The 1959 VW Ragtop Bug - (and my kitchen table rebuild experience)

This happened right after my wife and I got married in May of 1994.  I found this 59 ragtop on a dealership lot in Boise and couldn't stand it, I had to have it.  The brick building in the background was our first apartment, actually a 4-plex in a not-so-nice part of town.  Let's just say that people did their fair share of partying and inviting the cops to come say "Hi" around there. 

That cutie in the background is my lovely wife Tracy watering the weeds. :) and check out that Basset Hound, his name was Baxter, we got him from the pound when he was five and he lived with us til he was 14.  The vet said that Baxter was the oldest dog at that clinic, he pretty much headed up the geriatric ward for them.

We had owned the VW for a couple of months and one day Tracy and I decided to take a drive.  We made it out to Ten Mile in Meridian and the engine seized up like Volkswagens love to do.  ....I was really happy about that.... We didn't have very much money so I made the decision to rebuild the motor myself.  I got to know the guys at Bow Wow auto parts really well.  I pulled the motor, I took everything off of it, bought all of the parts and since I didn't have a garage, I put it back together on the KITCHEN TABLE.  My wife was rather supportive, considering.  I installed the motor, started it, and it had a hard time idling, I drove it around the block, and it seized again.  That was a rather low point in my life, I was really unhappy about it this time.

I pulled the motor again, took everything off of it, took the engine case to Bow Wow to see if they could help me figure out what happened.  They blew some compressed air through the oil lines and sure enough, a piece of emory cloth that someone had put in one of the openings during the last rebuild had been sucked in and eventually plugged the line.

I rebuilt it, put it back in, drove it for about 3 more months and was constantly worried that it was going to blow up again.  We had some fun times in this bug, great drives, good memories but unfortunately I sold it.  I wish I still had it, I ran into the guy that bought it from me some time later and he hadn't had a bit of trouble with the engine I had built, figures.