Allreet kids, i built my Ghia about 12 months ago from a wrecked car i got from a scrap yard here are some pics of the work i did on it. I'm currently putting a 2.0L 8v injection motor in it, as a 50bhp aircooled motor has its limits The spec is as follows: 1965 RHD Karmann Ghia spax adjustables up front, koni reds on the rear, narrowed the front suspension 4 inch so i can for wider offset wheels up front to get more lock, fibreglass bonnet, fibreglass engine lid, camber compensator on the rear, as the car is swing axle, solid mounted gearbox/engine, blue jazz poly seat, willans 4 point harnesses, compbrake hydraulic handbrake, porsche 944 ally master cylinder, line lock, late beetle disks up front with drilled disks, late beetle rear drums machined to fit short axles, 4 puck clutch, autogauge tacho, vdo tem gauge, err i think thats about it. the car has cost me around 1500 quid to build it, the car was 800 to buy and rear wing was 300, so as you can see its built on a serious budget
the handbrake I made is slippy, as its just painted with no grip.... so I went to JJB and bought some tennis bat grip tape... matches the jazz bucket seat cover also managed to get my autogauge tacho fixed, so it went back in the car
this is where i am up to at the moment...... this week I have mainly been doing an engine conversion on my ghia.... its getting a 2.0L 8v injection motor from a B3 passat. i'm designing the adaptor plate myself, and using a t25 diesel 215mm flywheel, 4 puck clutch, and the t25 pressure plate. Ive had to clearance the gearbox to fit the flywheel, and also move the starter by 2.5mm. the old engine....... new engine I put a socket on the passat gearbox then I could centre the template for marking the holes. template cut out and holes being drilled on the passat gearbox.. then same on the ghia box... all holes done yey Today I took the template to my local machine shop, and they said they will be able to make it in 20mm ally, no problem, so i'll just have to wait for the phone call for when its done Yesterday I started making the mount for the radiator, which is in the rear right wing. I cut out the battery tray to make some more room for the rad. I forgot to take pics of that tho.. and ive also ordered a duct from demon tweeks... (this one Large Duct | Brake Ducts & Ducting | Demon Tweeks Motorsport, Motorcycle, Car Modifying, Parts and Accessories,Sparco, Arai ) which will be cut into the wing
Part of me thinks this is cool and another part of me wants to cry Big lover of ghias and own a lowlight myself.
its not as if its a rare car or anything. lol i do actually get abuse off people who like ghias, aspecilly the people who like them all restored back to standard. at the end of the day its my car so i can do what i want with it, and pluss it was in a scrap yard, if anyone else was to buy it, they would have cut it up and sold it as pannels to make some decent cash. the wings are worth 300quid each, dash 800, engine 400, gearbox 100, axles 100, chassis 200, nose 200, doors 200, etc etc etc,
Very nice ghia there, although i would have left it aircooled, some serious power can be got out of them! But the 8v should be interesting all the same! Good luck.
cheers for the comments guys, the reason for the wheels is that they are cheap, i can get them for a tenner each, in 14 or 15 inch, from 5.5j to 10j wide. so tires are pleantyfull, i get really good tires for free from the local scrappys. i have some 15x10's to go on the rear, just gotta paint them white. the reason for the 8v motor is because to get that kinda power from an aircooled your looking at least 5k to build a half decent motor with that kinda power. i sold the 1600 for 375 quid, got the passat for free off my dad, and the adaptor plate will be costing me about 100 quid for the machine work, so i'm actually in profit with more power.... and that motor is about 115bph as standard so in the future a 16v head and supercharger will be seeing around 180bhp.
