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For you VW folks who have disc brakes (Karmaan Ghia owners after 1970, Bus after '67-correct me if I'm wrong, or after '67 if you were lucky enough to have a European-spec Beetle), the brake job will be a bit simpler in some ways. I will honestly tell you that I have had no experience with disc brakes on a VW of any kind. There are some very general procedures that I can share with you, however, but I would recommend you get a shop manual of some sort to get some details on assembly and disassembly of the calipers and related stuff.
As for resurfacing the discs, they are pretty thin to begin with, so if all you had was a little pedal "pulsation" or small grooves in the metal, you can probably machine them this one time. If the discs are badly grooved or are out of true more than .006-.008", you'll have to get new ones. As they are around the same price as a set of front drums, I don't believe the discs are terribly expensive new, anyhow. Either way, you'll have to make sure the disc braking surfaces are very clean before installing them. Clean and pack the wheel bearings just as you did on the front drums. Tap the inboard bearing seal in place, and install the disc. Preload the axle nut the same way as you did on the front drums. Install the caliper with new pads on the disc, put the caliper bolts back in and tighten them down fairly tight. You're done! No adjusting is required on disc brakes. Nice, huh? By the way, refer to Tech Article #3 for some of the above procedures.
First, make sure your brake fluid reservoir is full. You don't want it to go empty during the bleeding process or you'll be doing it all over again and let me tell you, my friends, bleeding brakes can be a royal pain in the boohonkus. Start with the right front wheel. Jack it up a bit if you need more room (USE JACK STANDS IF YOU DO!). Take off the bleeder cap, if it is still on there. Push your piece of hose on the end of the bleeder and stick the hose in the jar of brake fluid. Tell your friend to climb in the car and get ready. Open the bleeder half a turn and tell your friend to push the pedal slowly to the floor and hold. Tighten the screw. Now tell your friend to slowly release the pedal all the way up. Keep repeating the process until there is no air in the stream coming out of the hose. Do this on the left front, right rear, and left rear, all in that order. Don't forget to check the fluid reservoir in the front compartment frequently, as you don't want to run out of fluid! By the way, this method can also be used for flushing your brake system as is recommended every 20,000 miles. All this should get you a firm, high pedal. If you don't get a good, firm pedal but can still stop safely, you may have to drive the car for a couple of days to "shake" the remaining air in the system to the ends of the brake lines and then go through the bleeding process again. This is what I meant about the bleeding being a pain. It'll just sometimes do that to you.
Parking/Emergency Brake
You need a straight-slot screwdriver, (2) 10mm wrenches, and a new parking brake boot if yours was ragged or about to be. Jack the car up just enough to be able to turn the back wheels. Pull the old boot off. It'll be a bit stubborn. See those two slotted ends sticking up in the back of the handle? Those are the ones you'll adjust. Pull the parking brake up three clicks. There are two nuts on each cable. One is a locknut (top) and the other is the adjuster (bottom). Hold the bottom nut with one wrench and undo the top nut with the other wrench. Hold the cable end with the screwdriver and start turning the right adjusting nut with the wrench and keep turning it, checking the right rear wheel. When properly adjusted, you should be able to just barely be able to turn the wheel by hand. Do the same for the left side. After that, make sure the bar between the two cables is horizontal. Now tighten the locknuts and put the boot back on. Spraying a little silicon or soap in the boot will make the install much easier.
I hope the series on brakes got you out of a mess or kept you from getting into too much of one to begin with. Again, I recommend that you get a shop manual for reference, but there are some details they always leave out, and I hope I was able to fill you in on some of those details. Happy buggin', bussin', Karmaan Giah-in', whatever!
Your VW maniac and Tech Specialist,
Mike C.