1969 Volkswagen Beetle being brought back to life

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In late October 2020, Annie Van Orman bought a derelict VW Beetle. The Pincher Creek, Alberta resident knew the car was a significant project but wasn’t daunted by the prospect of putting in the hours it would take to return it to like-new condition. Van Orman has been documenting the progress of the 1969 Volkswagen Beetle restoration on Instagram, taking close to 30,000 followers along for the ride on her @annies_VW page.

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“At 16, my first car was a 1971 Volkswagen Super Beetle,” Van Orman explains. “I drove it until I was 18, and always knew I wanted to come back to a Beetle and thought I’d like to restore one.”

Raised in Lethbridge, Alta., Van Orman comes from a large family. Her dad, she says, “instilled in me, and all of my siblings, a love for work.” She continues, “Growing up, weekends were for working. My dad grew up rural, and when things broke you had to be able to fix them, so we were always doing something. But I had a real curiosity about how things worked, so I would take things apart and put them back together.” For example, every pedal bicycle Van Orman ever owned was first taken to pieces and reassembled, just so she could familiarize herself with how all of the components interacted with each other. And in 2013, when she and her husband built their home and garage, she did all of the finishing work and hung all of the cabinets.

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“All of this stuff is really up my alley,” Van Orman says of how she acquired the skills, and the well-stocked tool chest, needed to tackle a vintage vehicle restoration. “Working on the Beetle is really just an extension of some skills I’d been building over the years.” But one skill that really instilled confidence in Van Orman was the ability to weld.

“In 2018, a girlfriend of mine wanted to take a women’s MIG welding course in Lethbridge,” she says. “I went along, and it was one night a week for eight weeks of learning with a great instructor. There’s no way I’d have thought of doing this Beetle without those welding skills.”

Van Orman’s project Beetle was found by her husband, whom she says, “had known forever I wanted to restore one. But I kind of thought that ship might have sailed.” He pursued the car, and Van Orman bought it. At first, she didn’t do anything with the project but let sit it on the driveway. Instead, she spent a few months researching and formulating a game plan for all the different build phases she would go through with the Beetle.

Finally, in March 2021, she rolled the VW into her 30-foot by 40-foot climate controlled garage and began dismantling the car. With the body separated from the pan, first up was the restoration of the chassis. Van Orman cut out the rusted floor pans and welded in new ones. She disassembled, cleaned, and rebuilt the front and rear suspension. Many of the original parts were restored, while components such as shock absorbers and ball joints were replaced.

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The 1600cc single-port air-cooled engine was not in great shape. It was seized, and a head was cracked. Few pieces were salvageable, including the case. With replacement parts, however, Van Orman was able to build a complete powerplant to stock specifications. “I’m doing absolutely everything, with the exception of the machining, myself,” Van Orman says. “I spend time on YouTube and the forums, but that’s just half of it. The other half is getting out there and doing it. Even if it doesn’t work, you’re learning.”

With the Beetle’s pan and running gear reassembled, in August 2022, Van Orman turned her attention to the body. There was plenty of rust, and it had been hit in the front. She’s cut out all of the rot, made her own patch panels, and welded the majority of them in place. Rather than settle for a previous repair on the front clip that she says had been OK, she’s cut it off and will weld one in salvaged from another car, or a new replacement clip.

She’s got a little way to go before priming and painting the body, placing it back on the pan, installing an interior kit and buttoning up the Beetle, but Van Orman is determined to get there.

Of the popularity of her @annies_VW Instagram page, Van Orman sums up, “I am a little surprised by how popular it’s become, but I think people want to be invested in a story, and I’m just bringing people along on the journey.”

Greg Williams is a member of the Automobile Journalists Association of Canada (AJAC). Have a column tip? Contact him at 403-287-1067 or [email protected]