Building the Splinter

Update

2008-11-27T10:57:00.004-05:00

Sorry for the lack of updates recently; I sometimes forget that people read this blog. With Phase 1 of the Splinter project complete, I am concentrating on graduating next month and getting a job before plunging fully into Phase 2, which is getting the car running. We have been having a good time taking the prototype version of the Splinter around for sponsors, colleagues and friends to have a look at. Thanks for sticking in with us over the last couple years, and look for the Splinter at the PRI show in December in Orlando and at the AWFS in Las Vegas in July. We are also looking forward to seeing a small feature by Robert Cumberford in the January issue of Automobile Magazine.

25 Sep 08

2008-09-26T08:10:00.003-04:00

Spent most of the morning getting my laptop running again. It failed in the middle of the presenstation at VT last week, and we are going to be seriously needing that thing. Aaron was up to the job, fortunately. In the afternoon, I worked on the butterfly panels some more. The inner edge of each panel has some waves that show up in the clearcoat where I clamped the trim piece on. I was cognizant about not clamping them on too hard, but I think it would have been impossible to do it without reblocking that area. The amount of difference it takes to become a visible dip or wave in the surface is probably something like 10 thousands of an inch, and it was bound to move that much. Next time, the trim should definitely go on first.

24 Sep 08

2008-09-25T07:40:00.002-04:00

I spent most of the day at school today, because I have a lot of stuff to do for graduation and other things. Before I left, I cut some triangulating brackets for the steering arm bosses on the front suspension uprights that will beef up the joint. I have a lot of block sanding to do tomorrow.

23 Sep 08

2008-09-24T08:15:00.002-04:00

I jacked the Splinter up this morning took the front tires off. I had a bunch of errands to run and emails to write, which took me most of the middle part of the day. Ben came out to work on some benches, and we went to Wendy's for lunch. Chris came by to drop off a piece of glass that we might be able to use as a spare, and he fixed a small crack that was forming in the windshield while he was here. Later in the afternoon, Ben and I moved some steel with Hunt at his place, and Hunt and I took it to the scrapyard and dropped one of the wooden wheels off at JT's on the way to get the tire taken off. That one wheel has a leak, so we wanted to take the tire off and reinspect the seal around the center section of the rim. When we got back, I took the uprights off the front suspension so that we could reinforce the steering arm boss. I called it a night at about 7:30pm.

22 Sep 08

2008-09-22T07:43:00.002-04:00

I had some major cleanup work to do in the shop once we got back from VT, so I spent most of the weekend doing that. It feels good to have the shop mostly back in order. I had the shop clean enough for the car to be rolled back in by Sunday, and Ben helped me pull her out of the trailer. We have a bunch of work to do on her yet, so it will be back to it starting today. I really want to get the headlights and taillights in soon, and the whole body needs to be resprayed. Time to get to it.

Wood Week at Virginia Tech

2008-09-19T09:14:00.002-04:00

We just got back from Blacksburg, Virginia late last night after taking the car to Virginia Tech's Wood Week. I met Paul Winistorfer, the director of VT's Wood Science department, at IWF several weeks ago, and we decided that the car would be a good thing to have at their event. After spraying the car again on Tuesday night, we got up early on Wednesday to get everything ready to go. Ben and Aaron helped, and Aaron, Hunt and I left a little after lunchtime. We showed up in Blacksburg at about 5:45pm and went straight to the Inn at Virginia Tech, where I gave a short presentation about the car at a scholarship reception. We went to the hotel to crash that night and got over to the school at 7:00am for breakfast and a meeting. An hour later, we rolled the caravan over to the drill field and unloaded the car right onto the lawn underneath a tent. We spent the day hanging out around the car and talking to people about it. At about 4:00pm, it was time to head out, and we loaded up the car and hit the road by 5:00pm. We got back at around 8:45pm and were all tired. Paul and all the students and faculty at VT were some of the best people we have had the pleasure to talk with about the car, and we wouldn't hesitate to go back.

15 Sep 08

2008-09-15T23:08:00.000-04:00

I had some clean-up on the car to do this morning, so I started by sanding the taillight surrounds and going over some of the areas on the body that needed to be blocked. When Hunt came up, we finished adjusting the front suspension. Ben came out and put some flush-mount eyelets in the floor of the trailer to get use for holding the car down. I had to go to school this afternoon, but I fit a piece of bent plywood inside the rear body section to support it better. When I got back from school, I riveted and glued the piece onto the car. I also added some angle brackets inside the rear wheel well. Once I got this done, I took the rear wheels back off to make sure everything was locked down on the suspension and to get the wheel wells cleaned up. Hunt came up and sanded on the body with 400grit to prepare for spraying tomorrow. I finished at about 11:00pm and called it a night.

14 Sep 08

2008-09-14T22:11:00.002-04:00

Front suspension work all day long today. Hunt and I both crawled under the car at least 217 times between us, because when you adjust 1 parameter, all the other ones move, too. Once we finally got the front wheels located properly front to back, we saw that the caster was off, so we had to readjust that. Then, we found that the leaf spring wasn't centered over the upper A-arms, so we had to pull it out, shave it down, and stick it back in again. Everything turned out well by about 10:00pm, and we called it a night.

13 Sep 08

2008-09-14T07:32:00.003-04:00

More suspension work today. Hunt and I worked most of the morning getting the driver's side back tire located properly. We also went to the Home Depot to get some D-rings to mount to the bottom of the car as tie-down points. It was about lunchtime by the time we finished the rear suspension, so we took a food break. After lunch, Caroline came out to help me tighten the plates around the bearing that holds the steering column before it comes through the dash. This is not the first time that her long, lean arms have been a big advantage on reaching tight areas on the car. Once this was finished, we took the driver's side front spindle off and began adjusting the A-arms to locate that tire properly. We had the spindle centered in the wheel well by dinnertime and checked the tire fit. We decided that we needed to bring the tire out a touch more and to give it slightly more negative camber, so we broke for dinner. After dinner, I came out, took the knuckle back off, and unscrewed the heim joints to push the lower A-arm out. Hunt came as I was ready to get the tire on and checked things out with me. We had a few more issues to correct, but the tire was pretty much in the right place with respect to the body, so we called it a night at about 9:30pm.

12 Sep 08

2008-09-13T07:13:00.002-04:00

I went to school this morning and picked up some jam nuts and all-thread on the way back, showing up at about 2:30pm. Hunt worked on the suspension while I was gone. He and I continued work on the suspension for the afternoon, getting one of the rear tires properly located and the other side disassembled. I called it a night at about 7:00pm to go to dinner for Luke's birthday.

11 Sep 08

2008-09-13T07:02:00.000-04:00

More truss trim-out detail this morning. I had to scrape epoxy out of the corners of the truss for a while, modifying a scraper to fit in the process. Once I had everything all cleaned up, I started to trim out the leading edge of the truss by chiseling the front edges of my trim laminates square and cutting a piece to run across in front of the them. I also cut a piece of veneer to run over the whole area. Right before lunch, we went to the junkyard to look at the rear suspension of a torn-up Corvette. After lunch, Hunt and I went to work on the rear suspension of the Splinter. We had to snake in and take off a panel on the box channel to gain access to the trailing arms where they mount to the s-panel. Once we had access, we removed the trailing arms and cut off one end so Hunt could weld a different nut onto the end. I did a little work on the driver's side suspension and finished up at about 9:30pm.

10 Sep 08

2008-09-10T22:14:00.002-04:00

I went to school for most of the day today, getting back to the shop around 3:30pm. When I got back, I got the truss trim pieces glued down. I had to cut a bunch of wood blocks to spread them apart and to hold them down. I finished at about 8:15pm, right as Caroline got home, and called it a night.

09 Sep 08

2008-09-10T10:23:00.002-04:00

I routed the lightening holes back out of the truss, as they were covered over by the new layer of cherry veneer we added a day or 2 ago. It took me a while to get the tacky tape off the borders, but it all looked good when it was finished. Hunt cut the truss trim lamination into 2 pieces using the tablesaw and the planer, and I started fitting it. Before lunch, he and I went to Strutmasters in Roxboro to check out their products and look at using them on the Splinter. When we came back, we cut up an old trailer and put some steel on a trailer to go to the scrap yard. I cut some boards to help me clamp the truss trim pieces down and called it a night at about 8:00pm.

08 Sep 08

2008-09-08T23:46:00.003-04:00

I went to school this morning to work, and came back to go to Huntersville with Ben and Luke. We got an invitation to visit Joe Gibbs Racing last week and took them up on it. Rick Orellana graciously showed us around and gave us the full tour, from the car haulers to the engine room to the body shop. That is one incredible organization to see from the inside like that, and all the guys who worked there were really cool to talk to about the car. It was the most fun we had had in a while, and we got back at around 11:00pm.

07 Sep 08

2008-09-08T23:42:00.002-04:00

I planed some cherry backer this morning to 1/8" thick and laminated it to the curvature of the truss to make a trim piece. After this was glued up, Hunt and I molded a wheel well. After the wheel well, I laminated a piece of cherry veneer over the truss using 6mil polyethylene on each side of the truss. As I worked on this, Hunt glued another wheel well, and we called it a night after we got it in the bag at about 8:00pm.

06 Sep 08

2008-09-06T23:27:00.002-04:00

I block sanded the body all morning, concentrating primarily on the front fender lines. Hunt researched air springs and made the last 5 sided plywood pieces before lunch. After lunch, we dug one of the wheel well molds out of the storage shed, and Hunt cut the bottom radii off of it and ground it flat and straight. I continued to clean up the body lines on the front of the car and along the edges of the butterfly panels, and we made a gameplan for how to refine the truss. We called it a night at around 7:00pm.

05 Sep 08

2008-09-05T22:18:00.002-04:00

I block sanded the body this morning and got Caroline's assistance in putting a mold away this morning before going to school. When I got back, Hunt had made another 5-sided piece that ties in the rear cross-section. I went back to block sanding, which is likely to be the joy of my life for the next 10 days or so. Ben was out back working on the installation for his art exhibit, and Hunt glued up the final 5-sided piece. I finished up at about 8pm, and went in to eat with Ben and Caroline. After dinner, I came back out, block sanded and answered emails until about 10:30pm.

04 Sep 08

2008-09-04T22:35:00.002-04:00

It looked like the sun got us on the rear cross section piece yesterday, because we found out that the part was bad this morning. Not terrible, just not worthy of over 200mph. The sun was hitting that side of the mold hard while we were laying the part up yesterday, and I feel sure that the resin kicked off before we had the part vacuumed down. We started over on it, putting down 5 of the 8 pieces this morning. We had a visit from a nice guy named Doug Foster today, who asked Hunt and me some questions about the car and recorded some of it. After lunch, I sanded the car a little bit, and Hunt got ready to lay up the last 3 pieces of veneer on the cross section. After we bagged that, I sanded a little more while Hunt laid up an angle bracket. At 6:30pm, Luke came out, and he, Ben and I went to play some ball. Ben was on my team all night, so I didn't get the opportunity to dunk on him. Maybe next time.

03 Sep 08

2008-09-03T22:53:00.004-04:00

I went to school this morning to work on my portfolio, and Hunt glued up more plywood pieces while I was gone. When I got back, I went to work on more trim pieces and figuring out how to mount the headlights. That is going to be a complicated part, but it should be doable. Luke, Christina, and Ben came by to watch the piece about the car on the Discovery Channel tonight, which everyone was pleased with. Ken Hamm and his crew made me look about as close to a normal human being as is possible. Hunt came back up to glue up one last part, and Caroline, Luke, Christina, Ben and I went out to eat.

02 Sep 08

2008-09-02T23:21:00.002-04:00

I worked on trimming out the car some more this morning and helped Hunt get a part in the bag before going over to NC State to check some things out. When I got back, I worked on trimming some more. Hunt reworked an old mold while I was at school, and I helped him bag it after he had cut the veneers and spread the glue on them. We finished up at about 8:30pm and called it a day.

01 Sep 08

2008-09-01T22:51:00.003-04:00

I went back to work making trim pieces for the butterfly panels, and Aaron and Bimal worked on laying up more box channel pieces and dug a couple more molds out of storage. The produced a new firewall piece and the final 2 box channels by the end of the day and also sealed the rear cross section mold in preparation for making a part. I helped them on and off and trimmed out pieces on the car. Ben put our disc sander back together and modified the trailer hitch from the van to fit the Suburban. He and I put it on at the end of the day, finishing up at around 7:00pm.

31 Aug 08

2008-08-31T23:59:00.002-04:00

I worked on trimming out the butterfly panels, and Hunt worked on the rear suspension for most of the morning. Ben weedwhacked until lunchtime and took the motor off the 20" disc sander for Hunt to look at. Hunt fixed the motor in the afternoon while I glued the middle trim piece on the 2nd butterfly panel and fit the rear trim piece on the first panel. The panels are starting to look much, much better. I went in to eat around 7:00pm and came back after dinner to finish the rear trim piece on the 1st butterfly panel. I came inside to write at about 9:00pm and called it a night.

30 Aug 08

2008-08-31T07:02:00.002-04:00

Hunt and I went to the junkyard to get some pieces that we needed this morning, and I went to work on gluing a trim piece to one of the butterfly panels. I had this on by lunchtime, and we ate at the airport. After lunch, I made a trim piece for the front of the butterfly panel that I had glued to, and Hunt and I finished gluing up the transmission hanger and made a 4th box channel. We finished at about 7pm and went to eat. After dinner, Caroline and I went to Home Depot to get some 6mil and then went to get her a new laptop for school.

