Team Stampie $50 Q45 Challenge build

That is very cool. I wonder if any professional endurance race teams have a power race seat?

More than just power seat, what we learned with Infiniti #2 was that the power seat memory function was great as a two driver car.

We started the day with a broke down race car and ended with something that I'd run in the Challenge. We began with removing the lexan windshield and rear window to paint the edges. They came out nice. In the process we dropped a washer on the same place Chris lost his screwdriver bit and found the bit. He was a little happy about that. We then put in the rear diff we picked up last night. No pictures of that as the official picture taker had to work today. Would have been funny as we had three fat guys all under there at once trying to put it in. Not a lot of personal space. So then onto the interior. We stripped the carpet and so other little stuff. We then mounted the seat. No memory or switch control as we somehow lost the computer that ran them but we rednecked the wiring so that everything can be adjusted. At this point we need to button up some little things and paint it.

In reply to Stampie:

Does the navigation and radio still work?!?

No ... because race car.

The former owner seems like he would have just scotch-taped a wrinkled Playboy centrefold over the factory nav screen anyway.

I forgot to add that last night we named the car. Her name is Ish. As in I'll be over at 5ish. We use it a lot to mean close but not exact. We were looking at it last night and said well it's done ... Ish. And then her name was given to her.

Getting closer to paint.

Tonight because of the start of the school week we decided to tackle an easy project. We started conditioning our tires for the race. When I was a young buck an old timer told me that he always wrapped his race tires in Saran Wrap a few days before the race. This makes them real soft for extra grip and can even restore race tires that have gone hard. So we wrapped them all up. OK now that Ovid and Flem have run down to their local Dollar store to buy the whole stock of Saran Wrap I can tell you that we were painting the wheels. I decided to see how the wrap would work as a masking agent. Once we learned a few tricks it went very well. First the wheels we started out with. All masked up and sanded with 220 paper. Wiped them down with some mineral spirits and got to painting.

Is that gold paint!?

You could get another one to daily drive

Next time you have to paint w/ tires on... Index cards

Deflate tires.
Add index cards
Add air back in to hold cards.

JohnRW1621 wrote: Is that gold paint!?

If it is I'm glad I took the Gold Plasti Dip off my wheels that I tried.

In reply to JohnRW1621:

I've done the index card and it doesn't work as well as the wrap. Plus I wanted to mask off the inner wheel for some contrast.

In reply to Andy Neuman:

You can never get close to the style I'm going to pull off.

In reply to Stampie:

Can't wait to see it in all of its glory.

Found this picture from when it was in my basement awaiting its fate. I'm glad it found a home where it will be loved.

I'm curious if this Saran Wrap trick actually works.

edit: D'oh. At least I didn't tell too many people.

So let's see. Today was odds and ends day. We put washers on the seat bolts that didn't come with them, zip tied some loose wiring that was pulling on my long hair, did our battery tie down, added extra tabs for the windshield, and caught the car on fire. Lesson learned was don't let welding sparks land on foam. Just a quick Fire! Fire! and a jump inside to blow it out and all was saved. Our battery tie down was a piece of metal that just so happened to have two right sized holes in the right locations. It was in the trunk with a bunch of other stripped out stuff that I couldn't fit in the trash bin this morning. So tomorrow is paint car day. I'm off because Asa has a no school day so no rush. Not like I don't have four days until they judge it.

If you are painting it today, it will still have that "new paint" smell at the concourse.

That should mask the old musky smell it currently has.

Got the first coat done and I'm liking it. Then it started raining so 2nd coat delayed. The joys of working outside.

Gotta love florida. "When's it gonna rain?" "Yes "

A neighbor may or may not have requested a burn out and a serpentine belt may have been destroyed in said burn out. New belt installed.

Budget done. Needs second coat of paint, fire extinguisher mounted, cleaned up, photo album done, and receipts copied. At this point I'm about a day ahead of last year so I'm doing real well.

Well that sucked. Anyway came to $663.78.

In reply to Stampie:

That's a LOT of Awesome, for not a lot of $$$.

Good luck with the "Q"-ish