Replacing a VW Beetle Floor Pan with the Body on:

Video Transcript:

hi I'm Sam with jbugs.com and in this video we're going to replace some floor pans with the body on this 1967 Beetle this is a driver side floor pan what we're going to do or what I'm going to do is cut along this seam and along this seam all the way down to the back rear crossmember and then I'll cut there right here where we have the pedal assembly we need to very cautious because we actually have the brake line coming around we don't want to cut that brake line through so I'll be very cautious with by cutof wheel along here and along here and then right here I'll actually come in and cut all the way up to the heater Channel through the floor pan so that's the process of doing this with the body on noting this indentation for the pedal assembly in the floor and how close to the brake line is to it and then this bolt and how close the brake line is to right here we want to be very very cautious not to cut up through that when we're installing our floor pan I'm going to bend this tab here and this tab here and pull this brake line up just a little bit to make sure we don't cut it and always leave that guy there give us a little bit more room along there and there so when I cut along this line I know I'm not going to cut through our brake [Music] line so it gives us some good Cuts there and I want to do the same thing at the back section so when I get back there I can worry about that when I get there whatever I'm just going to take the saws on and get to it hopefully I didn't touch that brake line looks like we're clear get that wheel and tire out of the way there we go just like that and then we'll come in after we get the floor pans unbolted and we'll cut that last bit of the floor pan without cutting into the box so all here is good all here is good now I need to go all the way down that way put that in place there make sure that he is safe and tucked away because there is a lip on the tunnel and this brake line sits above that lip we should be safe all the way down to the back side seeing as this cable on that side's already broken I'm not going to be too concerned about cutting through this and seeing as it's all rusty I'm not concerned about it either uh in most cases we would actually cut this loose from the floor pan pull this out pull the cable up just disconnect it and pull it out but again this one's already cut I'm not too concerned about it right now so I'm just going to continue cutting cutting all the way back up to this point and then we cut down here all the way out to right here we leave this piece in place let me continue [Music] on now about right before the heater line so we're going to expect a little bit more resistance right through there again obviously make sure that we're safe and not cutting into the brake line but we need to stay up on top of this lip not down on this [Music] [Music] lip so now we've got the floor pan cut from here all the way to all the way back into right in there so from this point to the tunnel leaving that lip along the tunnel to the rear crossmember out to the heater Channel this floor pan cut free leaving this old lip in place which the fun part is going to be coming back and Hammer and banging that out but we'll get to that after we get both four pans out of the way maybe I'll just show it on just this one side the right side is exactly the same as the left just flip-flopped and since there's no brake line to worry about it's actually much easier and you don't have to remove the pedal assembly this is the more difficult side we'll go very very in depth this is actually the old floor plan welded on top of the tunnel spine I will pry this up and I'll show you guys that process as well so we're cut from here all the way to the back now I'm going to unbolt all the floor pan washes underneath underneath I'll show you what it looks like here we've got the floor pan cut to right here but not through to this Edge yet cuz we've got this reinforcement washer in place all the way across and all the way along the tunnel all the way to the front of the car and all the way out through the floor pan there and through the floor pan there but not cut right there yet we're going to cut that once we get everything unbolted all the way one two three four five 6 7 eight nine of those bolts we're going to remove this floor pan is almost completely free of the body what we're going to have to do now is cut through here and along the bottom side of this to that line but not cut into the heater Channel and if we we got a little piece of wood under there that's awesome well we'll get rid of that in a moment that's why I don't actually like using these jack points cuz they jack up your body structurally overall it's still strong enough but I just I don't like these at all and I don't like installing them but for vintage sake I will put them in I just not a fan again on the outside of this line straight up to there straight up to the body not through the body ever so cautiously and there we go that gives us a little bit of safety so we can continue cutting that last bit right there like so all right and now up at the front basically like we did here except this is a little bit easier now that the floor Pan's out of the way we'll cut through that last section at the front didn't even have to cut it just had the tear it out now we'll come back in and touch up the remnants there we go so with that our old floor pan is out well 98% of it the other 2% still left on the tunnel and the rear crossmember I got to work on getting that out of the way and then we can put the new floor pan in we do want to save our old pedal stop there we go and you can see a lot of the old seam sealant that VW used and we're going to go through and do the same thing but now I don't know if you can get in with close to this but we got 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 little spot welds and they're basically every inch and a half inch and a/ quarter that's what holds the factory floor pans in place is just spot welds every inch and a quarter or so so keep that in mind when you're welding uni for pans in you can drill along the edge and you know drill a hole every you know inch and a half and do a little rosette weld or what I'll do is actually just come in and do a little seam about every inch and a half just a little qu inch seam and all welded on the top side to hold the floor pan in place all right so from there to there is done now I just got to do all that over there wasn't that fun [Applause] PW Beetle 58 to 70 well it's technically you can use this as early as 54 seat rails are the same floor pan left hand side these are our heavyduty floor pans that looks to be a little bit more solid than our other pan doesn't it seat rails are already welded in place holes are already drilled out we've got our pedal stop Nutt welded in place that's the pan itself I honestly have no idea what that is I know what that is and I don't like it I know what that is and I don't need it there is unless this piece is completely rusted out in your car don't cut it out it is seam welded against the tunnel here and here and out at the frame horn at the end of the spring plate housing right here it is much easier just to leave this in place on your car or on your chassis actually than it is