29 Aug 08

2008-08-29T23:51:00.002-04:00

We had pretty good production today. Hunt and I pulled the first box channel off the mold to find a good part, and Aaron and Bimal went forward with laying up another one with the same method. I got a little work done on the butterfly panel trim piece in between helping the guys with glue-ups. After the 2nd box channel was under vacuum, Bimal and Aaron got into making the first half of the transmission hanger. We had it mostly in the bag when Bimal left at noon. After lunch, Aaron cleaned up and made a dump run while I finished up the butterfly panel trim pieces. He got a corner bracket ready, and I helped him get it in the bag. Next, he spread glue on the next set of box channel veneer, and I took the box channel from the morning off the mold. We finished laying it up right at 5pm, when it was time for Aaron to hit the road. Hunt and I worked on taking apart the front suspension for the next hour or 2, and I went in the eat at around 7pm. After dinner, Caroline and I went to see The Dark Knight finally, now that the schedule is a little less rigorous. It was pretty good, especially the Joker and the LP640.

28 Aug 08

2008-08-28T21:47:00.003-04:00

Hunt and I talked about what needs attention on the car this morning until Bimal and Aaron showed up at around 8am. They prepped the box channel mold lay-up by cleaning off the table, cutting veneer and collecting some pieces for the mold. In the meantime, I worked on fitting a trim piece inside the butterfly panel, and Hunt took the rear suspension apart. Hunt and I helped Bimal and Aaron get everything sorted, and we had a successful dry run finished by lunch. After lunch, Bimal and Aaron glued the part, and Hunt and I helped them vacuum it down. Ben came out to work on his art, and I worked on the trim pieces more while Bimal and Aaron got more pieces of veneer cut and ready for tomorrow. After dinner, I worked on the trim pieces some more and taped off a headlight cutout to look at for a while. Caroline helped me get one butterfly panel back on the car, and we called it a night at about 9:45pm.

27 Aug 08

2008-08-28T06:58:00.002-04:00

Everything is pretty close to back to normal now. Bimal showed up at 8am this morning and cleaned out the loom room to get ready for some work. Hunt and I cleaned out the blue room. Before lunch, Bimal and I dug out the box channel mold and spent a while cleaning it off. Bimal sanded it, and Hunt and I got some more scuba tanks to cut into rear uprights for the suspension. After lunch, Bimal went about covering the box channel mold in peel ply, much like he did on the trailer canopy. This will stop any leaks that come through the mold. We spent some time getting the car off the trailer and onto the table this afternoon, and everything went smoothly with that. When we finished up there, Bimal headed out. I took the 2 back wheels off the car to work on the rear suspension some tomorrow, and Caroline and I went to replace my broken cell phone at about 7:30pm.

IWF

2008-08-26T21:28:00.003-04:00

Sorry that I haven't posted in a while, but the 3 days preceeding IWF were somewhat of a blur. I only remember certain things, so I won't try to list everything that was done. Monday night, Ben, Caroline and I stayed up until about 4am getting the chassis together and ready for the body. Tuesday, more sanding on the body, and Luke and I went to get the rental tow van. We added some stiffeners to the z-panel and steering column and brought the body in. The body went on the chassis that afternoon, and we started mounting the corner blocks inside the wheel wells to tie everything in. I climbed inside the car and fit the interior body panels one last time, and ground the edges of the butterfly panel. Hunt helped me mount the 2nd panel, and I ground its edge, too. Hunt worked all night on the running boards, and turned out some unreal results in the time we had. He also helped Luke get the front plywood chin glued onto the car. Aaron and Caroline ground the edges of the wheel wells, and I took the butterfly panels off to hit their inside edges with a power planer. The sun was coming up, and the guys went in to sleep for a couple of hours. Chris came by to check on the windows, and a gentleman from NBC17 came by to do a quick pre-trip interview with me. I was completely filthy, but he said it was cool because I was in my element. We got permission from the guys at the Georgia World Congress Center to move the car in early Wednesday morning instead of Tuesday night, which made all the difference in the world. I went inside to take a shower and fell asleep for about 20min. I came back outside ready to tackle the rest of the car. I had some more pieces to fit inside the car, and Hunt and Jean stained and sprayed the new running boards. Jason and his brother, Robbie, from Custom Refinishers came by and saved the day by spraying the car body with 40 gloss Becker Acroma 2-part polyurethane, finishing up at about 10:30pm. Chris and his buddy, Kenny, went to work putting the glass in the car after the clearcoat flashed off, and they successfully finished at about 11:15pm in front of the lights and pressure of the Discovery Channel cameras and a big audience. As soon as they finished, I mounted the butterfly panels, and we started loading the car into the trailer. We finished and hit the road at about 12:50am. My ability to drive didn't last long, and I passed off to Luke. He passed it back off to me before getting the honors of driving the rest of the way through Atlanta morning traffic. We got to the door of the World Congress Center at about 7:45am and were escorted to the appropriate door. We had the car in the booth by about 8:30am, safe and sound. We floated around the show that day and walked around Atlanta a little bit. After being entertained by Spencer Lancaster and his handtastic hands, we finally crashed hard at the Red Roof Inn that night around 11:00pm. We enjoyed several full days of show, including a party in the Delta/Porter-Cable booth with Norm Abrams and Scott Phillips, and came back to Durham after a day at the beach to unwind. The show was a big success, and we look forward to the months ahead as we set about getting the car on the road. Thanks for hanging in there with us, and keep checking us out.

24 Aug 08

2008-08-24T11:50:00.003-04:00

Sorry for the lack of recent posts, but the team and I were with the car at IWF. The reception of the car was awesome, and it was gratifying for the team to see it. I will get some updates up on Monday evening; thanks for your patience.

15 Aug 08

2008-08-16T00:46:00.002-04:00

I finished mounting the headrests this morning by gluing the plywood to the frames and drilling the mounting holes. When I finished this, it was time to get back to work on the body. DP and Bimal worked on the canopy for a while, and Luke built boxes to space the wheels off the lofting table. Zac picked up the taillight grilles from Glenwood and sanded the glue off them. I marked the location of Luke's front splitter and cut it very roughly into shape. Aaron sanded, collected samples, and helped Bimal on the canopy. DP came back to the body shell and masked the taillight holes off so that Hunt could spray feather fill on them. I replaced the windshield and marked a trimline around it with electrical tape. After I ground and chiseled out the the line, DP evened out the depth of the window openings. Zac and Aaron planed a bunch of walnut backer board, and Caroline and DP glued the logos onto the side intake panels after I ground the edges and marked the locations. After lunch, our buddy, Chuck Messer, showed up, and we gave him a look around. Sean came shortly thereafter and went to work fitting his taillights. I mounted the grill and mounted the front wing with a little help from DP and Bimal. Bimal spent the most of the afternoon working on the canopies with Jean. Luke worked hardcore with Hunt on the front suspension, mostly the steering linkage. Chris came out right as I was finishing up mounting the front wing, and we looked at trimming out the lower side window edge with the F-250 window trim pieces that we ordered. We tried hot melting urethane a piece of the trim to a piece of wood, but it peeled off too easily. Chris cleaned the windshield off with a razor blade on the surface and a belt sander on the edges. We went in to eat, and came back out to find Hunt working on suspension pieces in the shop. We got the lower control arm heim joints secure and went to the back to look at the glass. Chris left a little before midnight, and Caroline and I rolled epoxy on the tail of the car and a few minor nicked areas and called it a night at about 12:45am. Big day tomorrow. The car needs to be rolling, and Chris is coming out early to start work on the side window glass.

14 Aug 08

2008-08-15T00:11:00.002-04:00

I fed Hunt with some parts to spray this morning, and we left them to dry. Afterwards, I went to work on the body shell, and Hunt went to work on the suspension. Caroline and Kendal sanded the interior body panels, and Zac and Aaron wet sanded the butterfly panels. DP showed up to help me on the body shell, and BP went to work on putting the fabric on the canopies. Ben helped Hunt with the rear suspension, and Luke worked getting the wheels ready to go, taking them to get tires remounted. DP and I got the guys to flip the car rightside up again so that we could mark the ground trimline of the front and back edges. We marked these and flipped the car upside down again to grind them. DP worked on the lower rear surface while I ground the edges, and we were ready for lunch. After eating, DP and I flipped the car rightside up again, and I went to work on the window openings while DP worked on the taillight openings. Kendal came back to work on the 2nd canopy with BP, and DP and I got the windows set into their openings. Luke spent the afternoon setting up to make the front air splitter, and Caroline helped him glue it up and put it in the press. A good guy from NC State named Adam came out to check out the car and got put to work helping BP tape the canopy. Everyone finished up what they were doing at about 9:00pm, and we all ate pizza. The guys headed out after dinner, and I went back out to work on the headrests. I cut and machined all the pieces for mounting them to the rear rollbar cover, but needed help to drill the holes in the right place and decided to call it a night at around 12:15am.

13 Aug 08

2008-08-14T00:02:00.002-04:00

We needed a good day today, and, despite the day-long rain, we got one. I started off the day by fitting the center console, and Dave and I drilled a hole in the middle of it to accommodate the shift linkage. BP, Chuck, and John worked on zip tying the fabric to the canopies while DP and Aaron sanded body panels. Dave sanded the interior of the car and the chassis. Zac moved some things around and cut some bi-ply for Glenwood to laser cut for us. Luke worked on sanded and organizing pieces that we are going to need. He went to the junkyard in search of window molding, but didn't find any. He got some overnighted to a local Ford dealer, and we hope to pick them up tomorrow. I worked on the taillight surrounds until the guys came back with lunch. After lunch, we flipped the car right-side up on the table and went back to work. Aaron wet sanded the shell while I ground the window surrounds. DP worked on the taillights surrounds, and Luke machined the cherry running board pieces and glued them together. Ben continued trailer work in the rain. Hunt bored the center hole in the back of one of the back wheels with some help from Luke. Chris came out in the afternoon, and he and I worked on getting the windows ready to go in. He helped me work on the reveal around the glass and masked off the 2nd triangle window with black primer. While we worked on this, Ben cut pieces of balsa and backer board to make a wooden version of a pinchweld for the windows to mount to. Caroline cooked dinner for the guys, and we ate about about 9:00pm. After dinner, DP, BP, and Dave went back to sanding, and Ben and I glued the pinchwelds to the body shell. The guys headed out at around 10:00pm, and I went in to help Hunt spray the chassis. We finished at about 11:30pm and called it a night after a very long and productive day.

12 Aug 08

2008-08-12T23:55:00.003-04:00

Holy schnikes. One week remains until we leave for the show. Caroline and I block sanded the sides with 320 this morning and got the top ready to spray. Aaron helped wet sand with us, and also on the butterfly panels. DP and BP prepped the canopy for fabric, and Luke worked on the grill. Kendal finished caning the headrests, and Caroline worked on the interior body panels. She sanded and squeegeed more resin on them. After lunch, Chuck and John showed up, and we gave them a brief tour and put them to work with BP and DP putting the fabric on the canopy of the trailer. Hunt sprayed the front, top, and both sides of the body, and we took the body shell back off the chassis for likely the final time. Chuck, John, Hunt, BP and DP finished putting the cloth on the canopy. Dinner was ready at about this time, and we all ate some chicken off the grill cooked by Jean. After dinner, Luke and Caroline glued up some plywood that will be laser cut into mesh screen for the taillight openings, and I started to sort out getting the center console mounted. Nothing went well with this, but I worked on it until about 11:30pm, at which point I went to help Caroline bag her glue-up for a piece of plywood that will tie the nose of the body into the chassis. We finished at about midnight and decided to call it a night. We are in dire need of a really good day tomorrow.

11 Aug 08

2008-08-12T00:09:00.003-04:00

Caroline and I block sanded the shell this morning. We added some resin in low spots and waited for it to kick. When the guys showed up, a massive cleanup took place while I sanded. Ben and DP worked on the trailer for most of the day, and BP and Kendal painted sealer on the wooden canopy arches. Zac and BP glued another set of cherry boards together in the air bag press, and Caroline and BP glued the woven cherry skin onto the side intake scoop. Luke worked on sanding and staining the grille. Kendal sanded various parts and caned the headrests. Sean came out and began to fit his taillight bars that he had already machined. Caroline and Jenna worked on the interior body panels, sanding and squeegeeing the surfaces, along with one of the side intake panels. I continued to block the body of the shell, trying to get it ready for a polyurethane spray. Ben, Hunt and I continued to work until about 9pm, and Hunt sprayed a coat of polyurethane onto the passenger's side before we went in to eat. After dinner, Ben and I came back out and went to work on our respective tasks. Hunt came back up, and we sanded both sides of the car, and Hunt sprayed the driver's side and another coat on the passenger's side. We finished at about midnight, and Ben finally quit on the trailer and headed out as well.

10 Aug 08

2008-08-11T00:21:00.001-04:00

I started the morning off by adding balsa blocks to the front windshield support to fill in a couple gaps, and I fit a piece of cherry backer around the front edge. Hunt had already pulled the bird's eye maple dash tie-in out of the bag, and it was wrinkle free. Caroline, my old man, and Hunt sanded on the body shell. Ben showed up, and he and Caroline worked on reskinning the side intake panels with 1/4" woven cherry. I cut holes for the front turn signals and mounted the lights in them while my dad sanded the shell. After lunch, I helped Caroline skin the side intake panel with cherry, and she helped me glue together cherry boards the Hunt and I ripped and planed for the side skirts on the car. We used a fire hose for an air bag on the I-beam cart. When we finished this, we went back to sanding the shell for a while and broke for dinner. After eating, Caroline worked one side of the shell while I worked the other. Hunt worked on the butterfly panels. At about 11:00, we mixed some epoxy to spread on the low spots, and Hunt was ready to spray polyurethane on the butterfly panels. We finished up at about midnight, and I purged the hot glue gun and called it a night.

