Billo - the 1960 truck-art beetle from Pakistan

[nmshaikh]

@nmshaikh
Hey,
It was nice to meet you. We could not spend more time together. I will try to come to Toronto again some time soon to see the car and drive it for a bit
Thank you very much to take out time from your schedule and coming all the way ...

..pleasure is mine...lets try and meet up at a show.

[rider4414]

one word
""Awesome""
keep it coming sir
we wanna know more

[nmshaikh]

details and pictures coming up..watch this space.

[nmshaikh]

Windsor is a city located in the southwest of Ontario bordering Detroit Michigan US and its claim to fame being the Ford Motor plant that keeps making headlines with the number of lay-offs announced every so often. The Windsor -Detroit border crossing is a very busy post with about 40,000 people and about $300 million worth of goods passing thru every day.

The plan was to arrive a day before the event, camp the night at the Windsor Camp Ground, attend the cruise and the main event on Sunday. We did make it to Windsor alright but while the rest of the cars cruised around Windsor we cruised the back roads trying to find the blessed camp grounds. My $500 plus Garmin proved useless but an ego boost for a 'directionally challenged' person like myself. With the patience of my passengers running out I had to do a very 'un-manly' thing - stop and ask for directions, and in about 10 minutes reached the camp grounds.
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I rented a tow dolly from U-Haul and towed Billo behind my Sienna as it would have been too cramped in the VW with my sisters family and all the camping gear. It is so much more convenient to tow the car on trips like these. I decided to buy a tow dolly in the days to come. Renting one isn’t exectlty cheap and then there is the added hassle of driving to the U-Haul location to pick up , drive back to the house, load the car, repeating the same sequence at the end of the trip
The Border bash event attracts VW, Audi and Porsche fans from both sides of the border and is a fun day with lots of fun activities for the entire family.

One of the 'fun' activities was to drain the oil and coolant out of a golf engine and run it till it ceases. I can imagine my friend Moqeem, Rehan, Ali Zafar and Khalid gritting their teeth in agony at the mere thought of molesting a VW in this way. It only took this particular car 2 min. 49 seconds.

Billo was showered with compliments and many a scantily clad dame (it being a hot day) posed for a picture next to the graphics on the side.

Billo was declared first in the Early Beetle Modified category and we headed back for home.<o:p></o:p>
























the trophy

[nmshaikh]

and the trophy...

[reezvaan]

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[nmshaikh]

I agree. This is an amazing 61. What I have noticed over the shows and the meets is that generally enthusiasts/people there are not really bothered about keeping the "correct" year parts on their VWs instead they focus on what matches their tastes and whatever looks good to them. May be you could comment on this perception of mine as you have the first hand experience.

About that many a scantily claded dames, its good that you didn't post pics here on the thread else focus could have shifted to the dames instead of VWs for many of us

Your observation is correct but do bear in mind that VW came with a lot of variations for same year models sold/ produced for different markets. So much so that the cars produced for the Canadian market were different from the ones sold just south of the border! However a lot of people bought their cars in the <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com<o:p></o:p>
The cars produced for the Australian model had slightly different features than anywhere else. e.g. the lights on the back of a 61 were the size of a regular snowflake but a different design altogether...For the Scandinavian countries the pattern was a Chevron instead of snowflake..all fitting into the standard housing. The snow flake lights that you see in the US have a plastic diffuser that you won't find in the snowflakes that are found elsewhere. It was introduced to satisfy the US dept. of transport who had objected that the snowflake lights on the cars were "too bright'..imagine how bright a 6V light can be! (but gives you an idea of how 'bright' the guys at the helm of a government department can be)

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The 61 you see here is a Canadian model car and came with that steering wheel.

Below is a Chevron design lens and the Australian lens mentioned earlier

[reezvaan]

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[nmshaikh]

Thanks for all the explanation on the variations that VW models received for different markets.

I simply love this steering wheel. It is...I dunno...more robust than the ones we are accustomed to see here in Pakistan. If I am correct, I saw this one on shwimmwagens and may be the correct one for them as well. This one was also seen on pre-50 Beetles, I believe.

I have seen a few in beetles that were crushed at one time or another in Pakistan. They had little to no appeal for the Pakistani buyer so most went to the scrap heap. I believe i have one stashed away somewhere in the attic.

[reezvaan]

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[reezvaan]

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[nmshaikh]

I have seen snowflakes and chevrons and known them too but I was not aware of this Australian Lense design. I believe they fit into the general tail light housings.

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They do fit the standard housing but kind of extend out like the later 65-67 lens

[nmshaikh]

I had registered for the Funfest - one of the largest VW shows in the Midwest...I can't go..
I'm working over the weekend.

