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Old 10-20-2009, 10:25 PM
Kerry Pinkerton's Avatar
Kerry Pinkerton Kerry Pinkerton is offline
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Join Date: May 2009
Location: Near Huntsville, Alabama. Just south of the Tennessee line off I65
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Wow, Oblong was great for me this year. We got a ton done on the car. With my bum knee I was pretty useless for most the time but the last few days I was at 75% or so and tried to stay on task as much and as long as possible. Regretfully, I didn't spend much time visiting other projects but it wasn't because of lack of interest. I tend to get very intense and this was even more so because of the knee. Hopefully I wasn't rude to anyone. If so, I apologize.

Woke up early and pulled into Oblong a little after noon. When we unloaded the roadster, I drove it around the lake to settlle the suspension. Once it was on the level concrete of the building, I was able to see a problem. The left rear fender was noticably higher than the left.

By the time I got everything off the truck/trailer and put more or less away, Robert Kolenda got in and we started to look at the fender issue. Taking some measurments, we discovered that the fender was 3/4" higher than the right side when the chassis was level. As part of the investigation process, Robert and I drew a center line, drew perpendicular lines, and drew parallel lines to the center outside the car. On those we made index marks so we could get accurate measurements side to side.

The next day Ben Van Berlo (Pedalcar Ben) from the Netherlands and Bob Baisden worked on the rear fenders. Ben suggested we remount the left rear to lower it and reshape/arrange to match. This meant the sides by the decklid needed to be redone but the arrangement didn't match anyway so that wasn't a big issue.

I had picked up some square tubing at the Robinson steel place and made a 'bridge' that stood on the floor and was level across the top. Using the reference marks on the floor, we were able to make cardboard templates referenced off the floor and with a perfectly vertical side. Pretty quickly we decided to clean up the right side, pull a flexible shape pattern, and reshape the left. Ben did this with amazing speed with the help of Bob Baisden. The guy looking on is Peter Miles.

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After Ben cleaned up the fender, we marked it using a plumb bob off the bridge to make reference marks.

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And the same on the left side.

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The left rear was restretched in several areas. Here you can see the round marks where Ben was hitting hard in a pattern to increase the shape in that section of the fender.

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I was pretty useless at this point so Ben and Bob did 90% of the work. Here they are checking the flexible pattern against the 'bad' side. Ben ended up moving parts of the ridge a good 5/8 of an inch to get it to match.

That is Tony Sanchez looking on.

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Later in the week, Ron Yeager did some finish work on both rear fenders.

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This was Ron's first Oblong meet. We met Ron at Carlisle on our first selling trip. He was our second customer and a good friend. He usually makes it up to Dutch's meet.

Dan Shady couldn't stand the mess and I caught him sweeping up around the car late one night.

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Robert Kolenda spend all 7 days working on the roadster 14-18 hours a day. Talk about an energizer bunny!

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When I got to Oblong, I had not decided on which headlight to use, the vertical unit or the VW style light with lense. Robert thought we needed to prototype the VW unit and took on the project.

The first thing he did was cut into the fender to mount the inner bucket. I think he was nervous about cutting a chunk out of the fender but I encouraged him to go for it.
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Here you can see both styles with the upper fairing on an early version of the fairing. A decision was made to go with the VW style light. John Alba has a source for full fluted aftermarket lenses that sound interesting.

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Tuning in the second version of the fairing.

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Top half tacked in by Jay Paganelli (Jpags)

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And after Jay welded it in and I filed it and bumped the back contour in place. It's kind of hard to see but the flair goes up then down into the fender. At first it is parallel to the center line of the car but at the very end it flows out into the fender trough.

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I welded in the other side on Saturday but wasn't able to metalfinish the top seam because of some proud on the backside that needs to be removed first. I'll pull the fender when I get a chance and finish it. Robert did a terrific job on these.

Jay and Ron and I did the hood. I welded a couple pieces of 1x1x1/8 aluminum together to make a channel.

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Ron and Jay with a mockup of the hood half.

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Robert and Jay cut the original hood in half, then scribed and trimmed to proper size.

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Jay and Ron tipped the hinge flange.

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And here we go. We used the clinch studs to bolt the hinge to the channel and the hood flange.

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We got HOOD!

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There is no inner structure yet. I'll wait until the fenders are DONE and then tune in the hood and inner structure.

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You can also see the windshield brackets. These were from a windshield unit given to me by Stan Lobitz. No idea what they are from but I love the look. Don't have a great photo of them.

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Also laid out and cut what will be close to the final grill opening but didn't get a photo yet. Should get the car out of the trailer tomorrow and will take some photos before it goes back in the shop.

I can't think everyone enough who helped. You saved me literally weeks of work and your insights and suggestions will make this a better car!
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Kerry Pinkerton
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