Sunday, November 25, 2007

In The Land of Hope and Glory

There comes a time when an anonymous VW enthusiast gets to go somewhere nice, usually that is California if you play your cards right. I got to go on this fabulous trip with my buddy Aleksi and we dearly owe our gratitude to our girls for organizing all this. We could not have made this with out them. Sad but true... ;)

The trip was already in planning early 2007 and we flew to Sacramento right on the beginning on September. Right in time for Sacramento Bug-o-rama! What a coincidence!!! Well that was about the only event during our trip so we were very happy that it worked out like this. Some pics following to let you know the main stuff that went on. One thing that I might add is the heat. It was really hot. We heard some rumours about some local hat fashion. You can guess the rest by looking at the images. Phiuh!

Monday, November 5, 2007

Niks Naks!

That should be translated as a removable rear valance of a bug. So that's where I got after finishing the channels. I have to say that it's true that when you start later in the line you get to study some earlier fabrications on a theme and that's just what I did. Never really liked removable parts that were too obvious to the eye. So I wanted to do it like a really nice boob job, invisible to the eye. Or at least as close to it as I could get. When the lid is on, there is a visible seam on the body where the valance meets the rest of the body. So that's the planned meething point. By using an aftermarket rear piece and rear quarter bits it was almost too easy to fabricate all necessary. Just mark the line of cut to sides and then allow the new piece to overlap about 15mm to allow fender style joints. The new piece slides out when all the bolts are loose with a little turn and lift and goes back in similar manner. I'm very happy with the results. Only down side is that you can not have your IDAs on the engine while putting the engine on. But there is enough room to do it when you've got the engine in. After the parts are painted I need to source some suitable rubber channel to seal the joint from water and dust...