09 Aug 08

2008-08-09T23:23:00.004-04:00

Hunt was already outside sanding this morning, and I found that the glue didn't stick the top layer to the steering wheel spokes. Caroline got prepared to recover them, and when Luke showed up with some urethane glue, she bagged the wheel. Hunt stained the side of the car that he and Caroline sanded back down The executive producer fit and sanded parts to the front of the trailer. Ben and I went to pull the fiberglass molds off the glass, but I cracked one and decided to wait. Hunt came back after a while, and we used a water hose to get them released the rest of the way. Ben went to work cutting balsa and fiberglass to make some parts off the window molds. DP worked on the body shell, dabbing epoxy into low spots and sanding high spots. I started on a mold for an angle bracket that will tie the bottom of the side intake to the floor of the car. Luke sanded parts and organized wheel hardware. After lunch at the airport, I finished up the angle bracket mold, and Ben and DP went to work on infusing the window pieces. Luke and I fit the front grille piece, which looked really good. Hunt and Jean sanded one of the butterfly panels, and Hunt sprayed a couple of coats of polyurethane on it. Ben and DP got their panels infused, and DP and Luke headed out. We broke for dinner, except for Ben, who worked through on the trailer. After dinner, dad and Hunt sanded the side of shell, while Caroline cut pieces of bird's eye maple to cover the center console. I fit a piece of angled plywood to fill in the bottom of the side intake, but we didn't like it too much and made a new plan. Dad helped Caroline and me glue the maple to the console, and we finished at about 11:30pm and called it a night.

07 Aug 08

2008-08-08T00:03:00.001-04:00

I picked up where I left off last night and finished fitting the driver's side inner body panel this morning. Caroline line sanded the body shell while I worked. Aaron went to work on making the photo book about the car, and Ben went to work on the trailer, as per usual. Zach laid fiberglass on the side windows that Chris brought by yesterday, and DP went to line sanding the body shell. Kendal also sanded various parts and polyurethaned plywood for Ben on the trailer. I got back in the car and trimmed an edge on the inner body panels where they will mate up with the dashboard and also spent some time figuring out a shape for headrests. Aaron and Kendal glued up another skin on the side intake panel, finishing right before lunch while DP sanded the lumps out of the other one. After lunch, I went back to fitting the dash in between the inner body panels. This took a while, as I had to crawl in and out of the car about 50 times to fit and test, fit and test, fit and test. Aaron and DP took the pieces that I trimmed off the edges of the dash and used them as a mold to glue up some strips of bi-ply to use as a trim piece for between the dash and inner body panels. Jenna sanded edges of the body shell while Caroline hand sanded the front brake ducts. Hunt and Caroline had a polyurethane session, coating a bunch of parts, including the newly skinned side intake panels. When I finished fitting the dash and inner body panels, I started mounting the side intake panels to the car. Jenna, DP, and Ben worked hardcore on the trailer top until about 8:30pm, when Caroline came back with some Chinese food. After we ate, DP and Jenna used their mixed epoxy up on the roof of the trailer while Ben fit some plywood to the side. I continued work on the side intake panel, and Hunt came up and line sanded on the shell. Hunt let Caroline take over at about 10:30pm, and she sanded on the shell until I got about halfway done fitting the 2nd side intake panel at about midnight.

06 Aug 08

2008-08-06T23:10:00.003-04:00

I took the dash back off this morning and glued a block onto the top of the Z-panel to tie it into the dash. Hunt worked on a bracket for the steering linkage. Aaron prepared an album photos for a book about the car, and Ben went to work on the trailer. DP and Caroline sanded the body shell, side intake panels, and various other chassis parts. Zac and I spread veneer softener on our figured eucalyptus and ironed it, but we still felt nervous about the possibility of vacuuming it tight to the steering wheel spokes, so decided to go with another veneer. After lunch, everyone cleaned off the lofting table and the chassis and brought the body shell in. Chris showed up at just the wrong time and got roped into helping. After we got the shell set on and rotated over, DP and Aaron went back to block sanding, and Ben went back to the trailer. Luke and Chris spread urethane windshield sealant around the wheels to stop the leaks, and afterwards, I talked with Chris about the side windows that he brought out that were cut from a school bus windshield. It looks like they will work well, and we ordered a power lift mechanism for them. Luke got the hot melt urethane gun fired up and started laying out the pieces for the front grille. Jenna sanded and picked tacky tape off the car before helping Caroline paint polyurethane on panels for Ben's trailer. The side intake panels looked lumpy and bad under the surface when Hunt sprayed the urethane on them, but we found another sheet of the same veneer way down in the pile. Jenna and Caroline dug the sheets out for us and put them safely in the loom room. I crawled inside the car and fit one of the interior body panels while Hunt blocked the body shell. Luke worked the grille and Ben worked on the trailer until Caroline and Jenna came back with dinner. We ate, and went back to our respective tasks. Luke got his grille slats glued on by about 10:30pm and headed out, and Ben cleaned up outside and left, too. I got a good start on the interior body panel on the driver's side, and Hunt and Caroline called it quits on the block sanding at about 11:00pm. Time for bed, but the clock is ticking louder and louder.

05 Aug 08

2008-08-05T23:27:00.003-04:00

Dun dun....DUNNNN. 2 weeks from today, the car has to be loaded onto the trailer and headed to IWF. Fortunately, we only have a couple of months worth of work to do in that period of time, so it could be worse. I started the morning off by drilling the holes in the S-panel to mount the dowels in the seat backs. I had to notch out the U-channel to accommodate them, and it turned out to be a nice detail. I also put a potential fix on a small wrinkle in the top layer of maple that covers the dash tie-in piece. I hope it works. On his first day back from overseas, Aaron did a lot of research on trailer registration and worked on the blog pictures. DP and Zac laid up another side intake panel, this time out of 4 sheets of bi-ply, and Luke located rear suspension parts and pressed longer studs into the rear spindles. Caroline sanded on the body shell and got another coat of epoxy on it. I got inside the shell and ground the A-pillars and window frames into shape a little, and made a template of the rear exhaust mold to locate the ground line for Andrew. Ben painted the trailer in classic black Rustoleum, and we broke for lunch. After lunch, Caroline and DP laid up another side intake panel and went back to sanding and epoxying the shell. I trimmed up both side intake panels with a power planer while Luke worked on laying out the array of cherry strips that will make up the front grille. Jenna came out and sanded several chassis pieces, along with the dashboard with Caroline, and Hunt put a coat of polyurethane on it when they finished up. Hunt ripped some plywood for Ben for the trailer looked at the finish on one of the butterfly panels with me before we broke for dinner at about 9:00pm. After dinner, I came back out and remounted the dash board, and Hunt came up and sanded the rear window cover for the interior. I sanded the gauge pod and used a scrap piece from the side intake panels to make the face that the gauges will mount to. Hunt headed out, and I made a collar for the underside of the steering column out of a piece of scrap from the engine covers. I got this in decent shape by about 11:30pm and decided to call it a day.

04 Aug 08

2008-08-04T23:26:00.003-04:00

Caroline and I glued the hat section onto the Z-panel this morning using rivets to clamp and locate the pieces. Afterwards, spiderarms Ben and I riveted the seat brackets to either side of the tunnel. Caroline went to sanding the body shell, and DP prepped the side intake panel to get ready for its reskin. Ben worked on the trailer, and Zach ground all the rust and welds to prepare for paint. Caroline went to Curvemakers to pick up the arch laminates that John Thomas made for us that will go on the the trailer. I worked on getting the seat backs ready to locate, and Luke cut blocks to use to hold the U-channel to the S-panel. After lunch, I went back to work on the seat backs, cutting, drilling, and tapping 4 dowels and inserting 3/8" threaded rod into them. I then epoxied each unit into the backs of the seats. These dowels will hold the seat backs off the S-panel. Luke drilled the holes in the U-channel and mounted it to the S-panel. Ben and I took the trailer for a test drive, and it towed like a champ. It is so wide the I can touch the inside center and the outside white lines on the road at the same time, so I am going to have to pay some serious attention on the way to Atlanta. Zac finished up his fiberglass mold of the tail for Andrew today, adding OSB to it for stiffness and grinding the edges. Zach and DP reskinned the first side intake panel with imbulia, and it had the same wrinkle problem, so it looks like we will have to figure out something else. Luke cut the ends of the arches to length, and Hunt and I ripped them on the tablesaw right as Caroline had gotten the shell ready for stain. We stained the shell and cleaned all the dust off the table to get ready for Hunt to spray a coat of epoxy onto the body. After Hunt sprayed the epoxy, it was time for dinner. After dinner, I came back out and mounted the dashboard, and Hunt came to work on the steering linkage. We worked on this until about 11:30pm and have it pretty well figured out now. Time for bed.

03 Aug 08

2008-08-03T23:13:00.005-04:00

We found a wrinkle in the maple we glued on last night, so I started off the morning by grinding it out, smoothing it out, and giving it to Caroline and DP to reskin. Hunt and I spent a little more time fitting the steering linkage and got everything ironed out except the heim joint mount. Next, I started fitting the steering column bushing into the dash. I spent a while on this getting the joint right so that we didn't have to make molding for it. Once I got it fitted, I used 5min epoxy to glue it to the dash to temporarily locate it. Caroline sanded and filled the body shell all morning, getting a coat on the roof and pillars. Zac worked on fiberglassing a mold that our buddy, Andrew, will use to make an exhaust exit shroud out of stainless. Zach cleaned up and removed tacky tape from the body shell, and DP sanded the side intake panels. Ben worked on the trailer all morning, as usual. After lunch, Hunt and I made some pieces to tie in the steering wheel bushing to the dash panel and glued them on. Caroline and DP prepared a piece of imbulia to use to skin the side intake panels, and Zach, who had cleaned the table under the chassis off, took over for Caroline on the glue-up. I went to work on mounting the Z-panel, and I had it about half way done by dinner time. The first glue-up of the side intake was a failure due to a bubbly warp in the imbulia, so we selected a better piece of veneer, and DP and Zach glued it on right before dinner. Zac finished his exhaust shroud mold, and we peeled Ben away from the trailer. Jean and Caroline cooked out for us, and we all ate for about a half hour. The guys all left, and I went back to work fitting the Z-panel. Once I finished this, I mounted the hat section that sits on top of it, and I trimmed the U-channel that runs behind the seat backs. I also cleaned up the reinforcement that we glued onto the back of the dashboard. I finished up at about 11:15pm and called it a night. Tomorrow, the body goes back on.

02 Aug 08

2008-08-02T23:26:00.002-04:00

I spent the morning fitting the dash tie-in panel. I put a little body filler on it to smooth out the balsa and have it ready to be skinned. Luke showed up and went to work on the seats, and Ben went to work on the trailer. Caroline sanded and filled the body panels like a crazy person all morning. I made a piece of polystyrene foam in the shape of the grille opening to use to plan out the grille slats that we will make and had it finished up by lunchtime. After a big lunch at the airport, we got back to work. Caroline, Ben and Luke went back to their respective positions for most of the afternoon. Caroline and I skinned the dash tie-in panel with a piece of maple, and Caroline went inside to make dinner for everyone while I pulled the gauge pod off its mold. Luke finished up the final seat at about that time, and he, Ben and I went inside to eat. After dinner, Hunt and I cut pipe for the steering linkage and got it mostly into place. Hunt headed out, and I stayed out to work for a while on a few odds and ends like trimming the gauge pod up until about 11:25, at which point, Caroline came out and told me it was time to come inside.

01 Aug 08

2008-08-02T07:06:00.003-04:00

It is time for me to switch back to the interior of the car now. Most of the body work can be left to the other guys, and I need to get as much of the interior done as possible before the body gets in my way. I trimmed the dash tie-in piece this morning, and I fit the backboard U-channel. Luke worked on putting the side backer trim on the dash tie-in once I had shaped it, and Zach helped him glue the trim on. Ben worked on the trailer, and DP worked on gluing the veneer on the A-pillars. Zach wove seats, and Caroline sanded body panels. Hunt and I went to Home Depot to get some plywood for Ben's trailer and got back just in time for lunch. After lunch, DP went back to gluing weave onto the car, and I spent a few minutes taping some things off for him. Luke spray painted the rims of the trailer black. I worked on perfecting the taillights bezels, which took a couple of hours, while Caroline and DP sanded body panels. After everyone left, I cut trimlines while Hunt sanded body panels. After dinner, Hunt came back up, and he, Caroline and I glued up some plywood in the Black Bros press. We also made a quick, simple mold and laminated a piece of trim for the side of the dash tie-in piece. We called it quits at about 10:30pm.

31 Jul 08

2008-07-31T23:22:00.003-04:00

Hunt had pulled the bag and peel ply off the side panel this morning when I came out, and everything looked good. It is a relief to know that the chances of having to weave more material are that much smaller. I worked on the trimlines this morning while the guys cleaned up the loom room and the area around the body shell. Ben started in on his trailer, and DP went to work on making an extra front wing out of woven maple. Zac sandblasted the trailer wheels, and Zach and Kendal pulled tacky tape off the body shell. Caroline sanded all morning on the butterfly panels. When Luke showed up, Kendal and Zach went inside to weave seats. I glued together the templates that DP made of the nose yesterday and traced them on a piece of tempered board. We will use this to glue up a front splitter out of backer board. After the front wing glue-up, DP and I started laying out the A and C pillar skins. We had them taped out, trimmed and ready to glue on before lunch, but we went ahead and ate to let the stain dry more completely on the weave. After lunch, DP and Zac glued the 2 C-pillar skins on while I ground on the taillight bezels. Luke started prepping the cherry backer for the front splitter and made a jig to use to glue them up with. We had a visit from Jenna, who just came back from Japan and Hawaii. Everyone headed out at around 7:00pm, and I kept working on the taillights. It hit me that I really needed a 1/2" belt sanded, so Caroline and I headed out to get one. I worked on the taillights until it got dark while Hunt worked on the side. We took the butterfly panels inside to grind off the edges, and I went in to eat at about 9:00pm. After dinner, Caroline and I came back out to stain and coat the butterfly panels in epoxy. We finished up at about 11:20pm and headed in to go to bed.

