1962 Volkswagon Microbus
1962 VW Microbus
In May of 2013, my wife’s college roommate contacted me about this 1962 VW Micro bus. Her mother had purchased it new, drove it until 1972 and then parked it in the driveway for 40 years. Since then, it has been used as a garden shed to store tools and a lawn mower. She thought my son Brad would like it, and of course he did.
Unfortunately, the car turned out to be a total “rust bucket”. We immediately started the process of removing the floors, support girders, exterior sheet metal from the bottom up to 9” to remove all of the rusted components.
Returning the bus to a solid and drivable vehicle took just over 10 months working weekends and nights. My son Brad learned all about disassembly, rivet splitting, welding and body work.
The decision to make the bus a “resto mod” bus, came early. There are many fantastic original and concourse restored buses out there; we wanted something different. The L-bench seating is his idea and that set the entire design direction. A leather interior, open and spacious, a “walk through” front seating design, wood accents, a 2180 cc torque motor and blue for the color scheme.
It was painted in our driveway, up early to beat the wind, the paint application took about 6 weekends. Wet sanding and polishing another 3 weeks. Somewhere along the way, my son saw the photos of my 1962 Ford Econoline van which I bought in 1973. It was everything I had at the time and took me two years to build. It was a 1965 Mustang with a van body on it and really something special back in the “Hay Day” of vans and Van Happenings. A friend saw the van when I painted it blue for the 5th time, looked at me and said “She’s the “Lil Blue 62” and it stuck (See Lil Blue 62 on the Web). When Brad saw the photos of my old van, he said we should put that name on this 62, so we did.
The upholstery is by Bill’s in Brea California, the motor by Jeff Lane at Kaddie Shack. Everything else from bondo to glass to wood is by Brad and I, it is his bus and for me it was a labor of love for my son.