[reezvaan]

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[nmshaikh]

Its been a crazy few days at work and its not expected to ease off any time soon. This has kept me from updating the thread but I'll try and do some more today.
[FONT=Arial]<o:p></o:p><p></p><font face=[/IMG]</st1:city>. The show is basically for the water-cooled cousins but it being a great day I decided to go anyway. There were a few other air cooled cars so I didn't feel totally out of place. However the events like testing the sound system with a decibel meter connected to a computer to check whose sound system produced more "noise" was not just my cup of tea! Age? I guess but I'd rather have the full use of my natural hearing ability than rely on the aids which is what I fully expect the drivers of these cars to be using in a few years. I mean seriously, one of these cars pulls up alongside at the lights and you can feel your car 5 ft away vibrating from the beats of this other guys sound system..can you imagine what impact would it have on the other guys ear drums?<o:p></o:p>
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Anyways so there I was, surrounded by souped up, modified to hell and back water cooled GTs and all and a crowd of people admiring the art work on Billo! that is all they could admire as they knew $#!^ about air cooled. Apart from that and the scantily clad dames there was hardly anything worth reporting. I did take a lot of pictures but I cannot seem to find them so I'll just have to rely on the ones I downloaded off their website.

I am including a picture of the scantily clad dames after the 'modesty makeover' Jang style. I couldn't however come up with a catchy traslation the way Jung used to (probably still does)..something along the lines of Chalak Haseena Urf Langra Shikari....Enjoy!
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[nmshaikh]

<span style="font-family: Times New Roman"><span style="font-family: Arial">Every so often I receive inquiries /requests from people who want to use Billo as a prop for their modeling photo shoots or functions..from budding young photographers to professional models. It isn't always possible for me to commit time as summer in <st1:country-region><st1:place><font face=[/IMG]<span style=" border=" 0"="" alt=" - st1country regionst1placeFONT faceArial colorblue size2SPAN style" title=" - st1country regionst1placeFONT faceArial colorblue size2SPAN style">Canada</span></st1:place></st1:country-region><font face="Arial" color="blue" size="2"> is short and I try and take advantage of the fair weather to go on road trips or even a simple backyard BBQ with family and friends.<font size="2"><o:p></o:p></span></font><p></p></font></font></span></font><p><font face=[/IMG]<span style=" border=" 0"="" alt=" - PPFONT faceVerdana colorblack size2SPAN style" title=" - PPFONT faceVerdana colorblack size2SPAN style"><o:p></o:p></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial"><span style="font-family: Arial">However some requests are too cute to turn down. In September 2008, one such request came from a young couple who wanted to get their engagement pictures taken with Billo.</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana"><span style="font-family: Verdana"><o:p></o:p></span></span>
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<span style="font-family: Arial"><span style="font-family: Arial">Here are some pictures.</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana"><span style="font-family: Verdana"><o:p></o:p></span></span>

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[murtaza_murti]

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How is the rear steelie so deep dished like?

[nmshaikh]

How is the rear steelie so deep dished like?

I couldn't find a half decent rim for Billo in <?xml:namespace prefix = u1 /><u1:country-region><u1:place>Pakistan</u1:place></u1:country-region> and two of the stock wheels were in bad shape so I had to machine out the centre plates, discarding the outer circle. I then took a pair of Toyota HiAce, 15 inch rims and did the opposite to them..carefully separated the plate from the outer circle, taking care not to damage it in the process. (The tool bit was aimed at the inner plate and any left over welds were smoothed over.) The original VW plates were then fitted in the Toyota outer circles using a hydraulic press for even fitting without a need for hammering, tack welded and checked on the lathe machine for true centre. I didn't stop at that and took the rims to a wheel balance shop and got a confirmation that the plates were indeed perfectly zero. The plates were then welded at opposite ends at a time - a precaution against possible warping due to heat. Re-checked the balance again on lathe machine and wheel balancing machine before getting them painted and installing on the car. The whole exercise took a week as my wheel balance wala with unlimited patience was located at the opposite end of the city.
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(The actual work was performed at Heera wheel something at Astabel Rawalpindi. Heera works on heavy duty steel rims he fabricates out of steel sheets cut out of ships. These he told me are necessary to withstand the extreme loads that our tractor trolleys carry. After the success of the project I got several sets done in less time, relying only on the zeroing check on the lathe machine.)<o:p></o:p>
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It was when fitting the plates that i decided to go for the offset you see in the pictures. As an added fun measure i assembled the wheels with the air nozzle on the inside to create perfect smoothies on the outside! It was fun to watch the expression on the tire wala's face when he would reach the rear wheels to check tire pressure and not finding the air valve... <o:p></o:p>
The rims look nice and fill the rear wheel-wells. <o:p></o:p>
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They have performed flawlessly on the highway at speeds in excess of 120km/hr. for more than 3 years. I came across a near brand-new OG set of smoothies at a swap meet in the US and bought those. All four wheels are now OG with stock offset. <o:p></o:p>
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Read about it when we reach 2010<o:p></o:p>

[murtaza_murti]

Thanks for the in-depth explanation it cleared out my confusion on the wheels, the depth of the wheels is about 2'' I guess? I can't wait to read more about Billo keep the stories coming :)

[nmshaikh]

the depth of the wheels is about 2'' I guess? :)

I don't remember off hand but it is about 2"..just enuff for the 165 80R 15 to clear the sides and stay inside the fender