30 Jul 08

2008-07-30T22:20:00.004-04:00

I got back to work on the side of the car redo this morning. The skin for this side was ready to go, so I needed to finish prepping the surface. I ground on it for about an hour and switched to getting the roof ready. Hunt and I went to get some plywood for Ben's trailer, and DP worked on skinning a side intake panel with 1/4" woven walnut. Luke worked on the seats, and Zach pulled tacky tape off the body shell. Zac helped DP lay his part up, and the 2 of them vacuumed the roof on with me right before lunch. We pulled a full 27" of mercury on the roof and were really pleased with the lay up. After lunch, Zach and Luke wove seats, and I sanded the side of the car one last time and painted it with epoxy to seal it. While I worked on this, DP and Zac skinned another side intake panel. Caroline came out to help DP and me finalize the trim on the weave and run tacky tape around it. Zac finished cutting the screen, peel ply, and 1mil for the part and came out to help us finish it up, too. We layed up the part on the car, pulling 27" again and breathing a sigh of relief that we are probably finished with the major skins. I still have to cover the A-pillars and C-pillars, but that won't be a big deal at all. When we finished, Zac, DP, and Zach planed a bunch of cherry for the trailer, and Luke and I collected a bunch of aspen to take to Curvemakers, where they will bend some arches for us. I dug a bunch of electrical tape from the front fender edge and worked on seams in the roof and tail for a couple of hours, heading in to eat at about 8:30pm. Hunt worked on one of the butterfly panels while I was eating, and he and I looked at some cars and turned the lights out after I was done with dinner.

29 Jul 08

2008-07-29T23:33:00.004-04:00

Caroline and I started getting the chin piece ready to glue on the car this morning, and we had it in place by around 10:30am. When we finished this, I went to work on the top of the car while Zach, Zac and Kendal finished up the 1/8" weave. Ben worked on the trailer, and Luke worked on the seats. DP helped me get the top of the car painted with epoxy to seal it up for vacuuming. Zach, Kendal, DP and I trimmed the new piece of veneer to fit the side of the car and stained it before lunchtime. After lunch, DP and I unwrapped and trimmed the new chin piece, and Caroline, Luke, Zach and Kendal wove seats. DP and I trimmed the rear woven section to shape, and I taped off the back end of the body while DP and Caroline set it up to glue. Caroline, Zac, DP and I spent the next hour gluing the weave to the tail of the body shell. This turned out to be a very difficult glue up, but we think we got it right. We finished at about 7:00pm, at which point everyone but Ben headed out. I took over for Hunt in sanding the old layer of weave off the side of the car for about 2 hours and got it mostly finished. Ben continued to weld on the trailer until he left at about 9:00pm. I called it a night at this time, too, as it was too dark to see the body shell anymore. We have a good chance at gluing on the roof and the side tomorrow, which will mean that we have essentially finished covering the body. I am keeping my fingers crossed.

28 Jul 08

2008-07-29T01:18:00.002-04:00

I pulled the bags off the body shell this morning to find everything looking good. The rear quarter panels look perfect, and the logo turned out pretty well. Hunt and I had to go to the Home Depot to get some steel for Ben and the trailer, and we got back right as everyone was showing up. I went to work on sanding the body and cutting the trimlines, and the Kendal, Zach, Zac, and DP cleaned up around the car and the loom room. Zach and DP sanded the butterfly panels while Kendal pulled tacky tape off the body shell. Ben worked on the trailer, and Luke was off getting some 1/8" fill cut by our buddies at Tramway Veneer. Zac sanded the side of the car that we are going to reskin, then went to help DP cut the veneer for the butterfly panels while Zach continued to sand them. DP picked out the splices and stained the weave and let them dry when Luke showed up with the fill. Kendal, Zac and Zach started weaving while helped Luke get the logos glued onto the seatbacks. I glued a couple of strips of backer board into the roof scoop to thicken up the leading edge and painted epoxy around the taillight bezels to get them sealed up and ready for a vacuum. After lunch, I went to getting the tail of the car ready for veneer, and Caroline and DP went to work on gluing the veneer on the butterfly panels. They ended up getting both pieces glued to the panels successfully today, which is a relief. Luke started caning one of the seats after lunch. I got the entire back end of the car sanded, stained and coated in epoxy this afternoon and let it cure. We will be ready to skin it very shortly. Zach and DP left, but Zac stayed and helped me glue up a piece for the side scoops until about 8:00pm. Ben was still welding, and Luke was still weaving when we had everything picked up at about 8:45pm. We went in to eat, and the guys left shortly thereafter. I came back out to try to the piece of veneer glued to the chin of the car, but didn't want to risk messing it up due to darkness and exhaustion. I got the surface sanded and the piece rough cut, ready for in the morning. I went inside at about 12:30 am and wrote stinking emails for almost an hour. Time for bed, believe me.

27 Jul 08

2008-07-27T21:51:00.004-04:00

Caroline and I glued the sides on the inner layer of the roof scoop this morning. She set the bag and pieces up while I trimmed the cut lines on the side veneer on the body shell. I trimmed the piece of veneer for the roof, lining up the center V with the centerline of the roof. We found the weave to be discolored on the 2nd side panel that we put on last night, which was really gutting. This means that we will have to sand the existing veneer down, weave 112 more inches, and start the process over again. It will cost us about a day of 5 people's work. On the bright side, we feel pretty sure that the condition is caused by the stain not being totally, 100% dry on the part at the time of the glue-up, so maybe we can avoid it on the last few pieces that we have to glue to the body. Zac and Ben wove until they ran out of fill at about lunchtime, and I got the roof scoop sanded, refit, and glued to the roof of the shell. After lunch, I worked on the rear quarter panels. I had to sand and prepare the surfaces, tape the cutlines, and trim the veneer piece. It took me about a half hour to figure out how to get both pieces out of the last piece of weave that we had available, but it worked out well. Caroline came out to help me glue them both on at about 6:30pm, and we finished at around 9:00pm and went inside to eat. Both glue-ups went beautifully. After dinner and the finale of Caroline's show, the Next Food Network Star, we went back outside to glue a Splinter logo on the front of the car. Literally minutes before we started the glue-up, a thunder and lightning downpour commenced. Since the shell is out under the lean-to, the mist from the rain was blowing inside all over the place. We waited for about 20min, but after no let up in the rain, I turned out the lights. As if the switch had control over more than just the lights, the rain stopped as quickly as it had started, so we turned the lights back on and got down to business. Caroline used a pencil eraser to spread the glue on the back of the logo, which was held together with a piece of masking tape. We then taped it down to the shell in the appropriate place and vacuumed it right to the surface. Everything looked good, and we called it a night at about 12:30am.

26 Jul 08

2008-07-27T21:02:00.003-04:00

I sanded out the edges of the decklid pieces from yesterday, and we started getting ready to fill in the small corners at the back topside of the shell. Caroline and DP helped me glue one down, and DP went inside to resin infuse the last interior body panel while I prepped the other side. We went to the airport for lunch, and I stole a couple ears of corn and some chicken from Charlie on the way home. That was a real lifesaver. After Caroline and I got the 2nd corner glued down, DP had finished his resin infusion. I felt the strength from Charlie's homegrown lunch, and we had a flurry of progress for the rest of the afternoon. We glued both sides on the car, finishing at about 9:15pm. The sides are the biggest, toughest pieces to glue on, so getting both done in 1 afternoon is pretty darn good. Jean cooked chicken and corn on the grille, and we ate after a long day of work.

25 Jul 08

2008-07-26T00:35:00.001-04:00

Caroline and I started the morning off by working on gluing down the 2nd front quarter panel, and Ben took over for her when he showed. Everything went well, and we had it glued down pretty quickly. Ben worked on the trailer for the rest of the morning, and Luke took the tires down to get them removed from the wheels. 3 have leaks, so we are going to fix them and remount the tires. Zac and Zach had more fun weaving the 1/4" cherry to repair our discolored butterfly panels. Caroline and I started on gluing a piece of weave to one half of the rear decklid. We decided to butt the 2 pieces together on the middle for this piece to be more efficient with the veneer. All but about 1.5" of the center of the panel gets cut out and replaced for the exhaust pipe exits, to the seam only had to be tight in 1 small area. We got both pieces glued down by the end of the day while Hunt spread epoxy on the front of the car to fill in the weave texture. Zac and Zach finished up their weaving and cleaned up around the body shell before taking off. Luke went to see our buddy Glenwood, who laser cut us a bunch of logos in various different woods, grain directions, and sizes. Hunt, Caroline and I picked out where a couple of the logos might go tonight and went in to eat. After dinner, I came back out and put body filler all over the inside surface of the roof scoop panel to smooth it out. Caroline came out and helped me glue a new center section on it, using a black trash can liner as the bag. We finished at about 12:15pm.

24 Jul 08

2008-07-24T23:15:00.003-04:00

Caroline and I went right to work on vacuuming a front fender on the body shell this morning. Zach showed up at about 8:00am to help us, and we had the part on the shell by 9:15am. We used electrical tape to mask off the trimline, and we put duct tape underneath the tacky tape on the finished weave of the adjacent panel for protection. We duplicated the process and had the opposite side on by lunchtime. Ben worked on the trailer, Luke worked on the seats, and Zach and Zac wove 1/4" veneer. After lunch, we had a visit from JB of Mas Epoxies and our buddy, Rick Fuller. I pulled the vacuum on the first front fender and cut the trimline along the buried electrical tape with a razor knife. DP and Luke glued up the beginning of another interior body panel, after which Luke went to work on the seats with Zach while DP helped Caroline cut pieces for the front quarter panels. I worked on sanding the shell and preparing the quarter panels, and DP and I had the piece vacuumed down by about 8:15pm. I helped Ben clean up his gear and went in to eat at about 9:00pm. After dinner, I came back out to get some stuff ready for tomorrow. I did a lot of work to the taillight bezels, fit the roof scoop, prepped and stained the weave for the 2nd quarter panel, and straightened out the back corners of the shell. Tomorrow, we want to get the 2nd quarter panel, along with the roof and some of the tail.

23 Jul 08

2008-07-23T23:06:00.003-04:00

I started work on fitting the roof scoop this morning. I got it pretty well fitted, but held off to make a firm decision on how to blend it into the roof on the front edge. Zach and Zac made a dump run and started weaving 1/8" veneer with a directional change for use on the roof. Ben worked on the trailer, and Luke printed out the hole patterns for the seats. Hunt worked on fitting a new vacuum pump to an old compressor tank that we had. I spent the morning cutting, fitting and staining a piece of veneer for the nose of the car. It worked out well, because I was able to use the scrap from the hood lay-up from last night. Ben helped me glue it and bag it, and we were finished by about 1:30pm. After lunch, Caroline and DP sanded the body to prepare it for skinning, and Ben went back to work on the trailer. Zach and Zac finished up their 1/8" roof weave and slit some material for the 1/4" loom. They wove 1/4" material for the rest of the afternoon. DP and Caroline went to work laying up balsa on the inside of the interior body panel while Hunt and I went out to look at sealing up the rims. Ben helped me organize the weave that we have to work with then went to help DP glue infuse the balsa onto his part. Hunt, Caroline and I worked on sorting the weave for the front fenders. I made paper patterns of the panels to optimize the usage of the material. We worked on this until about 9:00pm and went inside to eat. After dinner, Caroline and I came back out and prepared the necessary materials to glue the front fender skins on first thing in the morning. I feathered the underlapping layers with a DA sander until about 11:15pm as the rain came down outside the lean-to. We need to get a lot of skins glued on tomorrow, but we have a good headstart on them now.

22 Jul 08

2008-07-22T23:55:00.003-04:00

4 weeks. 4 weeks from today, we will have the car on a trailer heading to Atlanta for the IWF show. Fortunately, we only have about 4 months worth of work to do between now and then. Caroline and I did a trial over our stained weave this morning. We tried 2 different epoxy resins and a polyester resin for clarity and color before decided on 1 of the epoxies. Zach and Zac went to the dump while Ben weedate at Hunt's place. Hunt and I went to the junkyard to get some steel for Ben to use on the trailer, and Luke showed up and started fitting the hole template sheets on the seat frames. Caroline and I cut and stained a piece of weave to cover one of the interior body panel molds while Ben, Zac and Zach wove. After lunch, Caroline and I vacuum bagged the interior body panel. There were a couple minor wrinkles in the part, but I think it will work out ok. She and I went to sanding the hood area of the car to get it ready for the final skin weave application. While we waited on the weave, Luke and I took a tire up to JT's tire place to ask some advice on how to seal them. Ben, Zach and Zac continued to weave until about 6:00pm, at which point they had generated enough to cut off and use for the hood of body shell. Everyone headed out, and Ben and I trimmed, stained and vacuum bagged the final layer of weave to the hood. I hate to risk putting the jinx on things, but I feel like it went on almost perfectly. We finished at around 9:00pm and went in to eat. We need to get some more weave on the shell. I hope we can get it all on this week, which is setting a lofty but attainable goal.

21 Jul 08

2008-07-21T22:09:00.003-04:00

I pulled a rough and dirty test vacuum on the side of the body using polyethylene and duct tape this morning. Even the small diaphragm pump held the vacuum, so we now feel pretty confident in our ability to put the outer skin down. Zach and Zac cleaned up and made a run to the dump this morning, and Ben attacked the weeds and tall grass around the place. Caroline, Zac, and Zach wove 1/8" this morning, while Ben worked on the trailer. I did more work on the body, and Luke investigated the seat weave and took inventory on all of our wheel parts. After lunch, I mounted the driver's side brake duct to the body. Ben continued on the trailer, while DP, Zac and Zach wove. Luke made a trip to a small furniture factory to ask about caning the seats but didn't find out too much. We got a visit from our good buddy, Archie, and it was good to see him. I worked on the body for the rest of the afternoon, and Hunt worked on salvaging the butterfly panel with the skin discoloration. Luke measured the seat frames, laid them out in Rhino, and printed out a hole pattern for each one. Zach, Zac and DP got all the splices pulled through on the 1/8" weave and should be able to move with great speed tomorrow. I finished with the body filler on the front of the car and rolled some epoxy on the surface to help to seal it for vacuuming purposes. I finished at about 9:30pm and went inside to eat. We plan to start putting the skin down on the shell tomorrow, which will be a huge step for us. Everything has to go pretty well with this stage for us to make our Atlanta show deadline. Keep your fingers crossed.