to try and reuse this you know they come with them it's awesome if you need them but if you don't don't cut it out it's much easier to do a floor pan without cutting that piece out this guy obviously welds in like so I will weld this one in place but I just don't ever recommend using these I'll get a measurement off of this passenger side which is still in place from this hole or this hole to this point and we'll weld it in but now we'll go through and we'll get some measurements from our tunnel to our holes tunnel to our holes because in all my experience I've had to cut along this lip on virtually every single car uh where this is going to be seamed in the back this is typically going to have to be cut and often times this area right here will have to be trimmed down as well to get this up in place in the car but we'll figure that out as we go from that body bolt there to the center line about 3 and 1/2 in back which should put that right about there right about there when the time comes to our tunnel 13 and an8 let's make sure that's relatively Square kind of hard to see down there 13 and8 to that first body hole 2 3 four let's go to the fourth body hle 18 and A4 five 6 7 we go number eight actually no I'm about to go seven on a straight portion of the pan uh 20 on the dot basically so 20 13 and an eth to the center line of that hole right about here two three 4 we were something in a quarter I think it was 18 and a quarter yeah 18 and a quarter and four five 6 7 and I think it was 20 in on the dot and this is kind of actually that's pretty stout so 64 and2 plus our overhang at the front and the overhang at the rear 3/4 and 3/4 so an inch and A2 66 in overall length and we are 66 and 3/4 so front to back we're definitely going to have to trim as well and the hard part is is where do you trim from seeing as the seat rails look to be in the identical spot I'm guessing our front is over long but let's go from here to there 27 1/2 more or less versus 28 and 3/4 so we have uh 27 and 3/8 plus we'll add 5/8 so we'll go out to 28 in on the front basically well no time like the present let's stuff it in and see where we're at yeah we're uh too long I can't get it in that way so if we were to come in here right there you can see our front to rear is that going to actually line up over our Fender or over our bolt hole in the back I got to check that right now the answer to that is no by about a quar of an inch I'm going to start by trimming about a/4 of an inch off the back of this and then we'll go from there to get this hole to line up with this hole at the back I need to take off about 1/4 inch all the way across I you can always cut more off it's a little bit harder to put more back on so we'll start small and trim from [Music] there let's see how that fits all right getting better well if the floor pan sat further that way my oval hole at the back would be in the perfect place so that's a good start and getting a good idea of how far we've got to trim up here so one major spot is right here and then right here I know it's not really straight up and down but that's kind of a reference of where our lip is and of course we need to overlap that lip this one I can't overlap so that one's just going to basically be buted right up against that section right there this line here is where we're going to butt up to that frame horn piece where we cut this thing at the heater Channel and I'm going to leave it a little bit long just so I can gently massage it with a hammer later and this is the front of our floor pan now and we want to overlap that by about a/ an inch so we'll come in right about here and then this section we're going to come up and over to right there just to leave that again to butt up we're going to use a lot of seam sealer right here once this is installed because this isn't actually welded all the way to the tunnel but it will be sealed up believe me let's give that a test fit obviously lengthwise we're having issues but if I can get a long enough body bolt I can try and bolt these in and then get a scribe on there but let me see what I can come up with as far as a couple bolts to hold the floor pan up in place so I can scribe our tunnel to make sure we get a good scribe line there yeah hold that for a little bit all right that's better a little bit better idea of how this is going to fit in [Music] here all right now we're going to kind of have to eyeball but that'll give us a really good idea we're going to go a/ inch out on that line and then take that all the way back that should hopefully give us a nice fit all the way [Music] around Notch that corner right there so that this can pop up and hook in right around there and then I can massage that in but either way as much Brewing as this is going to take to get in first I'm going to go through and clean that rail up on the chassis hit it with a little cor seal real quick and then uh then I'll come and lay the floor pan in that way I'm not wrestling it just to have to pull it out back out once I get it back in in place and as far as our panda body seal I'm going to stick some weather strip adhesive on here when I bolt it back in place and we're going to call it [Applause] good and honestly I know that's going to have to come back too on the standard floor pans you could just bang that into shape but on the heavy duties it's not going to so let's just trim that down and since I don't like rust that's a wonderful thing [Music] [Music] [Music] couple more there we go make sure our panda body seal is in place down here and uh I'm going to go get all the the body bolts in place that's almost all the hard part I mean honestly it is the hard part welding at this point pretty dang simple everything's back in place overlapped overlap that tunnel piece all the way across the back butt it up and slightly overlapped on that front seam and sitting inside the pan all along the tunnel we trimmed that out I'll come back and persuade that little lip right there and then we'll get some seam sealant right here and in this Gap right here and obviously on the inside and that is good to go I haven't ground anything down in here for the most part anyway we got a couple spots that are ground so hopefully hopefully I'll have enough bare metal to Arc out d there we can see it's welded on the back two legs welded on the front legs and the brace is welded on the top the back and the front and we've got welds all the way back in there all the way up seam welded that and that that every inch and a half or so even including back behind the seat rail where it's nice and tight all the way across the front or all the way up to the front rather and across the front and even seam welded that guy all the way up the front there again doesn't really matter cuz all this is going to get seam sealed but before we do that we're going to use some cor seal all the way back all the way along the tunnel all the way to the front with that I got one side done the hard side I got to do it all again on the right side but at least you guys now know the process you don't have to pull the body off to get a floor pan done showed you guys how to do it relatively easy no reason why if you have the right tools and some time you guys can't do it in your own cars at home without pulling the body off it's not that hard until next time guys thanks for watching