Bill and Steve's BBQ

I drove down to Bill and Steve's today for their open house and BBQ in honor of the 55th birthday of Steve's 1952 split window bug. I had hoped to take the Ghia but I'm still trying to clear a carbon blockage from the intake manifold's heat riser tube. Anyway, it gave me a chance to focus on the other cars, like Bob Walton's '62 notchback. It's a late 1962 model imported from Italy with only 80-something-thousand miles on the clock. Nice!



Bob just got the notch last year and has wasted no time getting it loaded with period accessories. They don't call him Gizmobob for nothing.


The interior is fully accessorized. Fresh air deflectors, red needle trip speedometer, tach, full circle horn ring with a clock horn button, Blaupunkt radio, shift extension, Bambus parcel tray, wire cup holder...did I miss anything?


Oh yeah, he managed to score an NOS anthracite gray e-brake boot. Some guys have all the luck.


On the outside, in addition to the bumper overriders, Bosch fog lights, Jokon reverse lights, and mud flaps, he has this nice Albert accessory mirror.


Nice clean trunk with a bias-ply Fulda tire that might be the original spare.



Bob has a very rare late Hazet spare tire tool kit that was designed to work for both Beetles and Type 3s. Here's Bob himself showing us how it works.






Bob is currently working on another low-mileage early Type 3 acquisition. More on that later!

I also got to meet Craig (Licensepl8s on the Samba forums), who brought his nice '69 RHD notch imported from Australia.


Craig is a license plate collector who hooked Bob up with his '56 series yellow California plates. He's currently lobbying for a change in the law that will allow year-of-manufacture status for 1963–69 black-and-gold California plates, which would be a boon to '60s car enthusiasts statewide. Good luck Craig!

There were a few other Type 3s in attendance, including Fastback Don's. I missed Don again -- he's always early and I'm always late.