Embodied. Correction: Embodying

It's nice to be out of the Land of the Engine Gremlins (Lord willin' and the crick don't rise). 

Next Steps (at least as anticipated):

1. Install different injectors (I think the FIC injectors deliver too much fuel for a naturally aspirated engine)
2. Initial engine tuning (I have a professional who can remotely read my data logs and suggest adjustments)
3. Get car on ground and drive around the neighborhood to test systems (test brakes in driveway first!)
4. Fix any mechanical systems as needed
5. Move on to bodywork

Of course I'm starting with the last one first. To be fair I don't have the injectors yet so I can't do these in order even if I wanted to. 

Start in order of excitement, right? SuperfastMatt actually recommends this as a way to keep projects from stalling. Just before or just after some miserable job, throw in something fun.

I have been not-so-patiently waiting to test my sample of Buckinghamshire Green (AST 115D). This is the color Aston Martin uses when they want to evoke the original DBR-1. I've never seen it in real life, but it looks nice in pictures. 

Maybe a little too dark - and maybe the metallic flakes are too prominent and it should be pearl - but definitely in the neighboorhood.

I'm painting one door at this stage - mostly because exciting paint color test! - but also to test the products and techniques I plan to use. And, more than likely, discover one or two or three thousand skills that I need to improve.

Foreground: my project car door.
Background: Byron's Dalek (also at the paint prep stage)

The door is blocked, filled, and ready for primer. If you haven't done body work, the pink-brown areas are filler - which means these were low spots when I started. By the way, I really like my cheap Temu block sander (barely visible in the shadow at the bottom of the picture).

To avoid casting undeserved shade on Rob and his fine Quantum Sports Cars crew, I should point out that first thing they did was a complete remake of the bodywork. New plug, new molds, new everything. As the filler patches on my door show, this was a bit overdue. I am confident that anyone ordering an LMR-141 kit today will get better glasswork than those of us who went before.

Quantum Sports Cars' improved version of the Replicar, now called LMR-141

In addition to the improved quality, Rob & Co made the car more shapely - just in subtle ways - but the cumulative effect of the changes is the difference between "attractive" and "exquisite."

Back to mine, at a considerably less advanced stage of finish.

The darker grey area circled (it's subtle) is another low spot, but unlike the others, I think this one is shallow enough to fill in with primer.

I am not any kind of body/painting pro and this will not be a show quality paint job. Still, insofar as possible, I'd like to avoid the irregularities that make people say 'fiberglass' from 50 yards away. 

There were also a couple of high spots where I sanded through the gelcoat, which is generally to be avoided, but a coat of epoxy primer should take care of it.

This outside door corner had some problems. I wish I'd taken a picture first; there was a hollow behind the gel coat and the gel coat broke, leaving a kind of sandwich-edge void. This the kind of problem for which regular body filler is a bad solution: it lacks the strength to hold up as an outside corner. So far I've found SuperFil two part epoxy filler to excel in spots like this: basically a body filler job, but needing to be stronger than Bondo. 

I'm not worried about the quality of the bodywork long term. For all the issues with the aged first generation Replicar molds, the glass is laid well and I have no concerns for structural quality or durability. I do think I'm going to have a bit more work blocking and flatting than necessary - but I like bodywork so this is not a problem.

Also Body Work, but Different

Expressions of deep appreciation to Uncle Brother Ray the Engineer, who set up a four-bar linkage model in Solidworks for me to explore the particulars of my bonnet (hood) hinges. The lengths of the bars and the locations of the pivots and fixed points all dramatically change how the mechanism moves and this model will help me try out different variations of the design and see how they behave.

Ray suggested this kind of hinge and from the beginning I realized the potential advantages, but I was having a very difficult time getting started. Linkages like this involve actual "people-go-to-school-for-this" engineering and advanced CAD skills which I abjectly lack. Now that Ray has created the model for me, I do think my Solidworks chops should be adequate to use it for the necessary experiments.

The goal of this exercise is to make hinges that will a) be hidden inside the bodywork, b) move so as to prevent painstakingly prepared and expensively painted fiberglass parts crashing in to each other and c) afford the best access to the engine bay. I'd like this to hinge at the front and open at the rear if possible. But before I finalize any of this, I need to get the bodywork on the car so I can measure the dimensions and angles and adjust the model accordingly.

I am confident (delusionally so?) of my ability to make these hinges if only I can get the details figured out. I anticipate 3d printing test parts - not strong enough to actually hold up the bonnet lid; just to demonstrate that the hinges can go through their motions without having to pass through any solid objects and that hood moves as desired. Then order the parts laser cut by Send-Cut-Send. I envision the hinge brackets with large perforated flats that I can glass into the bodywork and reinforce with 2-3 layers of kevlar fabric, thereby distributing the forces and hopefully preventing the bodywork cracking or breaking at the attachment points.

I plan to make hidden hinges for the doors and boot lid with similar construction, but I don't think they'll need this kind of complex linkage. 

So, "bodywork" includes:

• Fit the body to the chassis
• Fabricate door-sill lockboxes (I love how Roadrunner Racing did theirs)
• Make and install hinges for the doors, boot, and bonnet
• Install and wire the lights
• Fit headlight covers
• Ditto windscreen
• Install mirrors
• Complete boot interior
• Make something for fender liners / wheel wells
• Prep work (as started above on the one door)
• Paint
• Buff and polish

Wow. Each of those subdivides into its own list. 
I will try not to think too much about this and just take it one bite at a time.