Ratty's Bug

This '64 Bug belongs to my friend James Ratcliffe, better known as Ratty. He bought it for the bargain price of £400 – not bad for a left-hand drive '64 bug with a steel sunroof, although the car wasn’t without its faults. Once we started digging about, we found that someone had wedged a lump of wood in the heater channel and fillered over it!!!!

In terms of panels, the car needed a floor pan, half a heater channel, a lower half rear quarter, a lower half front quarter and a door pillar. It sounds like a lot but it’s the only way to really repair a rotten car.

I returned the car to James with all the welding complete. All that was left for him to do was grind a few welds down, smooth them out with some body filler and then paint the repaired sections.

The car will be coming back to me soon to have the front beam narrowed and fitted with sway away adjusters so that the front end can be lowered.