I am considering starting a v8 beetle project. I am new to building cars and would prefer to buy a proffesionally built chassis to start from. Is there anyone who makes a chassis suitable for a mid-mounted rover v8 that would be easy to modify to be able to fit a beetle body to?

Also what kind of drivetrain would be good for this?

Ileck, I've built 5 mid-engined beetles, all with V8s, and I've done a lot of work for other peoples cars too. There is someone in the States that sells a huge RHS chassis with Mustang II front suspension, and something equally horendous at the rear. It needs a V8 just to move it!
I've used Renault transaxles, and have modified some of them to take a ZF LSD from a diesel Peugeot pick up (not all of them have one).
I've also used a ZF transaxle, and one from a Porsche 914.
It's such an easy conversion, as the Bettle is probably the only car that's readily available with a seperate body/chassis.
Take a look at my site for a few hints, and if you like what you see, I have a full rolling mid-engine chassis with LSD trans, suspension, radiators, seats, steering column, pedal box/booster etc. for sale.
I can ship it anywhere in the world.

It wouldn't be a "true" VW Beetle, but you could get your hands on an old mini-truck like an S-10 or Mazda B-series, section the frame rails to make them shorter, and mount your V-8 up front and through the differential of the truck. If the beetle body doesn't fit, get a 30's style grille and stretch a vinyl tarp from the welded-on-grille to the front of the beetle cabin, with some wire supports underneath to keep its shape. A friend of mine did this and left the sides of the engine bay open to make room for straight pipes. Loudest beetle I've ever heard.

Also, he fashoned up some slick polyurethaned white pine running boards and some G-70 Drag slicks on American Racing wheels for the back, and a Cerwin-Vega 18" subwoofer where the old motor was - cops used to pull him over just so they could look at the car.

As for Mid-engined bugs, you'd probably have to do some serious re-arranging of seats and such as well as some big-time stretching of the beetle body to have the engine be middle-mounted... check out some of the Beetle funny cars or pro-stockers on Google
-MR

mranlet:

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As for Mid-engined bugs, you'd probably have to do some serious re-arranging of seats and such as well as some big-time stretching of the beetle body to have the engine be middle-mounted...

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