Okay, now for todays project. Since the car had to be moved over to the other side of the shop to allow a customer car in the working bay, I was concerned that the car would get scratched, dusty or some other nastiness so I decided that I needed to custom fit a car cover to the little car to protect it until I can get back to color sanding and buffing it. I think it turned out pretty good.

Upon final fitting and trimming they were bead blasted preparatory to painting.

 

They were then installed on the engine. You can see how they fit below.

Although This is all posted today, it actually took place over a weeks time. I had been searching for a needed part for my heating system on the Bianchina with absolutely no luck. About two weeks ago in the middle of the night I had a sudden flash of inspiration on how to fabricate this part. The following is a step by step photo record of what I did. The part I needed is a two piece elbow that connects the motor cooling shroud to the heat exchanger on the front exhaust pipe. I am told that this is only on cold climate cars and apparently very few were made thus the scarcity of this part. I went online and found a 3 inch ID copper elbow and a 6 x 12 inch sheet of copper as shown below.

The elbow was cut in half and sanded flat on a large disc sander, the sheet was cut on my bandsaw. I then silver soldered the half elbows to the copper sheet. When cool they were roughly trimmed to size.

Backed it out to clean the shop. Only took two days! Not perfect but I can live with it. I have a Corvair coming in tomorrow so the little car will be on the other side of the shop for a while. As soon as I can I am going to instal the engine to make more room in the shop. After that I will start color sanding to prepare for buffing and polishing. It looked so good in the morning sunshine I had to take a picture.
Be back soon, promise.

Ah rats! Wrong pictures. Here is todays.

Looks shinier now.

Big day today, got four coats of clear on it. Now color sand and buff and I can start putting it back together. BUT first I will disassemble the spray booth and clean up the area to bring in the next Corvair. Need to build up the building fund.

No pictures but I have been working on the car fixing paint flaws, trying to find the parts removed four years ago and ordering some supplies needed to install the engine after the clear coat is done.
(this week?) PLEASE!

First wash and inspection before the second coat of clear.

One step forward, two steps back. Sanding yet again, my favorite thing to do, NOT!

Well, here is something I haven't seen in a good while. My little girl is up on her own four wheels.
I can move her outside and sand some more now.

I finished up the front suspension and steering and started on the back, hope to finish tonight.

I have started installing the front suspension in order to push the car outside for more, what else?. sanding the runs off and scuffing the paint for the second coat of clear. The leaf spring was a real bear to install but I persevered and was successful.