You can follow the transformation process of a stock Beetle to Old School California Look in these pages..

This innocent looking little car sure had no idea about what will happen when it arrived to Helsinki, Luftsick Land. No more MR Nice Guy..

I am selling my 1960 Cabriolet in order to cut the mortage for my apartment a bit, so I needed some kind of a ride for next summer. My 1952 Split Window needed a lot more work than I was willing to spend on it. So, I let it go too and managed to find this MR (museum registered) 1964 Beetle Sedan.

It was refreshing for a change to see something else than gray interior. That Mr Hankey color fits nicely with the Panama Beige paint.

Old School California Look has been around since late 80's and the trend shows no signs of slowing, naturally in Europe German Look has arised during 90's, but Old School Cal Look is still the way to go for me. Basic Old School car is not very far from stock except technically. Original paint, trim, flashers and interior are used along with 12V electrics, lowered suspension, built gearbox and big engine.

In Finland we have concept called museum registration. It basically means restoring a car that is 25 years old or older to 100% stock condition and with museum registration you would get 15 dollar insurance that covers most common incidents. The yearly usage of the car is limited to 30 days.

So, in theory a museum registered Beetle should be a good basis for Old School car and this is something that we have talked many times in club meetings. In practice things are little different since many museum registered Beetles are awfully restored. To people that know jack shit about VWs museum registration is an easy benchmark when buying the Beetle, to rip-off hustlers museum registration is a sales pitch for putting some extra to the price.

This car has many of the usual MR Beetle flaws (like painted without removing windows) but what matters most is that the car is still quite untampered and has very solid body & pan. Those MR flaws are beyond my understanding, I simply cannot understand how would any one do a scottish (cheap) restoration in one of the most common cars in the world, I spent more money in getting the missing Cabriolet only pieces to my Vert than the purchasing price of this car.