April Build update

April Already i don't think I'm going to be finished by the summer. LOL

 Now that the body is on the chassis and all glued and bolted down its time to get on with fitting out the car i am starting with the outside getting all the doors fitted bonnet boot side vents and so on, this is so that all the holes can be cut in the fibre glass,  then as I'm going along i can put the aluminium paneling over the top to create the look I'm wanting, although i will be concentrating with the out side I'm going to be lining out the engine bay the boot and the gear box tunnel as part of this stage.

 Below is a picture of the two side vents i have bought they are a recreation of an original set of vents made/sold by Europa spares i decided that i didn't like the dax option so i went for the more original look.

Cobra side vents

Vent opening

As you can see from the picture above dax have very nicely shaped an opening for you to fit a stainless item straight into but as i have already said i decided i liked a more original look.

To be able to fit the new vents I had to cut out the return from the fibre glass and then add some new fibre glass to make the hole 2/3mm smaller.

  This was made even harder by the two sides of the body not being equal inside the engine bay so on one side i have had to cut out some of the wheel arch and on the passenger side i have had to cut away some of the foot well so a few repairs will have to be done the strengthen the body back up before the IVA Test.

The next stage was to use some filler to fill in the gaps both on the inside and out that the fibreglass doesn't get perfectly smooth, at this stage it is worth noting that i needed to sand both inside the body as well as the out side,the aim is to get a very thin area for the vent to sit in side of the body, because I'm trying to get an original look it was important to remember that the real cobras vent were fitted in much the same way but they were up against the inside of an aluminium panel not a fibre glass one it is there for impossible to get the fibre glass as thin as the aluminium would have been but you can get a reasonable finish if you take your time.

 using a template to mark out where the vent will fit and of course the size the hole need to be taken out to leaving just enough so the vent sat just nice and flush with the inside edge.

Finished hole ready for paint

All primed up ready for the vent.

 Vents are finally ready to be fitted they will eventually be held in place by the panelling in side the engine bay, as I'm sure you will agree i think they were worth all the hard work they look awesome and when they are painted i think they will look even better.