Video: VW Trunk Assembly - Trunk Liners, Hinges, Seals, Hood, Emblems

Video Overview:

We’re finishing up the trunk reassembly in our 1971 Super Beetle and by the end we’ll be able to shut the and lock the hood. Follow along as our Tech shows you how to hook up all the fresh air hoses, and fresh air box. We also install the hood seal, hinges, upper and lower trunk liners, and finally the largest piece of the car apart from the body, the hood itself! Then we’ll cap it off with a new hood emblem, and install the body matched hood handle, with new seals and a latch.

Video Transcript:

Hi! This is Sam with JBugs.com. We can finally close the hood on our trunk assembly. We're finishing up installing all the items in our trunk before we bolt on our hood and we made a lot of progress in our last video. With the fuel tank and glove box installed, we'll get to work on installing a new fresh air box, vents, and defroster hoses. Years ago, if we had bought a new Beetle and it happen to have all those hoses and whatnot, they'd just be thrown out in the trash. This time around though, we wanted to do things as original.

We start by installing the original plastic defroster hoses into the back of both sides of the center dash vent. The hoses are routed off to either side of the trunk where we can get to work on attaching the heater hoses to either side heater channel.

VW must have installed the hoses when the body was being welded together as we could never find a way of getting the hoses in place after the fact. Even pulling them off will be difficult. Instead of trying to force them into place over the ducts, I made some coupler pieces that drop into the ducts. Now, we can cut a new piece of hose to length, attach the hose to the coupler, install the vent tree at the top, and drop it in place into the heater channel duct, down in the fenderwell. The plastic hose from the center vent is attached to the center vent on the hose tree.

A new hose for the side defroster vent is pressed onto the front of the vent tree and then routed up to the side defroster vent. Yet another new length of vent hose attaches from the back vent of the tree to the corner vent of the windshield. We cut a slot in the hose for the antenna wire that we ran earlier. The vent hoses on the drivers side are installed. Then, we prep our hood hinges by installing the new hardware for the gas struts since we pulled off the original hood springs.

The struts come with studs and nyloc nuts that thread into the hinge through the end of the strut. The hood hinge is set into place into the body and the original pivot bolt and washer is threaded in to hold it in place. The bottom end of the strut is clipped into place into the body and once both sides are installed, we can install our restored fresh air box.

First, the fresh air box cables are attached. The cables crisscross at the control mechanism. The cable that points to the left of the car is looped back and attached to the right duct. The one that points to the right is attached to the left duct using the cable clamps on the back side of the box. The three wires on the box are connected to the new harness that we made, and the ground on the body. Then, the fresh air box is pressed into place at the drain at the bottom.

It's wedged in place underneath the body at the top of the trunk opening so the three screws can be installed at the top edge to hold it in place. Now, we can connect the fresh air box to the left and right defroster and dash vents. The original coupler pieces aren't reproduced but fortunately, the 72 and later Bus fan hoses happen to be the right diameter for the vents. We cut down a section of the hose to length and then cut it down the middle so it can be slid over the two vents. To seal up the split on the hose, we cut another section of hose to overlap the seem. Once we have hoses and pieces cut for both sides, we slide the couplers over the ducts, set the overlapping piece in place, and then install two reusable zip ties over either end to hold the vent couplers in place. Next, we'll get a new hood seal installed.

We start at the corner of the hood and install the molded corner piece there, into the body. There are three nipples on the back of the seal that get pulled into the body, up behind the good hinge. Installing the seal is much easier without the hood in the way but can be done with the hood it's just a lot more difficult. A little silicone spray lube is sprayed inside the body channel to make installing the seal a little easier. The seal is installed into the top channel.

Pulling the seal a bit to stretch it with one hand while pressing it into the channel using a trim tool with the opposite hand works best for me. When we get to the opposite corner, the corner piece of the seal is installed there, pulling the nipples into the bottom side. Then, either side of the seal gets installed into the channel on the body. Again, stretching and pushing the seal into the seem is my preferred method. Having a clean channel with no dirt, debris, or old seals in place, makes the job much easier. At the bottom of the hood opening, where both seals come together, the seal is cut to length so the ends but up towards each other. I like to cut a little piece of either end, at an angle so any water or moisture that gets into the seal can drain out.

With all the pieces for the trunk now in place, we're going to install a new upper trunk liner. Unfortunately, the reproduction liners are trimmed for a European fresh air box which didn't have a fan. That works fine for those models and even works well for those without a fresh air box. Regardless, it won't fit with our U.S. model fresh air box. After using a printable template that we have available on our website, we cut our new trunk liner to fit.

To make the installation much easier, we'll pre-bend all the tabs and edges before we install the liner. A flat metal bar is used as a backer for the shorter ends and especially where the liner isn't scored. The liner is set into the trunk, the edges are pushed and folded into place. At the top edges, nest to the fresh air box, the flaps are rolled over and set into place at the body tabs, at either side, at the slots in the liner.

Since a standard spare tire won't fit our lowered car, we'll use the recess for car detailing supplies and storage. The lower trunk liner installs more easily than the upper. With it in place, we can get to installing our hood. We tape off the edges of the opening to protect the paint just in case we drop the hood or otherwise.

Then, with the help of some co-workers to hold either side of the hood, we can install the four hood bolts with washers and close the hood to check the fitment. With the new seal, the hood will sit up off the body a bit. We're more concerned with the gap at the back of the hood to the body and we adjust the hood as needed. Once we're happy with the fitment, we can install a new hood emblem.

First we use a drill bit and by hand, clear some of the paint from the holes so the new hood emblem pins can be installed. The pins are tapped into the hood either with an improvised punch or a trim tool and the new emblem is pushed into place.

New hood handle seals are installed onto our hood handle. Then, on the back side of the hood, the hood catch without the pin is installed and the bolts are threaded through the catch into the handle. The hood pin is threaded into the catch, then we can close the hood and check the operation of the catch. We can now get our windows installed so we can color sand and polish the paint.

Thanks for watching! Let us know if you have any questions in the comments below. Click the like button and the subscribe button if you haven't already. And when you need parts for your vintage VW, click on the links to JBugs.com Looks pretty good huh?