20 Jul 08

2008-07-21T07:12:00.003-04:00

I set up the butterfly panel for glue infusion this morning and helped Joe with the steering wheel until DP showed up. DP and I mixed glue and pulled it into the butterfly panel next. Everything went well, except the glue cured too quickly, and we were forced to add in glue lines to infuse the whole part. We worked on it until about lunchtime. Our friends, Heather and Tom, came in from Canada, and Caroline brought them back from the airport. After lunch, Hunt and I went to get some resin as a back-up while DP got the 2nd butterfly panel ready to infuse. When we got back, DP and I finished the panel up and infused it. The glue kicked on us in about 25 minutes this time, which is less than half of the working time we expect from it. We thought that the earlier problems had to do with the 95degree heat outside, but the 2nd part was infused in the loom room, which has A/C. We had to do a lot of shuffling around and ended up adding a couple of glue lines on this part, too, although it wasn't as bad as the first one. When we finished this one, we looked at the first butterfly panel and figured out what needed to be eventually done to it. There was a discoloration on the surface of it which we haven't quite figured out yet, but it seems to be blendable. DP headed out, and Hunt and I put 3 holes in the steering wheel end cap which allow it to bolt to the quick release mechanism, finishing up at about 9:30. Caroline, Heather, and Tom were all still waiting on me to eat, and we had dinner and watched the Next Food Network Star. After dinner, Caroline and I came back out and dug the mold out of the 2nd brake duct, finishing up at about 1:15am. Long day, but decent progress.

19 Jul 08

2008-07-19T22:29:00.004-04:00

I hacked away at the taillight bezels with a reciprocating saw this morning for a while, after which I fit and glued on a brake duct. I used Daubert's 2-part epoxy and some colloidal silica to strengthen the fillet. DP showed up right as I was finishing this up, and he went to work on glue infusing the cherry weave onto the roof scoop. I worked body filler onto the body shell while he prepped the roof scoop. We pulled a vacuum on the part right before lunch, and we infused the part with glue as soon as we got back. When we finished, we cleaned the area up a bit and started preparing the butterfly panels for their final skin. DP sandblasted the pinholes out of them while I cut and stained the veneer and drilled holes in the panels around the trimline. We both sanded the panels to rough them up for glue and started setting up to glue infuse them. Caroline, Jean and Hunt wove 1/8" veneer while we worked on setting the butterfly panels up. We worked on vacuuming 1 panel until about 8:45pm, but had to give up on it for a compounding number of reasons. We will fix it up in the morning. DP headed out, and I ate dinner. Afterwards, Hunt and I pulled the roof scoop off the mold. It turned out to be killer, so we were pleased. We also mounted the steering wheel to a block which will allow us to turn the column on the wood lathe. Hunt had worked on machining some other pieces for the steering column, so we got this set up to turn in the morning. We called it quits at about 10:40pm. Tomorrow, we hope to get the 1/8" weaving knocked out, along with the final glue infusion on both butterfly panels.

18 Jul 08

2008-07-18T22:44:00.003-04:00

I pulled the dash tie-in piece from the mold this morning, but it was a little tacky still, so I put it back on the mold and left it in the sun to cure. Ben came and started work on infusing the brake ducts. I painted a coat of polyester resin on the 4" thick balsa chunk which will lend depth to the taillight cutouts. Caroline replaced spools of veneer on the 1/8" loom while Zach and Zac rolled the spools outside. Hunt sanded, coated, and recoated the front wing, which was really looking gorgeous by the end of the day. I took the windshield out and used body filler to smooth in the areas around where I built up slightly to accommodate the glass. We decided to cut the balsa chunk into 3 pieces for easier fitting, and I marked where these cuts needed to be made right before lunch. Ben soldiered on with his infusion during lunch, and didn't quit until he had the glued pulled at around 3pm. After lunch, Luke and I went to work on fitting the balsa chunks to the back of the body. Luke had the unenviable task of sitting inside the body shell and holding the chunks up inside the taillights holes while I looked at them and ground them to fit. We spent an hour or 2 on this, and then we glued them in with epoxy once they were fit properly. I roughly fit the dash tie-in piece, which had eventually cured, and Luke headed out. Ben and I stained and laid the veneer for the final layer of the roof scoop, but left the infusion for tomorrow. He headed out around 8:00pm, and I went in to eat. After dinner, Hunt came up, and he buffed the front wing while I pulled the peel ply off the brake ducts. We spent the next hour or so wrestling with the air chisel, digging the mold out of the part. We didn't want a draft angle in these parts, so we had to invest the molds when we made them. Hunt left at around 10:15pm, and I did some research on light fixtures for the car, calling it quits at about 11:00pm.

17 Jul 08

2008-07-17T23:47:00.003-04:00

I did more body work on the body shell this morning, mostly focusing on the front fender lines. Ben went to work infusing the balsa onto the roof scoop. Zac and Jean finished up the 1/4" cherry in the pink room, and Zach, Kendal, and Caroline wove 1/8" veneer. Hunt worked on finishing the front wing, and Luke worked on sanding the seat frames. Luke built a router table, and Hunt used it to rout the inside of the seat frames. I taped off and protected the front windshield to prepare for fitting it. After lunch, Ben pulled the glue into the roof scoop while Zach, Zac, and DP spooled 1/8" veneer. I fit the windshield and the 2 quarter windows using a grinder and some body filler. DP and Ben infused the backs onto the brake duct molds while Zac started getting the dash tie-in mold ready to infuse. At about 7:45pm, Zac, DP, Ben and I started to infuse the glue into the balsa for the dash tie-in mold. The guys stayed with me until about 9:00pm, and I added a few glue lines and got the part saturated by around 10:30pm. I went in to eat and go to sleep after a long day.

17 Jul 08

2008-07-16T23:59:00.000-04:00

I worked on the dash tie-in mold this morning. I skimmed it with body filler and sanded it smooth, and I made an MDF box and fastened it to the mold to make an extension on 1 leg. I then feathered it into the rest of the mold with body filler. Ben worked on infusing the messed up side of the roof scoop and had the glue infused in it by lunchtime. Zac and Zach worked on weaving the 1/4" cherry veneer, and Caroline and her mom wove the 1/8". Luke glued more maple on the seat frames. After lunch, DP, Caroline, and her mom wove 1/8" veneer, and Zac and Zach rolled some spools to feed the loom. Ben sanded, waxed, and PVA'd the brake duct molds, and he and DP infused part of 1 layer on them. Chris showed up with 1 quarter window cut, and he and I made a template and located the opposite side glass. He cut it magically while I was too scared to watch. I put some body filler on the body for a while and painted polyester resin on the dash tie-mold and sanded it. After dinner, I came back out and refined the surfaces of the inner body panel molds until about midnight.

15 Jul 08

2008-07-15T22:08:00.003-04:00

I put body filler on the body shell outside this morning for a couple of hours. Zac showed up first and picked up trash in the back, pulled the roof scoop out of the bag, and mixed some styrene and cobalt naphthenate into polyester resin. Zach, Kendal, and Caroline wove 1/8" veneer for most of the morning until they ran out of spools to change out at about lunchtime. One side of the roof scoop must have had a bad mix of resin, because it never cured, meaning we will have to redo that part. I waxed, PVA'd and taped the tail mold so that we can glue infuse a giant chunk of balsa onto it that will be made into taillight trim. Luke prepared to vacuum bag a walnut layer onto the top of the seats, and I helped him get one into the bag right before lunch. After lunch, Zac and Zach wove 1/4" cherry in the pink room while Kendal, Caroline and her mom worked on the 1/8" machine. I put more body filler on the shell, and Ben worked on the glue infusion of the tail balsa. We pulled the polyester resin into the balsa at about 7:00pm while Zac and Zach wound veneer strips on spools made from CDs that Hunt put together this afternoon. Zac and Zach wound 38 spools of veneer, and Ben and I got the glue infusion done on the 4" thick balsa chunk by about 9:00pm. I went in to eat and came back out to check on the part, which was still doing fine. I am going to call it a little early tonight at about 10:30pm to catch up after a few long nights in a row.

14 Jul 08

2008-07-14T22:39:00.003-04:00

I pulled the roof scoop mold out of the bag this morning, but I left the part on the mold. We only laid up 1/3 of the first skin last night, and the placement of the 1st part is critical. It was easier to lay up the next pieces right over it without losing the proper location. I cut the side pieces and a layer of balsa, and Ben took over for me on setting up for glue infusion. Kendal, Zach, and Caroline wove this morning, and Luke went to Tramway Veneer to get some more stock clipped. Aaron sandblasted all morning, prepping the body for body filler and knocking the pin holes out of the 2nd butterfly panel. Sean made templates and took measurements for the taillights for most of the morning. Chris showed up with a piece of glass from an S-10 that is going to work for the front quarter window. Everyone was excited, amazed, and somewhat relieved. Well, I was anyway. Chris is really turning out to be a crucial asset in getting the car to Atlanta, and we are thankful to have his help. After lunch, I cut the taillight holes out of the rear of the body shell, and Sean began 3D modeling the taillights. Zac, Ben and I glue infused the roof scoop, and Zach, Bob and DP set up to weave 1/4" cherry. Ben sanded the inner body panel molds while I worked on the chin of the body shell and filled in other areas. I went in to eat, and Hunt and I spread epoxy over the front wing to fill in voids after dinner until about 10:15pm.

13 Jul 08

2008-07-14T07:53:00.004-04:00

I carved out the front brake duct molds this morning. I sanded them out and painted them with polyester resin, along with the roof scoop mold. Ben set up to glue infuse the bamboo layer on a butterfly panel, and Hunt and I helped him deal with the glue. Once this was a success, Ben and I glued the dash tie-in mold from yesterday together, and Hunt got the big press ready for us to smush it with. We broke for lunch at this point. Ben ground a bevel on the balsa layer on the 2nd butterfly panel and set up to glue infuse it. I sanded the polyestered molds and put another coat over the top. While these were curing, I worked on laying out the taillight cutouts. I went back to sanding the molds again for a while until Ben had the butterfly panel ready to infuse. I helped him with this until about 7:30pm, and he headed out when we finished. We pulled the 1st butterfly panel off the mold, and it really looked incredible. There are some pin holes to fill in with epoxy, but the surface quality is extremely impressive. Hunt went to eat, and I got a piece of weave ready to glue on the roof scoop while I waited for Caroline and her mom to come back from Charlotte. We watched the Next Food Network Star while I ate, and Caroline and I came back outside to glue the piece on the roof scoop mold. It went smoothly, and we finished at about 12:15am.

12 Jul 08

2008-07-13T07:27:00.003-04:00

I took the front wing out of the bag and ground it to shape first thing this morning. It will need some work to fill in some pin holes on the top coat, but that won't be a big deal. Zach and DP showed up again, and they wove all day with Caroline. They reached 18feet by lunchtime, and we cut the veneer off the spool after we ate at the airport. They spent the next half of the day redrawing the loom in. I spent the morning making a pattern for a mold that will tie the dash in to the tunnel and figuring out how to cover the rear trailing arm bolt plates that are visible inside the car. Hunt and I went to Home Depot after lunch to get some MDF and a couple straight 2X4s to make molds with. Sean came out, and we talked extensively about the taillights and got a game plan. I bandsawed the MDF to the rough shape of the mold and drilled alignment holes in each piece. I also glued the 2 2X4s together to make a U-channel mold. It was time to eat again. Afterwards, I made 1 piece of the dash mold from MDF and copied the rest with a router and follower bit. Hunt came up, and he and I put a radius on the 2X4 mold and the roof scoop mold. After he left, I set about molding a piece on the 2X4 mold. Caroline and her mother wove most of the time I was working. Caroline helped me glue up the piece, and we finished bagging it just shy of 1AM. It was a long day, and we were ready for bed.

11 Jul 08

2008-07-11T22:49:00.004-04:00

I ground the balsa edges of the front wing and a butterfly panel this morning, and Ben took the wing to the back to glue infuse the backside of it. He also cut some balsa for the 2nd butterfly panel. Everyone cleaned up the loom room this morning, and Luke mounted a spring and some locks on the door. Hunt worked on getting a vacuum pump running, and I showed around a couple guys who were shooting some footage for the Discovery Channel. DP, Luke, Zach, Caroline and her mom all worked on the weaving this morning, and they really ended up getting on a roll. They finished the day with over 14' of weave, meaning that we will have enough to do a side panel by tomorrow. Ben and I glue infused the front wing after lunch, and Ben went to work on gluing down the balsa to the 2nd butterfly panel. Aaron sanded on the body all afternoon, digging the tacky tape out of the seams. Everyone finished up at about 7:00pm, and I worked on figuring out the instrument panel. I glued some foam together and rough cut it, and came back out after dinner to shape it. I had it pretty well shaped by about 11:00pm, in between working with Hunt on cutting a hole in the dash for the steering wheel and gluing the new reed into a plywood slot that will allow us to mount it to the loom. Caroline and her mom came in from weaving, and I called it a night.

