need to be bought. Cab floors are among them though, Cris sold his pair not so long ago to the same guy who had the wheels. Robin - you're a lucky boy!

Interesting thread keep the info / piccys coming!!

always thought there was a h in cris

dannyboy wrote:always thought there was a h in cris

Normally yes but not the way he spells it.

ill get round and have a look this week need to get mine over to him for mot

Progress has appeared to be slow the last week or so but Cris has been hard at it underneath making sure everything's correct, solid and straight.



Then onto the interior panels. Flat bit wasn't but then after some careful hammering it was again...



Next, the filler neck...



All zipped up, ground back, seam sealed and painted...



That's that side done, time to move over to the left side and start all over again. The right rear wheel arch has been poorly replaced in the past and, ideally, it needs re-doing but it'll do for now until all the important work is done.

Archie's back in his old seat, just like the good ol' days...



He's a bit concerned that the driver's seat is held in with plastic tie wraps though!

Tonight it's on with the Left side.

I had a seet of the same seats


and this is what hapend







looking good ther soon back on the road

When Cris first had the bus it had a pair of knackered stock seats. He slapped in a pair of Peugeot seats he had spare to make Run To The Sun bearable.

It now has Renault seats fitted and they have been fitted on top of the Peugeot seat runners. At some point the welds on the driver's seat have broken (very poor penetration) and the seat is now retained by plastic tie-wraps - this is possibly a temporary fix post-accident. Hunt is on for another pair of seats.



Anyway, back to the action. Another late night last night,

Starting point, Outer skin has been removed but all the internal metal has been left. Edge of the wheel 'tub' is a little crusty in a couple of places but worth leaving.



Trimming the repair panel, removing the internal parts like the wheel tub and leaving just the outer skin and the battery tray.



Lining up, looking good. Just need to work out what's to be removed from where.



Tacked in place, making sure all shut lines are good and everything inside lines up...



There we left it for the night, too late to get any further involved, but it's starting to look like a Split Screen camper again!

Going to be a cool thread this one.

great stuff

blimey cris looking sweet id better make sure allen dont let you have my motor