Geezus...what a rabbithole, pardon the pun

Never did I think that a roof swap would be this much of a chore.  I knew it had to be dealt with gingerly, cuz manhandling a roof skin poorly will turn it into junk quickly.  Little did I know that portions of the gutter and A pillar needed to be replaced as well.  One thing's for sure, if I ever find another Mk1 I want to buy that has gutter rust, I'm walking away....period!  I will never go thru this again!!!

It's also readily apparent, that while Westmoreland-built cars are generally maligned when compared to German-built cars, that definitely does not hold true with respect to the weldable primer used on all the body parts.  The westie primer is thicker and seems to resist rust better.  This is why we have gutter rust at all, which Jetta's seem to be afflicted with much worse than anything else. (we didn't get any German tintop rabbits in North America after 1980)  The manufacturing process for <<airquotes>> "sealing" the gutter lip edge leaves alot to be desired, and must have been done on a premise that this is an economy car for mass use, not for collector longevity.  The void underneath the roof sheet and gutter form is a ripe haven for rust.  I'm willing to bet that every single Mk1 in the world, has some sort of festering rust occurring under there to some degree.  It comes largely from the fact that this void is open to the headliner cavity, which attracts moisture from your breath, and the massive temperature changes on the roof skin.  Plus there may be a bit of moisture leakage thru the rollover gutter edge itself.

So anyway, the roof skin has been replaced, but the A pillar is the next order of business.  The Passenger side isn't so bad, only needing the new gutter strip and pillar skin, but the DR side needs everything but the inside skin replaced.  You can probably avoid this problem if the Mk1 you are about to buy has Ziebart or Krown and they drilled a hole right and injected inhibitor where the A pillar starts to lean back.

I'm continuing to find more and more previous owner's shortcuts.  The next order of business is to get the braided fuel lines done across the firewall and get the 1.8 back in.  

This project needs to start going in the right direction again, too many steps backward....

Setbacks...

Setbacks...

So, I called fellow VW nut Jesse P (and autoglass guru) over to pull the glass out of the GLI to drop the headliner to get rid of the mouse stank, and I optimistically thought I would find the same pristine metal behind the glass seals as I did behind the flares....oh, I was wrong.

Rear right quarter glass has pin holes in the sill, left quarter is rusty too, rear is perfect across the trunk, but the front scuttle panel is friggin nasty!  layers of bondo hiding sins.  Good thing I have a pristine windshield panel from Gerry's cabby, but was not looking forward to drilling spot welds.  The right rear corner of the roof is also punky, with evidence of poor paint adhesion and water wicking up underneath the bondo from more sin-hiding...more corner cutting bullshit!!  Maybe the flares arent really all that pristine after all?

So here we are at a crossroads.  There really is no case to make to continue with the paint and body as it stands, Pandora's box has been opened.  But you know what?  There's no reason why I can't tackle the body and paint myself, I mean we're talking about good old Mars Red LA3A which is a non metallic colour, and covers well.  I'd rather spend a grand on a paint gun, and some materials to do it myself in the driveway, take it all the way thru from epoxy primer to base coat and wetsanding, then hand it off to a proper bodyshop to shoot the clear.  That seems logical.  I have a car sitting right next to it in the garage that I did body work and primer on 27 years ago and she still looks great, so I HAD the skills at one time to do it at least.

I borrowed my dad's AN flare tool, so I have no excuse but to start bending up some 5/16 line for fuel lines, want to get that engine in by August.  Its frustrating that things are moving at a snails pace, and stuff I did put on the car's exterior, I have to take back off again.  Such is life...

Worst part is the gutters.  There are sporadic areas where pin holes of rust have eaten thru the gutters, on the A pillar they've eaten right thru the entire gutter.  Bruh.  Rabby has more to give.  I gingerly peeled off the roof skin from Rabby and I have no choice but put the sunroof skin on the GLI.  THE biggest challenge of removing any mk1 roof skin is to grab a high powered trouble light and travel along the entire length of the gutters to find those illusive spot welds.  VW fired only a few in there, just to keep the skin from sliding while the machine curled the gutter lip over, so there's no definite location.  The GLI seems to have 3 on the A pillar, bottom, mid and top, and I need to find any on the top.  Rabby (US westmoreland) has one over the midpoint of the door, and the 3 on the A pillar.  I am finding that the weldable primer that Wolfsburg used is sh^t.  It appears that the Westmoreland primer is much better for fighting rust, the German stuff just doesnt.  The key to roof bodywork is to TAKE YOUR TIME.  You race, you wreck.

I seemed to recall that the GLI I scrapped in 2012, and the Atlantic were the same way.  If I could have cut those 2 cars at the beltline and swapped the Atlantic top on the GLI bottom I woulda had a decent starting point.  I am finding that the German built Jettas are not built well above the window sash, stemming from poor primer application.

I might focus on getting the 1600 done for the beetle too, so I can at least score a goal this year on one of these cars. Longblock is done, with new Meyle pistons/barrels and rebuilt German heads.  I'm not touching the beetle until next year, don't need two projects exploded apart in the Dirty Gaunch! (Kid's nickname for my garage)