10 Jul 08

2008-07-10T22:57:00.004-04:00

Ben and Zac prepared the 2nd buttefly panel for glue infusion this morning, while I fit the front lip to the body. I glued and riveted it to the body when I had it fit right about the time when our buddies, Dick, Glenn, and Joe from Daubert Chemicals, showed up. We spent a while showing them around, and everyone broke for lunch, which was pizza in the blue room. Aaron and Zach spent the morning finishing weaving the 1/4" walnut, and Luke made a trip to Tramway to get some cherry clipped into 1/8" for fill. After lunch, Zac and Ben demonstrated glue infusion for Dick, Glenn, and Joe, and everything went well. Tim and Chris stopped by to talk glass with me for a while, and I think they are going to be a huge help. Sean and I also spent some time discussing the taillight options. Ben laid some balsa on the front wing and glued it down with a normal vacuum bag setup. Kendal, Luke and Zach wove the 1/8" material and got about 3 feet in 3 hours, which is a rate that we can definitely handle. Zac cut balsa for the 1st butterfly, and Ben helped him trim it and glue it down in a vacuum bag. After everyone left around dinnertime, Caroline and her mom wove 1/8" while I used body filler to feather in the front lip. It got pretty dark and buggy at around 10:00pm, so I went in to the blue room to work on fitting the Z-panel. I worked on this for about an hour, finishing at about 11:00pm.

09 Jul 08

2008-07-09T22:10:00.003-04:00

I went to work on infusing the front wing while the guys cleaned up this morning. Caroline's mom was scheduled to arrive today before lunch, so the place needed some tending to. Hunt and I pulled the glue in by about 10:00am, and everything went well. I went in to work on taking the body shell off the chassis while Ben worked on the leveling the body table. Aaron and Zach wove 1/4" walnut, and Luke and Zac worked the 1/8" loom. Ben came in to help me get the body ready to come off, and all the guys came to help take it off right before we went to lunch. After lunch, I cleaned up the car a little where we had made the interior body panel molds, and then I went out to work on stabilizing the body shell on the table with help from Ben and later Luke. Caroline and her mom finished drawing in the 1/8" loom. Zac cut and prepared the piece of woven veneer that will make up the outer skin of the 2nd buttefly panel. Aaron left for the day, and Zach came up to help Luke and Zac work on the 1/8" loom. Ben worked on the trailer until he headed out. We broke for dinner at about 8:00pm, and after we went to the Home Depot to get some glue guns and extension cords for weaving tomorrow. Caroline and her mom wove for a while, and I did some work on the computer. We all called it quits at about 10:30pm.

08 Jul 08

2008-07-08T22:57:00.003-04:00

I started work on glue infusing a buttefly panel this morning. Luke, Zach, and Zac took the old body plug table apart as Ben welded the tongue onto the replacement. Caroline, Aaron and Hunt worked on the clothespins. Sean worked on a mechanism that will turn the wood lathe into an engine lathe, allowing us to feed material into the chuck in a rate consistent with the chuck's revolution. We will use this to make the headrest supports. Zach and Caroline went back to Mecks' to finish up the spooling. We also sprayed a light stain on the weave for the butterfly panel before lunch and let it dry. We have found that it really helps to even out the weave a little bit with a stain beforehand. After lunch, we all set Ben's steel frame on the axle that we removed the table from this morning. It fit like a glove; thanks, Ben. Zac and I worked on infusing the butterfly panel while Luke, Caroline, Kendal, and Zach worked on stringing the loom. The mounted all of the spools, pulled the veneer through the clothespins, and started drawing it into the loom. Aaron helped Zac mix glue as we infused the butterfly panel, which went excellently. Everyone took a break for the day on the loom at about 7:00pm, as I worked on infusing the front wing. Ben was working on table for the body shell. Caroline came back from getting some infusion supplies and Chinese food, and she, Kendal, Ben and I ate. After dinner, Ben and I went back to work on the front wing infusion and had it ready to vacuum by about 10:00pm. We finished the night off by slitting some walnut veneer from our buddies at Band-It into 13'X 1/4" strips for weaving tomorrow. It was a good day, but we need a better one tomorrow. I hope get the front wing infusion done, along with the secondary infusion of the butterfly panel, and a full draw-in of the loom. We want to start weaving pretty soon.

07 Jul 08

2008-07-07T23:06:00.003-04:00

I cleaned up around the shop a little this morning, and Hunt and I redid one of the spool carriages where we couldn't quite get it glued up straight last night. We ended up cutting the glued in pieces out and replacing it with a thin strip of wood that allowed much more adjustability for the width. Zac, Ben and Aaron made a huge run to the dump, carrying off the remainder of the body plug along with a plethora of trash cans. Caroline glued strings to clothespins, and Aaron went to weave the 1/4" walnut. Luke and Zac started going about mounting the spool carriages in the loom room. Zach, who is different from Zac, showed up today and helped Aaron weave. Ben welded up a large steel frame that we will use as a table to set the body shell on. Sean worked on the steering wheel, gluing in the final pieces of the column. I trimmed up and sanded the front wing mold up to 320grit. After lunch, Sean went to work on making an attachment for the wood lathe to turn a wooden acme thread screw which we will use for a headrest column. Luke and Zac continued their work, and Kendal, Zach, Caroline and Jean went back to Meck's hangar to spool some veneer. Hunt widened some spools which didn't come out to tolerance, and Ben and I created some space under the lean-to for the butterfly panel lay-ups as well as the body shell. Everyone headed out around 7:00pm, except Ben, who helped me wax a butterfly panel mold in preparation for tomorrow. We got a good surprise when our friend, Rick Fuller, came up to see us for the first time after being released from the hospital, and we showed him around while Ben finished sanding the edges of the butterfly panel mold. Ben stayed for dinner, and Caroline was busy putting clothespins back together. After dinner, I came back out and cleaned up the roof scoop mold, finishing up at around 11:00pm.

06 Jul 08

2008-07-06T23:33:00.004-04:00

I pulled the front wing mold from the buck this morning, and it is a good looking mold. Hunt, Zac and I went to work making a creel for all 300 of the spools that will feed the loom. Ben, Caroline and Jean went to our friend Mike Meck's hangar to spool the veneer. For most of the day, Hunt and I machined part while Zac drilled holes in them with various jigs. All in all, he drilled about 1500 holes today, which is pretty good production if I do say so myself. After everyone left for the day, Caroline and I went back out to string all the newly made parts together with all-thread to make the 4 spool carriages that make up the creel. Each assembly consists of about 218 pieces of wood that we planed, ripped, cut and drilled today, along with 72 3-piece spools, 72 axles, and 72 tensioners, which are made of a rubber band, a clothespin, and a piece of string. This puts the creel at somewhere close to 3000 pieces, each of which must fit together and work properly. I feel like everything will work well, but, there are a lot of pieces to keep track of. I am sure it will take a little tweaking, so I hope we can get it going tomorrow. We finished assembling 4 spool carriages at around 10:00pm, just in time for Caroline to watch the Next Food Network Star. Phew.

05 Jul 08

2008-07-05T22:24:00.003-04:00

I took the front wing mold back outside and put 2 layers of chopped strand mat down on it this morning. Aaron came by to take some pictures, and Hunt made a jig to cut the corners off the spools that we glued together last night. I went to the back to lay out the veneer and try to figure out how we would spool 300 pieces of veneer that are 1/8" wide and 60' long. I laid about 40' of OSB out and put a table at the end. After lunch, we mounted small axle to the table that let us wind the veneer on the spools. Jean drilled the holes in the spools for the winding handle and ground the tearout away while Hunt cut the corners off. Caroline and I wound the veneer on the spools. Jean came out to wind with Caroline while I went back out to the front wing mold. I put down a layer of tessellated, end-grain balsa for stiffness, feathered it in with body filler, and covered it in with a final layer of chopped strand mat. Hunt made another jig to drill a hole in clothespins at an angle, and I drilled them until dinner time. After dinner, I came back out to drill some more holes, and Caroline glued string to the clothespins. Hunt took over on the drilling while I planed and jointed some oak for tomorrow. Caroline continued gluing strings to clothespins, and I glued the angle pieces on to locate the body to the chassis until about 10:30pm, at which point we called it a night. We would about 50 spools of veneer today, meaning that we have around 250 to do tomorrow. If we can get those done, the day will be a success.

04 Jul 08

2008-07-04T21:22:00.003-04:00

I cleaned up around the shop this morning and trimmed some angle pieces that we molded earlier this week. Aaron had some computer work to do this morning, and Caroline worked on the tensioning system for the loom. Zac started tearing apart the body plug. I got a little misty watching her go, but we don't need her any more, and we need the table underneath to work on the body shell when it comes back off the chassis. I sanded the front wing plug up to 220grit and put on some gel coat. Sean came out and worked on the steering wheel column some more. Aaron began weaving after his computer duties, and Ben welded on the trailer all morning. After lunch, I put down a layer of chopped strand mat over the gel coat on the front wing, and Zac finished up with a 2nd layer. Hunt and I made a run to the Home Depot to get some tempered board to make some spools for the veneer strips. Hunt, Zac and I cut a bunch of 5 1/4" squares while Caroline ran the drill press, putting a 1" hole in the center of each one. I set up a jig on the bandsaw to cut a slot in 302 of the squares that will allow us to start the veneer on the spool. When we finished, Sean and I talked about the taillights for a while and helped Zac get the rest of the body plug in the bed of Big Red. Hunt came back up, and he and I glued spools together until about 7:30pm, at which point we broke for dinner. We came back after dinner and glued up the rest of the spools until we ran out of material. We brought a bunch of stuff in from outside to beat the storm and called it a night at around 9:30pm.

03 Jul 08

2008-07-03T21:43:00.004-04:00

Aaron and I got some walnut veneer down from Hunt's hangar today, and we ran it through a paper shredder to turn it into 1/4" strips. Aaron and Zac took it down to the pink room to weave some cherry for the front wing, and the walnut for the side intake panels. I ground on the front wing buck for a while until Hunt and I went to the glass shop to get some universal windshield molding. I started putting body filler on the front wing buck, continuing the process until lunchtime. Luke and Caroline worked on the tensioning device for the loom, and Ben added stiffeners to the fiberglass molds that he made off the side glass areas on the body. After lunch, I went back to work on the wing, and Ben went to work on the trailer. Caroline and Luke continued work on the loom tensioners for the rest of the day, and Aaron and Zac wove until quitting time. They wove enough cherry for the front wing, and got about 18" of walnut done. I mounted the front wing buck to a piece of OSB, and Hunt and I finished filling and sanding it. After, I surrounded it with a 3" wide polystyrene foam border, which I sanded down to about 1/16" below the surface of the wing and covered with aluminum tape. Lastly, I painted on a coat of polyester resin, which we will sand tomorrow before gel coating. I finished at about 9:45pm.

02 Jul 08

2008-07-02T21:24:00.003-04:00

We had a pretty big day today. I cleaned up the chin mold first thing this morning. Aaron took some trash to the dump and picked up a spare windshield when he got here. Caroline glued up more of the clothespin tensioners. Luke worked on the tensioning mechanism for the loom, and Ben set out to resin infuse the chin piece on the mold I cleaned this morning. Sean started locating the spokes of the steering wheel, ensuring that they were holding the wheel squared and centered on the column. I worked on gluing in some 1" thick, laminated balsa reinforcement beams to the ceiling at the top of the side windows. After lunch, I routed the cherry backer on the side intakes to the right shape and ground the bevel into the body that surrounds the intake. Ben continued work on the resin infusion and was ready to draw resin in by about 3:30pm. I helped him with the resin part of the process, but he didn't really need it. Sean glued the spoked to the column and the steering wheel, and I took the buck for the front wing out and mounted it to the plug to start grinding and shaping. Ben laid some chopped strand mat over one side window to give us a pattern to go by in searching for a piece of glass to use. Caroline glued up a large angle bracket, and I ground on the front wing until about 7:45pm. After dinner, I came back out, cleaned up some stuff, and made some plans with Hunt on what happens next. It was a good day overall; hopefully we keep the momentum going.

01 Jul 08

2008-07-01T22:57:00.003-04:00

I ground epoxy out of the windshield slot this morning and worked on fitting the opening, and Ben put a layer of fabmat on the chin mold. Luke worked on the tensioning mechanism for the loom, and I figured out what adjustments needed to be made to fix the mold for the side air intake. I also glued the pieces together that I bandsawed last night for the roof intake mold. Sean came out and started trimming and fitting pieces for the steering wheel. He used a machined piece of steel with a 1" steel rod in it to hold the spokes upright while he sanded them. Aaron and Caroline worked on drawing in the loom again, and Ben worked on the trailer. After lunch, I put the side intake mold adjustments in place. We ripped some wedges, which I nailed down and covered with MDF to change the angle. I also added 6" of length to the short leg of the bend and enlarged the radius some at the top. I cut out the brake ducts next. I made a template to transfer the hole to the other side and a small mold from a piece of polystyrene foam to serve as the trim for it. After dinner, I made a similar mold for the other side. Caroline and Kendal worked on making some pieces for a new version of the clothespin tensioning system that we used on the 1/4" material. There is an outside chance that the crew could be weaving tomorrow, so keep your fingers crossed.

30 Jun 08

2008-06-30T23:56:00.001-04:00

I pulled the windshield frame from the mold this morning. It looked like another beauty, so I brought it inside and started cleaning it up. Aaron and Caroline pulled the 60' x 1/8" cherry veneer through 6" diameter 6mil polyethylene tubing to prepare it for drawing in on the loom. Ben went to the junkyard to get some purlings to use on the trailer. Joe and I had to get some argon for Ben to weld with, along with some body filler and tips for the hot glue gun. When we got back, it was time for lunch. After lunch, I cut a bunch of pieces of balsa to make a stiffening ledge on the front edge of the windshield surround. I used Daubert's hot melt PUR to attach them. When I finished this, it was time to fit the windshield frame. I ended up cutting the front legs off of it and attaching them seperately, but since this piece is essentially a core, the integrity will be easily regained. Hunt mixed some 2-part epoxy with some colloidal silica to add thickness to the resin that aided in filling any gaps. Ben welded all afternoon, while Caroline, Kendal and Aaron drew the loom in. Luke worked on the the roller tensioning system and got it working before heading out. After dinner, Hunt came back up, and we designed the mold for the roof intake. He sanded the nose of the car while I geared up to build the mold. I cut the 3/4" MDF into blocks and bandsawed them to the shape of the mold. I finished before midnight, ready to call it a day.

