A portable hairdryer came in handy

I used a small portable hairdryer to heat and soften the material so that I could peal it back and trim the backing board appropriately. This would have saved me about 3 hours of work if LeBaron Bonney would have provided me with the right sized panels to begin with. (And they should for the $1,230 they charged for the kit!)

I Finally get started on installing upholstery

I finally received my upholstery kit from LeBaron Bonney, two weeks before I expected it, after their latest delay. So it took a total of 9 weeks to get it. (Their website states 2 weeks) Everything looked good until I started installation. The headliner was a lot of work and took me 9 hours on Friday June 15th. I could have done a better job if I would have read the instructions before I started (like they suggest)

But then a Snafu in installation: the rear window quartet panels didn't fit properly. They were found to be each5/8" too wide and needed to be trimmed. (This photo shows how it overlaps the rear window instead of slipping underneath the lip like it's supposed to) I contacted Doug at LeBaron Bonney and he suggested I could do it myself by using a heat gun to loosen contact cement then peel upholstery back and trim the card board backing. Material would then be trimmed accordingly and reinstalled so that it fits properly. Now it butts up against lower and upper rear window pieces! (You'll see in my next photo set how it all finished up)

Still waiting for my upholstery kit from LaBaron Bonney

Ok, so I order my upholstery kit from LaBaron & Bonney 7 weeks ago and figured to have it in a few weeks to be ready for the Steve McQueen Car Show on June 2nd. But when I called to see where it is in process three weeks ago they tell me they don't have it even scheduled for manufacture until June 22....Ahhh, Really? What ever happened to the 'Two Weeks' as advertised on their website? Now I won't even have it for the July Fourth parade in LaVerne!

Well, now I can say that my car is 'Award Winning' as it won 'Best Model A or T' in the Friends of Steve McQueen Car show at Boys Republic this past weekend. Here's a photo. I've also added a photo of the frame as it looked during dismantle...

After some minor? effort, I got the Model A registered and insured this past week and got it out on the road. It performed well. (other than running out of gas Thursday on the way back from lunch...see Andreas' FB post... luckily, I had Markus and Dre to push me to the gas station!)

I do have some issues with loose front wheels. They wobble off and on, mostly when starting off and at slow speeds. I'll have to remove them and see what the issue is. They seem to wobble both top to bottom and front to back so it might be a few things.

 In my haste, I decided not to rebuild the front end and just clean and paint it. That is proving to be a mistake and so now I'm rethinking that...I'll just tighten up what I can for now and then pull the front end off and go through it more efficiently after the Fourth of July parade in La Verne. We'll post photos after the parade and before we go to Europe with the girls. (Kat and Abi, our 'Enkelkinder!)

 Here's a photo of me in front of the Ace Hardware...a great old building in Old Town San Dimas.

See you in the Funny Papers!

Fenders are mounted

Fenders have been added along with radiator shell. I needed to take some photos for the insurance company so even though it's not quite complete, I shot them to send off tomorrow. Because in order to register the car it must be insured. (Too bad I'm not an illegal alien, then that rule doesn't apply...LOL) Next, it's off to the body shop again to do some final touch up work.

The upholstery has been ordered and should be here in a few weeks so that puts me on track to have it finished by June 2 and the Steve McQueen Car Show in Chino...Yahoo!

A lot of progress over the weekend

First off, I got my tires mounted on newly powder-coated wheels: Tacoma Cream. They look great!

Secondly: started the motor up on Friday and again Saturday...had some issues with running verly long. Sounds like a fuel flow issue. Took my newly rebuilt Zenith carberator to A Bone in Alta Loma and had Ray test it out for me...no problems; it ran great and so that aleviated one potential problem.

And finally got the vinyl top installed (took four hours). Had to do it Saturday morning as the sun was shining and warmed the material up just right. You'll notice tools of the trade. I found a set of dividers very useful to maintain distance between nails. I didn't replace the wood underframe so some of the tacks didn't take hold very well. But she'll hold.