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With the chassis and cage modifications complete, and the clock ticking on the build, the time had come for body fitment. The addition of the door bars creates the need to modify the inner door area for fitment around the bars. Additionally, the rear body section requires relief and modification to the section behind the seat which follows the radius of the rear wheel well.

Rick Anderson has been at the helm of the Competition Coupe build from the start, and his fabrication skills and creativity in designing and problem-solving the mods to the Coupe have been nothing less than amazing. Working closely alongside, and there every step of the way, has been "The Never-Ending" Coupe builder and forum master Hank Lopez, whose design and problem-solving skills have been key in our progress to date.

Forum guru and Coupe builders extraordinaire, Russ Thompson and our own Hank Lopez made the trip up to Heladsburg last weekend (and Hank came back and spent this weekend as well) to assist with fitment of the nose and the sculpting of the doors. I think any of us that have owned previous iterations of the Coupe bodies (black or gray) would agree that the "new" red bodies are a thing of beauty in comparison to the older bodies. The smoothness of the gelcoat and the overall better fitment make the new bodies so much nicer to work with. However, all of the improvement doesn't mean that the pieces just slip into place. In fact, in spite of the fact that we made virtually no modifications to the chassis in the nose area, when we went to fit the nose section, it still required sectioning out and modification in order to fair up correctly. The issue was that the nose section sat too tall on the "pontoons" by approximately 1/4" in the latch area. After considering all of the options (and praying to the fiberglas gods), it was decided the only answer was to section out a horizonal piece from the latch area and then re-fiberglass the section back into place above the lip.



As you can see in the photo above, the doors have also been fitted, and the door hinges and latches have been installed and adjusted to close fully and with ease. Fitting the door over and around the SIB's requres major relief of the inner door section to accommodate the door bars, however, when done accurately, we believe provides a very clean look.









Special BIG thanks to Russ Thompson, Hank Lopez, and Robert Walter for their skills, guidance and expertise in persuading the body into shape. We are very fortunate to have each of these build experts lend their many talents to our build!!