My Meyers Tow'd

[Vealmonkey]

After talking to several board members and a couple requests, I'm posting pics of my Meyers Tow'd. Bruce Meyers is considered the Grandfather of fiberglass dune buggies. The Tow'd was his second major design. It was made to tow behind a camper and they were origianlly off'-road only. Customers later prompted Bruce to make parts to make the Tow'd street legal and those cars were technically called "Tow'dsters". My Tow'd was off roac only and never registered. I need to get a Bug rear pan section with a title so I can swap the sections out and try and register my Tow'd. Tow'ds were only made for 2 1/2 years and a rough estimate of between 600 and 800 were made. The early Tow'd tubs were made from ABS plastic that had the color already mixed in. Brake fluid and brittleness prompted Bruce to change to fiberglass bodies. My body is ABS, but in pretty sad shape, as in unsavable. Production started in Oct of 68 and my body is made in Dec of
68. My body is "217" and nobody is sure if it is the 217th body made or the 17th body made in the second month of production? My body was originally orange which you can see below the Metal flake blue paint. I'll be posting pics as I make the car roadworth, or that's the intention anyway. I bought the car about 3 or 4 years ago and only mess with it in spurts. Lots of projects as everyone knows. LOL Here are the pics as I bought it.

[Vealmonkey]

When I bought the car, it barley ran, was abused and I was told there was no reverse in the swingaxle transmission. Mission number one was getting it running. I bought alot of new engine bits and new carb and intake and exhaust and of course tune up parts and oil change and new fuel pump and all that. It pretty much put the engine to this point. Now I could get the engine running, but it wouldn't stay running. I found out the rust from the fuel tank was clogging up the fuel lines. I bought several disposable fuel filters and found that they clogged up even faster! LOL So now a dilemma. I just so happened on a Dune Buggy forum I post on, several people were running into this same problem. The original fuel tanks were made from well pipe casing and they were beginning to have problems. So a membe with a hot rod shop or at least a friend that worked in a hot rod shopt commissioned him to build an aluminum tank to the original specs. Well, the gentleman made a "jig" and had the ability to make more copies so 10 or 12 tanks we built from aluminum and you could even get a fuel lever indicator in it, so that was what I bought. I will get a pic of the aluminum tank and get that posted.up here shortly. If you notice in the pictues, the engine seems a little weather beaten and the distributor is missing. The car sits outside under a tarp and my buddy "borrowed" the dist to try and get his buggy running and he hasn't returned it yet. LOL

[Vealmonkey]

Here are pics of my custom made fuel tank. These tanks were made only to fit the Tow'd. Notice the fuel sender.

[Vealmonkey]

Another one of the problems I had to deal with is the car is required to have an emergency brake handle. These kits originally came with a emergency brake cable actuated turning brake instead of an emergency brake proper. So I bought, and modified to work, a mount for an emergency brake handle. I also had to shorten the emergency brake handle itself,
2 1/2 inches so it would clear the shifter as it's pretty tight inside the buggy. 2 emergency brake handles later...success. A Tig welder and a person that knows how to use one beats an inexperienced but enthusiastic person on a stick welder. LOL So another major hurdle down. Now it just needs bead blasted and powdercoated. Now the next big push is to finish getting my 68 rear section switched out with what is in the Buggy now.

[edog]

Cool buggy!!!!!

What kind of engine is that?

[SYKO]

Cool buggy!!!!!

What kind of engine is that?

its a 327....

[Thorpe]

its a 327....

Oh yeah... The opposed SBC... Those are rare!

[wheelie king]

Oh yeah... The opposed SBC... Those are rare!

1600 cc dual port VW engine.

Bad little sucker with endless mod possibilities and makes good power with very little weight.

[Vealmonkey]

The engine has a larger displacement than stock and a bigger cam. I think I was told 1776, but I really don't know as I don't know the stroke and bore. I've never really had the engine running for long because of the rusty fuel tank. And you have to remove the body to get to where the tank is, so that is why I'm doing that and replacing the rear pan section with the titled IRS section. Also the IRS gives a much better quality of ride on the road and the wheels stay in better contact with varying road condition than the swingaxle trans does, even though people prefer the swingaxle trans for racing and such. A board member will be coming over Saturday to give me a hand with the buggy and maybe a couple other projects so there should be some more progress tomorrow. Also we will reassemble his 110 top end.

[Zach]

that thing is awesome!

[MonroeMike]

Very cool machine, nice project.

[dcreel]

My dad has an original manx sitting in his barn. His has a 1500 motor in it, and gets along quite nicely. Or did when it was running. You definitely have a lot of amazing stuff vealmonkey. I can't wait for more pictures.

[Bryan Raffa]

you and MIK6 would be like brothers .... hahah who makes them rear tires..

[phreakboy]

Very cool, I have always wanted to find a tow'd but they are pretty hard to come across. I will be tuned in for any updates for sure.

[Vealmonkey]

They are some kind of tractor rear tires I believe. The rear wheels are modded original vw rims. Those rear tires had managed to rub 2 nasty areas on the original body also adding to the not being able to repair it factor.