Prep and paint

With the metalwork finished we moved onto painting the bus. I found it difficult to find anyone willing to paint the bus for a reasonable price so I decided to paint it myself ..... with a roller. Now this may seem to most people madness, however old Rolls Royce vehicles were hand painted so why shouldn't my bus.

I painted the bus with Rustoleum CombiColour RAL2000 Orange and RAL 9000 White. The first stage involved rubbing the whole bus down with 120 grit. After two coats with the roller I then wet sanded with 400 grit, then another two coats, then wet sanded with 800 grit then another two coats then 1000 grit then a machine polish with G3.

I have to say that I was impressed with the end shine and depth of paint, the negatives would be that the paint is very hard and chips easily often taking a 1p sized chunk with it especially on the front panel.

The metalwork

I'm luckier than most VW fanatics in the my father is a sheet metal worker, that's to say that he's good to have around when cutting, forming and welding panels and chassis parts to go onto the bus.  The bus needed welding in all of the usual areas, basically the bottom 6" of panels all around the bus and a new section of chassis leg around the engine, some floor work and a couple of outriggers too.

We tried to keep as much of the original VW metalwork as possible and only replaced what was absolutely necessary.

The rear apron / valance was rotten so this was replaced fully.


A small repair made to the front bumper deformation panel.


Both of the rear corner needed replacing...


surprisingly the battery tray on the ns was ok


a new rh chassis leg was fabricated by dad complete with captive nuts internal to the box section for the bumper irons.


Both doors needed some bottom repairs, both new repair panels were fabricated by dad...


Both steps and front arches had thankfully been replaced but the small closing section was needed on the os.


Additional to this there were a number of patches to the floor required, the roof corner needed replacing along with some gutter sections.

A piece of VW history....

Well, we didn't know it at the time but our little VW is in a very small way a piece of VW history. It's not the most sort after conversion, nor is it the most practical, however original VW  T2 Holdsworths are becoming very rare with one estimate I heard of less than ten examples left!

I'm guessing that these are rare because the Holdsworth T2 conversion was cheaper than most other conversions and it also was made from a panel van, meaning the windows are cut into the metalwork rather than the window surrounds being formed at VWs Wolfsburg factory in Germany, this makes them generally less desirable.

I did find some copies of an original T2 Holdsworth brochure...





Our interior is basically Layout 1 without the poptop and without the fridge. It does have a storage hole at the far side of the cooker which can't be seen in the above photo.





When we received the bus the interior was just thrown in the back, there were some hideous green curtains and the original seats cushions were totally threadbare and beyond repair. Importantly it was complete which makes restoring the bus to its original specification a much easier task.

The arrival....

This is the full and unedited story of our December 1972 VW Type 2 Holdsworth camper (officially motor caravan) with reg OUD888L. We're Mark, Jen and our son Harry and we live in Gateshead in the North East of England (UK). This blog is an attempt to catalogue for prosperity the work carried out to this great vehicle and to record technical information about rebuilding, renewing, tweaking and tinkering to get this bus into the usable condition it is in today.

We bought the bus back in September 2005 from a local chap called Michael, many people have bought various busses from him over the years and he's a nice guy. We were super skint at the time and he allowed us to pay the £700 over a number of months. I think the same bus now would cost three times that.

The bus turned up on a low loader, my wife was instantly horrified by the remarkably poor bodywork and the amateurish graffiti on the front panel. It was actually not in too poor condition considering it is an original RHD UK bus. The engine was however not original and was a 1600 unit from a T25 which at the time we though was OK, it turned out to not last more than 3 miles!

Some images from the day we bought the bus, it was in a sorry state to say the least. Thankfully the original interior was with the bus and the headliner was in excellent condition. All we needed was a solid bus to put it in - and so the work began (it hasn't stopped since!).