OTHER WAY ROUND PARTS
John Ham, host of the ANC/MEV Replicar group on FaceBook, has been immensely helpful and this is the most outstanding example:
Because the kit is from the UK, and therefore has the steering wheel on the passenger side of the car, I can't use the front subframe or steering rack from my US donor car. I tried getting on to the UK Miata parts group, but it's tricky to manage from here in Indiana because I have no idea whether Devon (location of ANC Sportscars) and, say, Dartmoor (hypothetical location of the mirror-image parts for sale) are 5 minutes or 5 hours apart.
John graciously found me the above parts for an embarrassingly low price and is arranging for their transfer to ANC Sportscars. Thank you, John.
SEATING IDEAS
Looks like most people use Cobra style bucket seats for their Replicar builds. No argument here - they do look nice - but I suspect I will want a more reclined posture in the car. Not as extreme as a purpose-built racing car, but at least a notch or two in that direction.
My currrent idea is to fabricate aluminum "Bomber Style" seats - so called because the idea is derived from aircraft seats. The weight savings of all those holes doesn't matter that much for a ground bound hobby car but it does look nice. In the upper right picture I really like the detail of the metal piping around the edge. I am envisioning a more squared-off construction with rivets, more like the upper left picture. Most people seem to upholster these all over, but my idea is to recreate the cockpit styling of the formula cars of my childhood - upholstered leather pads that snap in to place (bottom right picture). This would allow the outer metalwork to be seen from the sides of the seats and might also provide an easy but thematically coherent way to upholster other areas of the car the driver touches, the insides of the doors, the center tunnel, etc. Best of all I could build to my own design and get exactly the amount of recline I'm looking for, along with some support for the lumbar spine and underneath the knees.
It's silly to be inordinately fond of a simple car part like a fuel filler cap, but this one is just so perfect. The polished aluminum is exactly period correct and it has that nice 'weighty' feel of old machined parts.
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