"If there is light it will find you"

The "little ball of momentum in restoration" I'm attempting to keep rolling has found some resistance lately...I gained a lot of momentum by finding some hard to locate parts recently but haven't found much real progress with the actual project of the car.  The body is off being worked on at a decent pace but that's where things seem to have stalled.  As mentioned before, I picked up the transmission this past Saturday but have found so many things wrong with it that I can't trust that anything was actually done correctly.  The more I look at it, the more I find wrong with it-and this is just the outside...who knows what actually happened inside?  I guess disappointment takes a lot longer in some cases.  At some point, I'm either going to pull it apart myself or send it to another trusted shop to pull it apart and have a look inside.  I'll never understand why some people spend more time intentionally doing things the wrong way vs. doing them the right way...especially when time is on their side.

So to keep this little ball rolling, I've enlisted the help of a local VW guy to clean up the 1500 S motor.  It was pulled off the transmission last night and looks really nice.  There's a little end play but it's otherwise very clean.  The flywheel is clean and has very minor wear.  I didn't get any photos before it was loaded but it was a nice surprise.  The heads will be rebuilt using new valves, the cylinders will be honed (it's been sitting for 25 years), tins will be straightened and powder coated, everything else will be installed per the original specs way back when...

The 'fits and starts' of parts purchasing is in a lull...I've spent enough for now and found enough to keep me going for quite some time and unless something super rare pops up, I'll focus on working on what I have and thinning the parts pile.

I also found a new powder coating shop...cheaper and faster than the previous place that's caused me a ton of money in extra work.  I will have to put together a pile of parts to meet the minimums and get it all done at once.  It'll hurt, but only once!

There's a local VW show in August.  I don't think I have enough to get a swap space but I might have enough to share one.  I'm still thinking about it...

...meanwhile, I'm focused on trying to finish up the 20 projects going on around the house.