29 Jun 08

2008-06-29T23:17:00.003-04:00

I pulled the windshield surround from the mold this morning, and it was a beautiful part, fully infused with glue. Next, I started pulling the interior body panel molds out of the car. I had to dig out most of the polystyrene foam from the backside with the claw of a hammer, so it took a while to get them out of there. Ben painted some polyester resin on the fiberglass parts from yesterday to cover the tacky resin that air-inhibited. We decided to make the windshield surround again for various reasons concerning fit on the body, but we knew what we were doing from yesterday, so we were ready to roll. Caroline and Ben worked on setting the infusion up, this time with 5 layers of 3/8" tessellated balsa. I ground the untrimmed edges off the interior body molds while they worked on that. When Caroline and Ben were ready to pull a vacuum, Hunt and I went out to lend a hand with the resin mixing. Everything went beautifully, and Ben cleaned up while I planed some cherry backer to use for stripping out the engine access holes in the body. I cut and fit the strips until about 7:30pm, when Caroline called me in to eat. After dinner, she came out to help me glue all the strips to the body, and we were all done by about 10:00pm.

28 Jun 08

2008-06-28T22:40:00.001-04:00

I put some tessellated balsa strips down on the door panel molds, beveled their edges, and smoothed them out with body filler first thing this morning. Luke worked on assembling the comb that will sort the veneer strips before they enter the heddle eyes of the loom. Ben showed up, sorted through our fiberglass resin jugs for a while, and helped me lay up another layer on the chin of the body plug outside. While we let this layer kick, we came inside to put a final layer of chopped strand mat over the balsa and body filler. After we ate lunch, Ben, Caroline and Luke started on resin-infusing a new windshield header on our nose mold. While they prepared everything for this, I planed some cherry backer board and ripped it to width. I used this stock to trim out the lining of the intake hole on each side of the car. I used 2 layers of 1/8" thick cherry, overlapping the miters between the 2 layers. I had the pieces cut for both sides with 1 side glued on when I went out to check on the infusion. The guys and girl had everything set up well, and the resin flowed quickly through the 1"+ thick laminate. When we finished this, Caroline headed to Home Depot to get some supplies for tomorrow while Luke took the clamps off his comb. Ben and I put 3 more layers of chopped strand mat down over the chin mold to potentially finish it off. We broke for dinner, and Ben and I came back out to glue the cherry backer on the inside lip of the intake hole on the other side of the car. We cleaned up outside and finished at about 10:30pm.

27 Jun 08

2008-06-28T07:05:00.002-04:00

Aaron, Luke, Hunt and I cleaned up the shop this morning while Caroline and Ben slit veneer. We worked on this until about 11:00am, after which Luke went to work on the loom, and Hunt and I looked at the steering wheel placement. We made a block to take the place of the leaf springs underneath the spring mounts to help us mock it up. After lunch, I masked off the areas around the interior body panel plugs, waxed the surfaces 3 times, and brushed on PVA to prepare for fiberglassing. Luke continued to work on mounting the drive motor to the tensioning carpet roll of the loom, and Ben and Aaron continued to slit veneer. When they finished, Ben and I laid a layer of chopped strand mat on the chin of the body plug and came inside to lay one on the interior body panel plug. Ben had to leave, but Luke had finished mounting the drive motor and came in to help me. We put 2 layers on the plug on the other side and one more on the first plug before heading in for dinner at around 8:00pm. We came back out after dinner to bring the total up to 4 layers per side before calling it quits at around 11:00pm.

2008-06-27T11:58:00.001-04:00

26 Jun 08

2008-06-26T23:15:00.003-04:00

I went back to work on the interior body panel plugs this morning. I filled in the driver's side panel and redesigned it in the process, so I had to go back and make the passenger's side the same. Unfortunately for me, the passenger's side panel had less volume, so I had to add material. I did this by making a dam out of polystyrene, mixing an expanding foam, and pouring it in the cavity. I had the foam put in by lunchtime. Ben and Luke shredded some material this morning while Caroline put together some photos on Flickr, and Aaron got a rendering ready. Ben and Aaron made another wooden angle bracket, and Luke worked on the loom. After lunch, I went back to work on the plugs. I ended up having to cover them with body filler to protect the foam from the fiberglass resin that we will make the molds from. This took forever, and I worked on them until dinner time at around 9:00pm. Ben, Luke and Caroline shredded most of the afternoon. They should finish up tomorrow morning. Paul came out to wish me a happy birthday and stayed for eats, after which I came back outside and worked until about 11:30pm. The plugs should be essentially ready to make the molds from tomorrow. The plugs took way longer than I hoped they would, so I am going to have to try to make up some time.

25 Jun 08

2008-06-25T23:27:00.003-04:00

I started fitting the dashboard this morning. Luke worked on the infeed table for the 2nd loom, and Aaron and Caroline wove. Ben worked on digging a trailer out of the weeds in the backyard. By lunchtime, I had the dash in place, and the weaving was almost finished. After lunch, I laid out a knee hole for the passenger side and replicated it on the driver's side when I had it like I wanted it. Hunt and I went to Harbor Freight for another el cheapo winch to use to draw veneer through the slitter, which Luke and Ben mounted to the porch on the loom room. Luke mounted the winch to the trailer hitch of Big Red while Ben and Bob took the axles off the trailer. Next, Luke, Hunt and Ben ran a test roll through the slitter, which looks like it is going to work well. I spread body filler on the front lip of the body plug, sanded it, waxed it 3 times, and sprayed it with PVA. Tomorrow, we will need to make a small fiberglass mold off of it to use for the chin of the body. After dinner, I came back out to lay some polystyrene foam inside the passenger compartment for making a mold that will trim out the interior. I glued in blocks and ground until about 11:30pm.

24 Jun 08

2008-06-24T22:47:00.003-04:00

I started the day off by lowering the body on the chassis by about 7/16". This took a while, as I had to detach all the mounting brackets, cut the body around the roll bar, and grind the wheel wells in certain locations. By lunch, we had the body pulled back up into place. Luke worked on finished up his mold from yesterday, and Ben, Aaron, and Caroline wove. After lunch, I reattached the body and started figuring out how to cut out the wheel arches. I ended up putting a wheel in the wheel well to start with. I screwed a piece of all-threaded into a threaded hole in the center of the wheel and looped a string around it. Once I had the wheel properly centered with respect to the body crease, I went around it with a Sharpie, using the string like a compass. I cut out all 4 wheel arches using this method, and I cut the passenger's side engine compartment hole. Luke brought Ben and Caroline up from weaving to glue a panel on the new mold, and Hunt and I went out to help them get it sealed up. After dinner, I came back out and made a 3-piece paper template of the engine compartment cut-out, transfered it to the other side, and cut the mirror image of the first hole. I made some marks on the back of the chassis to help me line some stuff up tomorrow and called it a night at about 10:45pm.

2008-06-24T11:35:00.001-04:00

23 Jun 08

2008-06-23T22:46:00.003-04:00

I worked on fitting and trimming the body for the first part of the morning. I cut the side intake on the other side and checked fit and alignment around the roll bar. Ben worked on getting a trailer dislodged from weeds for the first half of the morning while Luke got a mold figured out and made a trip to Home Depot for some 2X6s. Aaron did some computer work. After lunch, Luke built the mold for the dimpled panel while Ben, Caroline, and Kendal wove more 1/4" veneer. They are nearing the home stretch. I worked on cutting the side windows out and fitting the A-pillars into the body, which took me most of the day. They needed a lot of cleaning up, plus a shim along the top edge to fit properly. It looks like they may not be usable, so Hunt came up after dinner, and we talked about other alternatives until about 10:45pm. Still no definite plan, but I am somewhat sure that whatever we come up with will be less painful than the first time we made them.

2008-06-23T11:36:00.000-04:00

22 Jun 08

2008-06-22T22:25:00.001-04:00

After I pulled the angle from the mold this morning, Caroline and I drilled and mounted 8 tabs onto the chassis which we used to secure the body this morning. We have about 5/8" clearance between the body and the table when making a full rotation, so that worked out well. We took the motor off the rotisserie, and Hunt made a shaft that allows us to operate the worm drive with a drill, giving us forward and reverse, as well as more precise control of the rotation. I started looking at the windshield situation, and cut the hole for the windshield in the body shell after lunch. I broke the A-pillars free from the plug, where they have been for the last 6 months, and started figuring out what I needed to do to fit them to the car. It looks like it won't be too much work, but I will have to take the body off the chassis, so it will have to wait until tomorrow when I get some help. The body doesn't weigh much more than 100lbs or so, but it is extremely cumbersome. After dinner, Hunt worked on a take-up device for the slitter, and I cut the hole out for one of the side intakes. I hot glued a strip of plywood on the backside of the panel and ran a router with a follower bit to make most of the cut. I finished up at about 10:15pm.

21 Jun 08

2008-06-22T00:51:00.004-04:00

Ben and I built and installed a truss today to use for hanging the body. We had the body hanging by around 3:00pm, at which point Ben went to Hunt's to weedeat while I fine tuned the positioning of the body. Hunt worked on the slitter some more, which is getting close to ready. At around 6:45pm, when I had the body positioned, I decided it was time to mount it to the chassis with some angle brackets that would allow me to remove the body and reposition it in the same place. Ben came up from weedeating and helped me glue up an angle bracket, which we finished at about 7:30pm. Hunt, Jean, and Caroline made some burgers on the grill, and we ate and called it a night.

20 Jun 08

2008-06-20T23:08:00.003-04:00

Big success today. We pulled peel ply, bleeder ply and lines off the inside of the body mold this morning, and Aaron and Caroline took out all the bolts holding the pieces of the mold together. Ben and I added some crossmembers to the infeed ramp for the loom, and then we started taking the molds off the part. Luke was working on setting up the loom, and Hunt was working a slitter to slit veneer rolls into 1/8" strips. We had the part off the mold by about lunchtime, and we took it out to look at it in the sun. The huge amount of work we still have to do couldn't overcome the accomplishment of the body shell, and we enjoyed it for a couple minutes. After lunch, Ben, Luke Aaron and I moved a stack of OSB, and Ben, Caroline and I hung the body molds from the ceiling under the lean-to. Aaron cleaned off the table, and we moved the body into position upside-down on the table underneath the chassis. I spent the rest of the day grinding the bottom flat on the body shell and grinding in certain places on the wheel well edges, trying to coax it into position over the chassis. Hunt was still working on the slitter until we broke to eat at about 8:45pm. I came back out after dinner and worked on positioning the body until about 11:15pm. It was an awesome day for the car, and people should finally be able to see a big-time change in the view from the webcam.

19 Jun 08

2008-06-19T22:44:00.003-04:00

I cut some 1/4" steel rod this morning for Hunt to weld to 8 pairs of vice grips. We needed to rig them this way to close off our resin flow lines on the glue-up later today. Aaron, Ben and Caroline sealed all the bolts that hold the molds together on both sides while I worked on the vacuum lines. Hunt made up a splitter for us, and, when he brought it out, we were ready to pull a vacuum. The vacuum went well, but we chased some minor leaks for a while. We told our buddies at Daubert yesterday that we really needed some glue, and our shipment arrived at around 11:00am today. This kind of help is so typical of these guys, and we really appreciate it. This meant that we were ready to flow the glue by lunchtime. We decided to eat first, and we put the glue to it right after lunch. Kendal came, and everyone worked together to make sure the process went properly. It turned out to be what we think it a raging success, so Luke got everyone moving on getting the loom put in the new shop while Hunt and I went to get some drainage pipe. When we got back, Luke, Kendal, Caroline and I cut the drainage pipe in half on the table saw. Ben worked on the frame for the doors on the loom room while Caroline, Aaron, Luke and I cleaned up. Hunt, Jean, and Caroline grilled some burgers for everyone while Luke, Ben and I hung the new door and put up a wall around the A/C window unit and the slot for the infeed of the loom. After we ate some of the best burgers anyone had had in a while, Ben and I drove posts in the ground and nailed in cross pieces to mount the drainage pipe infeed ramp to the loom. We got all the cross pieces up, along with 2 of the 6 rows of halfpipes. We finished at about 10:45pm and called it a night.

18 Jun 08

2008-06-19T06:49:00.003-04:00

Ben and I worked on splicing the body panels together almost all day today. First, we had to PVA the molds, run tape around the edges, and put the body panels in the molds. We used clamps to hold them in place until the vacuum hits them. Luke worked on the loom all day with help from Hunt, and Aaron and Caroline wove until about 4:00pm. There is a good chance that they have woven all the 1/4" material that we will need. Ben and I cut a bunch of 4", 6", and 8" strips of woven veneer to lay in the seams of the molds panels for reinforcement, and we had 2 layers put in place with spray adhesive by lunchtime. After lunch, we were out of weave to use for the splicing, so Ben helped Caroline and Aaron weave while I helped Hunt and Luke on the loom. After a couple of hours, the weaving was finished, so Ben and I went back to setting up the splices. When we finished the last layer of weave, we put down peel ply and bleeder ply, and Caroline and Ben ran the resin supply and vacuum lines while Hunt and I went to get more clamps to seal the lines off when the time comes. Ben, Caroline and I started sealing the bag at around 7:15pm and didn't stop until we finished at 10:15pm. We set some world records in pleat length, but the seal looked pretty good. We went in to eat, and Ben headed out. Luke and Hunt got the loom finished today except for adjustment and a couple tiny details, so we should be ready to move it into its new room and get it set up.

