EdwardB’s 35 Hot Rod Truck Build - Well Traveled

[edwardb]

Finally, another update. Since my last update, Erik Treves took his truck build from kit delivery to a running and rolling chassis. That’s crazy. For lots of reasons, don’t expect I'll ever be able to complete things at that pace. I have been working some when I’ve had the chance but nothing too significant to report. Between driving season and events with the Coupe, travel, couple weeks in Cleveland for planned surgery for my wife, it's been an usually busy summer and now fall. Will sneak in a couple updates today.

I had a page-long punch list of body related items to complete, which is now done. I will only say that deciding to do a truck with full fenders, running boards, hood, and engine side covers probably doubles or even triples the amount of body related work compared to what I’ve observed are the more common truck builds with open wheels, etc. I don’t regret my choice one bit. It’s how I envisioned the truck for me. But fair warning to other builders – it’s not just the sheer number of fiberglass parts to deal with but getting them to all fit together. I’m done. Can’t say it’s perfect. But as close as I’m going to get with how the parts fit. Enough said on that.

My last task before going to paint was to put undercoating on the fenders, running boards, and bed sides. I used UPOL Raptor, same as earlier on this build and on my Coupe build. Really like how that stuff goes down and how durable it is once cured. Highly recommended. Spent hours masking (the usual case when spraying…) and yesterday had a perfect day out on the driveway getting the pieces sprayed. Put a single coat on the bed sides. Only the part that’s below the SS panels but visible from underneath. Put three coats on the other pieces. Used up a 4-liter kit in the process. The directions are excellent so can’t add anything. I used the higher end Raptor adjustable gun (UPL-UP4880) which I highly recommend over the standard Schutz gun. My only caution is to follow the directions and clean the gun between each coat. Not necessarily like the final cleaning. But get the material out of the innards of the gun. The one hour wait time between coats is just enough for the material to start gelling and mess with how it flows the next time around. Ask me how I know about that. All done now and looks like this while curing for a couple days while the DD sits outside.



Next up I’m going to remove the dash and all the components. Then I’m ready for paint. I have a painter lined up so that’s a breakthrough. A buddy who used to paint cars in a former life is going to paint it for me. He did his own Challenge Roadster and it looks very nice. Plan is to start next month and should easily be complete and back together for the start of driving season next year. We’ve decided to leave the cab on the chassis, with that and the doors to be completed first. Then back to my place for re-assembly with the balance of pieces as they’re completed. Looking forward to getting this wrapped up. I think it’s going to be a fun ride. The first components of my next project are supposed to be shipping any time. So shouldn’t run out of things to do.