SuperBeetle's History / Lee's Story

My Super Beetle was purchased in 1986 by my grandfather.  The car came from Donna, Texas right near the Mexican border.  They bought the car for my younger brother Lee. Lee had always loved VW’s and really wanted to get one but could never find a really decent bug in our area.  For my brothers 16th birthday my grandparents surprised him with the dark green 1975 Superbeetle.  The car was all stock with a standard 1600 engine with fuel injection.  My brother fell instantly in love with the car, and took very good care of it.

After Lee used the car for a while, daily driving back and forth to school etc., he started having issues with the fuel injection system.  He replaced the fuel injectors and lines and he also replaced some additional parts.  It seemed to be running well. 

One day I received a phone call from him, he wanted to know if I could come over his girlfriend’s house, and follow him home just in case the VW stalled out on the way home. I agreed and met him there.  Apparently, the fuel injection system was acting up again. He decided to try and drive it home anyway.  As I was following him, I noticed a leak from under the engine.  I was trying to get his attention to have him stop and check it out. We rolled up to a stop sign and just as I opened my door, the car caught fire.  Apparently, one of the fuel injector lines popped off and was spraying gasoline all over the engine. As we both frantically ran around like idiots not knowing what to do a few people stopped with fire extinguishers and tried to put out the flames. We found that the key was still turned on in the ignition, which would normally be fine considering the huge ball of fire consuming the car, but this car had an electric fuel pump which kept feeding the fire until the wiring melted.  The flames were finally extinguished after the fire department pumped 500 gallons of water into my brother’s beloved bug. My brother was beside himself as he watched the car he loved burn up.

We had the car towed home and Lee began stripping off the old charred pieces, pulling out the motor and wiring and doing some general clean up on the car.  He built a new 1776 cc engine for the VW, installed a 3 puck rigid racing clutch and reworked all the wiring. The car was coming back together.  Throughout his rebuild process of the VW, I was very hands off with it.  I really was not interested in Volkswagons or Bugs so I didn’t really participate in his rebuild.  

Lee finally finished the rebuild and the car was incredibly fast. Lee had broken the “Stinger” pipe off several times because of the high level of torque the car produced “off the line”. 

As time progressed the bug ran very well and would beat Mustang 5.0’s off the line at stop lights.  I DO NOT CONDONE STREET RACING, but it is fun to see a Superbeetle whomp on a mustang or camaro.

Lee needed to replace some wiring on the VW, so he began working on the car in the driveway and had removed the deck lid over the engine and the air cleaners from the dual 750 Webber carburetors. It started raining later that day and water went down through the carburetors and into the cylinders of the engine. After a few more days of assembly of the new wiring, he still couldn’t get the car running.  He left it sitting for a few weeks and, ultimately, the water that had gotten down into the engine, rusted the pistons to the cylinders.  Lee pulled the 1776 out and disassembled it. 

This is where the story takes a turn.  My brother was diagnosed with an inherited liver disease when he was 16 years old. He underwent 2 liver transplants and spent allot of time in the hospital. So during the time he was rebuilding the 1776, he became ill and spent a great deal of time in the hospital unable to get the car finished.  My parents helped my brother trailer his Superbeetle to our cottage in Northern Michigan where they put it in the barn for storage.  Lee never was never physically able to work on the VW again but he would always talk about it and tell me all his plans for fixing up his first car and that someday he would get it all done. Unfortunately, that time never came and Lee passed away shortly after his 27^th birthday.

My brother Lee with his 2000 Bug & the ’75 Super

Shortly after his passing, my wife and I were blessed with the adoption of our two young children.  They were never able to meet their uncle but know of him through photographs and the stories we share with them.

One summer I took the initiative to push the bug out of the barn so I could get a better look at it.  After 8 years of storage it was in pretty rough shape. There was some rust, but, for the most part, the car was solid and the chipmunks who were living in the car seemed to enjoy the interior.  I went though some drawings of Lee’s various ideas of what he wanted to do with his bug, and decided to finish the project for him.  First I trailered the car south to my home and began the disassembly.

1975 Super Beetle in my garage after 8 years of storage

I removed the fenders, chrome and interior and sent the entire car to be “Media Blasted”.  This would remove all the rust and loose paint. Once this was done the bug went over to the body shop to get a couple coats of epoxy sealer and primer.

Media Blasting and Epoxy Coating ( UPaint – It )

 In the meantime, I had a new 1776 engine built by Sunset Parts in Silver Lake, Michigan.  Sunset Parts builds high performance race engines for Dune Buggies and ATV’s.  I gave them one requirement; the engine needs to be fast. What I got back was a killer 1776 ported, polished and balanced with dual 850 Webbers with NOS taps in the stacks.  I was assured that this engine would do the job.

1776 Built by Sunset Parts – Silver Lake Michigan

Once the bug came back from the body shop I put in new lowering struts from Topline Parts then removed the wheels and the drums, and replaced them with all new disc brakes, custom drilled (5x100mm), also from Topline. 

Disc Brake conversion from TopLine (Thanks Jon!)

This allowed me to install the 17x7.5 inch Toyo tires and rims all the way around the car.  The fenders are custom made 2 inches wider than stock from Glass Action Inc.

2 inch wider than stock fenders from Glass Action

I have learned allot of things about VW’s since I began working on this project 1 year ago.   I can’t wait to finish this project and help fulfill my brother’s dream.  Working on this has also given me a way to help my children get to know their uncle that they never had the opportunity to meet. Every time they see any VW now they refer to it as Uncle Lee’s Car, and all the great memories of him come to mind.