17 Jun 08

2008-06-17T23:07:00.003-04:00

Caroline and I finished prepping the tail piece for a second glue infusion this morning, and we were pulling resin into it by the time Ben and Aaron showed up at 8:00am. We chased a leak for a while, but felt like we had a good part. Luke went back to work on the loom with help from Hunt after making huge strides yesterday, and Ben, Caroline and Aaron wove. Hunt and I made a run to the Home Depot to pick up a skid of OSB, and we got some stuff for Luke at Lowe's. After lunch, I cut the back legs off the nose mold and started to lower the rear, since the flank molds were too high in the air in the back. Ben helped me lower it, and we took the infused laminate off the tail mold. It looked good, so we cleaned the mold and waxed it twice with help from Caroline. I detached the mold from its legs while they finished the waxing, and we carried it over to the other 3 body molds. We spent the next hour or so hanging it and mounting it to the rest of the mold assembly. It fit like a glove, and Caroline and I tightened all the bolts while Ben went back to making the reed. Luke worked on the loom until about 8pm, and Ben finished assembling the reed. After dinner, Hunt came back up, and we worked on the loom for a while. I called it quits at about 11:00pm.

16 Jun 08

2008-06-16T23:19:00.002-04:00

Caroline and I prepared for glue infusion of the tail mold this morning. We had all of the veneer and plys cut, but we had to run the resin lines and wax and PVA the mold. Hunt and I made a run to Agri Supply while Ben and Caroline stripped some 2X4s from the old flank mold stands. When Hunt and I got back, Caroline, Ben and I worked on the tail mold and got it sealed. Luke showed up after a run from Tramway Veneer and brought lunch. After lunch, Caroline, Kendal and I infused the tail piece with glue, and Ben and Aaron restarted the loom. Luke went to work cutting pieces for a second loom that will be dedicated to 1/8" veneer weaving. Ben continued to make the dents for the reed and finished all of them before he headed out. I started sorting wood to be used for covering the seat frames, and Hunt and I went to the Home Depot to get some hardware for the loom that Luke was working on. We found that the glue infusion of the tail got some air-related porosity in it because we lost our vacuum from the resin curing in the lines. Caroline and I worked until about 9:00pm setting up to reinfuse with more glue to fill in the air pockets. Luke was still working on the loom. We all ate dinner, and Luke and I came back out and worked on the loom until about 11:20pm. We will be ready to glue infuse the tail first thing in the morning, and Luke has a real shot at getting the loom set up tomorrow.

15 Jun 08

2008-06-15T21:38:00.003-04:00

I laid some woven veneer in a small fiberglass mold of the joint along the front fender this morning and put in a vacuum bag with just a mist of water on it. We wanted to see if it would take a set and make it easier to lay up later. It didn't hold much shape, but it was worth a try and still might be worth doing. When I finished this, Caroline and I started working on hanging the flank mold from the roof of the lean-to to be able to bolt it to the nose mold. We worked at it for a while, and Hunt came and helped. I worked on running the bolts through and tightening them for a while, after which I started on cleaning up the other flank mold to be mounted. Caroline helped me wash and wax it with 2 coats. We used tacky tape between the flanges to give us an air tight seal needed for later vacuuming. I had the mold released from its base and ready to hang by lunchtime. After lunch, Hunt helped Caroline and me hang the 2nd flank mold, and I ran the bolts through and tightened it up. I ground the edges on the 2 flank laminates and the nose laminate to insure a smooth transition with no overlaps, and I crawled in the mold and waxed all the seams liberally. While I was working on all this, Hunt was busy making a setup of rotary razor blades spaced 1/8" apart for slitting the veneer for our next weave. He spaced the blades with polycarbonate. Caroline and I reaped the weave from the loom and used it to make the inner layer of the tail mold. We spent a couple hours covering the mold with balsa, woven veneer, peel ply, and bleeder ply before going in for dinner. After we ate, we came back out and put the vacuum line all the way around with mold, holding it down with spray adhesive and peel ply strips. Tomorrow, we will be ready to glue infuse the tail piece as soon as we get our glue. Once we have this piece, we will join all the body panels together to make the shell.

14 Jun 08

2008-06-14T21:59:00.003-04:00

Caroline and I came out this morning and placed our resin and vacuum lines around the flank mold. Since we already had the veneer and transfer plys in place, we were essentially ready to roll. Ben and Luke came and helped me seal the polyethylene sheet around the edge, and Hunt came out when we were ready to infuse the glue. Everything went well, and we had the part finished by about 11:00am. Ben's family came down from Pennsylvania, and we showed them around and went to lunch at the airport. After lunch, Caroline and Luke wove about 5' of veneer while I ground the edges of the nose and flank laminates to prepare them for joining. Hunt and I peeled the bag off the flank laminate from this morning. Caroline helped me clean the edges of the nose mold and get the flank mold into place, and we went in for dinner. After dinner, we came back out, and I loosened the legs from the flank mold. Caroline put some tacky tape on the flange of the flank mold, and we finished up at about 9:45pm.

13 Jun 08

2008-06-13T23:15:00.003-04:00

Hunt, Luke and I pulled the glue-infused nose from the mold this morning. It turned out to be a mind-blowing part, and it will only get better as we add to it. Luke and I worked on gluing, taping, and PVA-ing the mold, and I ground a scarf the side of the roof and the nose that were getting spliced together. Ben, Aaron, and Caroline wove all morning and made some incredible progress. We needed enough footage to cover the 2nd flank mold by the end of the day, so they were racing to make it. After lunch, Luke and I started getting everything together to glue the roof to the nose, and we harvested the weave that Caroline, Aaron and Ben had produced. We made strips to cover the scarf joint, and mixed and spread epoxy on the joint and the strips. Bob came by and helped Luke and me seal polyethylene film over the entire mold, which we sealed with tacky tape. The bagging was a royal success, and we gave Caroline and Ben a break from weaving to come help cover the flank mold in a layer of woven veneer, a layer of balsa, another layer of woven veneer, a layer of peel ply, and a layer of bleeder ply. We finished at about 9:00pm and called it a night. Tomorrow, we will run out resin flow lines and the vacuum lines, seal polyethylene around everything, and go for the glue infusion. The whole laminate will be made in one shot, assuming we don't mess anything up.

12 Jun 08

2008-06-12T23:01:00.003-04:00

Caroline and I worked on the nose mold this morning, continuing the preparation for glue infusion. Ben showed up and took her place while she went with Aaron to start weaving. We decided to lengthen the piece we were infusing on the nose to extend past the roof piece, allowing us to easily splice on the next lay-up. Luke came in a while later after making another run to see our buddies at Tramway Veneer to get some more 1/4" cherry for the weave. We had everything cut and placed on the mold by lunchtime. After lunch, Ben, Luke and I place our resin lines with some advice from Hunt and sealed the polyethylene sheet over the top. The glue infusion process went absolutely beautifully, and the part was saturated within 30-40min. After the success, Luke and I cleaned up around the shop while Ben punched more dents for the reed. After Luke left, Hunt, Caroline and I pulled the peel ply off the nose piece, which looked great. Hunt and I talked about how we could form the body into 1 piece until about 8:00pm, at which point we went in for dinner. After dinner, Caroline and I went down to the pink room to weave. A lack of resin and woven veneer will soon be holding us up on the body panel making process, so we wanted to make up a little time. Hunt came down and spliced while we wove until about 11:00pm when we called it a night.

11 Jun 08

2008-06-11T22:26:00.003-04:00

Caroline and I got outside early to cut the woven veneer to fit the roof. She and Aaron went to weave, and Luke came out to help me get everything set up to glue infuse the roof. We got the mold cleaned up and surrounded with tape, and we had a vacuum pulled by about 10:00am. We set the glue flowing, fed laminate with resin, and monitored it until about lunchtime. After lunch, Luke and I went out to the nose mold to pull the part off and cut the tessellated balsa for it. We had a few dry spots on the roof that needed help, so we added glue feed lines and vacuum lines in strategic locations to move the glue around inside the bag where we needed to wet the part out. We worked on this until about 4:30pm and finally got it fixed. Aaron and Caroline wove for the second half of the day, and Ben worked on making the reed for the 1/8th veneer weave. Luke waxed the nose section of the mold and spread a coat of PVA on it while Hunt and I got some tubing. Luke and I scored and broke the balsa to fit the nose part and cut the veneer that Aaron and Caroline had accumulated on the loom. When Luke left, Ben, Caroline and I cut more small pieces of balsa to fill in all the gaps, and then cut all the veneer to cover the balsa. Since we plan to glue infuse the nose, we were able to hold the balsa and woven veneer in place with small dots of hot glue. We finished at about 9:00pm and went in to eat.

10 Jun 08

2008-06-10T22:12:00.002-04:00

Caroline, Luke, Ben, Aaron and I glued the final inner skin on the flank this morning. It took us until about 11:30am, and it looked great. Ben and Aaron reconnected the weave to the loom while Luke and I scraped epoxy off the nose mold. After we broke for lunch, Aaron, Caroline and Kendal wove while Ben, Luke and I started figuring on the onerous task of gluing radius strips between the 3 front pieces on the nose. First, we spread double stick tape all around the front of the nose mold where the pieces were to be glued. Luke spread glue on the backside of the strips while Ben and I hot glued them to the nose pieces at the corners to hold them in place. Luke spread glue on top of the pieces as we fixed them in location. When the pieces were located and coated, we started taping down 4mil polyethylene film to the double stick tape, creating pleats where necessary to provide the necessary volume to accommodate the large hump in the nose mold. To everyone's surprise, the poly pulled down immediately when we turned the vacuum on. We knew we had a good part, but we chased a few small leaks for a while. When we finished this, Ben went to cutting and welding some metal for a punch mechanism that we need, and Luke waxed and PVA'd the rearward part of the nose mold which forms the roof. Caroline, Ben and I cut woven pieces and a layer of balsa to cover this section of the mold and broke for dinner at about 8pm. After dinner, Caroline and I came back out to cut some more woven veneer to cover the balsa on the roof and cleaned some stuff up outside, calling it a night at about 10:00pm. We will likely glue-infuse the roof tomorrow morning.
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09 Jun 08

2008-06-09T21:49:00.003-04:00

Ben and I started looking at how to mold the 3 nose pieces together this morning. We cut some pieces to use for the radii and got the 3 pieces trimmed and ready to be connected. Caroline scraped all the resin off the surface of the mold that was left from our first glue-ups. Ben and I decided to wait until we get some more vacuum seal tape before we glued the nose together, and fortunately Luke was headed by Composites One on his way to Atlantic Veneer to get some cherry that Rusty sliced for us at .3mm (.012") thick. This stock will allow us to do some further research in the development of woven veneer for reinforced laminates. Aaron and Caroline worked on the loom for the first half of the day. After lunch, Ben and I cut tessellated end-grain balsa to fit the flank and some strips to fill out the edges. Aaron, Kendal, and Caroline came up and helped us glue it all down, as time is really of the essence due to reduced open times on the epoxy in the 98 degree heat. After we finished the glue-up, Caroline, Aaron and Kendal went back to weaving, and Ben and I waxed the other flank mold. Ben, Caroline and I glued several more layers of reinforcement into the top of the front fender arch on the flank and resealed the vacuum. After dinner, Caroline and I cut the 17' of 1/4" weave off the loom and brought it up to the shop to start fitting it to the flank to make the inner layer. We worked until about 9:50pm.

08 Jun 08

2008-06-09T06:49:00.003-04:00

We spent the first half of the day figuring out how to glue infuse the center of the nose mold. Glue infusion is a process which involves pulling a vacuum on a part and opening a valve to let the glue flow under vacuum pressure through flow lines set up in the bag. It results in a uniform, void-free laminate and requires no glue-spreading. Also, since the glue is not catalyzed until after the vacuum is pulled, you have no time constraints on setting up and pulling a vacuum. We were really happy with our first part, which finished wetting out at about 2:00pm, at which point we broke for lunch. After eating, we went to get some more material to glue infuse a part on the rear body mold. Caroline waxed the mold, and I fixed a couple areas with body filler. We cut the parts, and I finished taping around the edges by about 8:30pm. We hooked up the glue, and it wet the part out by about 9:15pm. We had a couple leak areas, and we chased those until a little after 10:30. We were drenched in sweat and covered in bug bites, so we decided to call it a night.

07 Jun 08

2008-06-07T22:09:00.003-04:00

Caroline and I glued onto the opposite half of the nose mold first thing this morning. It took a couple of hours, and Luke showed up right as we were getting it together. Luke and Caroline then put 5 coats of mold release wax on the flank mold, and I put a little body filler on to repair a couple of places. Hunt sanded the butterfly panel like a madman today, trying to get a slight haze out of the clearcoat. Luke, Caroline and I cut a bunch of pieces of woven veneer and taped them together around the mold, finishing up around lunchtime. After lunch, Caroline and I glued the taped veneer pieces together and cut our peel ply, bleeder ply, polyethylene, vacuum screen, and 40mil PVC sheet to fit the mold. Hunt came out to help us glue and seal the piece, which took over an hour for the 16' long piece. On such a large part, a bunch of minuscule leaks can add up to one big leak, so we really had to work our seal to get it pulled down all the way. I went to the Home Depot to get some more 40mil PVC, and Caroline and Hunt cut the pieces to get us ready to go on another glue-up. When I got back, Caroline and I cut the PVC sheet to fit the roof area of the nose mold and glued a part onto it. Hunt helped us get it pulled down, and then he and I spent an hour or so releasing the 2 pieces on the nose mold. We weren't sure if we were going to be able to release them easily, so we decided it would be better to try now before it gets any harder. After dinner, Caroline and I went to the Home Depot yet again to get some more 40mil PVC to save a run tomorrow, and I pulled the vacuums off the flank mold and the roof mold. I peeled the peel ply off the flank mold piece, which turned out great. Caroline helped me move a couple things under the lean-to, and we called it a night at about 10:15pm. It was a stiflingly hot day, but we got a lot done.