First thing that I needed to do was to jack up the front of the Vortex differently, I needed to get into the very front of the wheel wells so that I could finish glassing in the area directly behind the front bumper. Once repositioned I proceeded to remove all the bolts that held on the front subframes, it makes getting into this tight space a lot easier and besides I will also need to sandblast the front subframes, all suspension components and paint them. I used two layers of mat in this area.

Next I started making some removable panels that get positioned inside the front wheel wells. These panels will allow me easy access to the headlight mechanisms so they really needed to be removable. I cut some 1/4" plywood into the approximate size/shape and started custom fitting them into their positions, I also made them slightly oversized so that I could mount them in later on with some screws. They are basically just a flat panel with a small triangular back, pretty easy to make but it took a while to get the shape to conform to the inside of the fender, luckily the one for the opposite side was a mirror image, so I just traced it and cut it out. I still have to make a lip on the fender side but here is what they currently look like:

I got them glued and brad nailed together and once the glue is dry I will glass them up to help protect them.

My 120v compressors just would not handle spraying the new style of sprayable body filler, I would have had to 'gang' them together, so for me this is a better long term solution.

In addition I got a new HVLP spray gun kit that contained 3 spray guns, the price was quite reasonable at about $100 for the entire kit. They have stainless steel needle and nozzle sets, knob for spray pattern adjustment and includes 1.8mm primer spray gun, 1.4mm topcoat spray gun, 1.0mm touch-up spray gun, 1 liter aluminum cups, 125cc stainless steel cup, locking pressure regulator, metal paint gun stand, and a 5 piece cleaning kit which includes a spanner wrench, hex wrench, brush and filters. In addition I purchased a 2.0mm tip which will be used to spray Feather Fill and help to level out the body.

I really did not want to try to squeegee the entire body with bondo and do hours-and-hours of sanding so have been researching more modern methods to level out a body. The plan is that I will knock down all the really high spots using a grinder, then I can use an inline-sander to clean up a lot of the remaining medium-high spots, then finally I will use the spray gun to put on Feather Fill and block sand the body. I image that I will need to do this a couple of times until I build up the low spots enough to end up with a flat/level body.

So this is what I started with:

So today I was tasked with making something out of this Frankenstein, and again I sat down in front of the foam saying to myself that I am not a sculptor and just kinda started picking at it. Well once I got into it, it actually went ok and slowly but surely it started to take shape. I needed a bit of a curvature for the outside of the fender as initially the flat wood panel was pretty boring, I also knew that I wanted to cover the front of the tire as much as possible and tapering it down towards the front as I tied it into the bumper structure.

After about 2 hours of whittling away this is what I ended up with on the passenger side, it is a bit tough to see the profile though:

I was careful to 'wrap' the pieces carefully around into the inside of the fender well, in addition I aggressively squeegeed down the entire surface as well as the insides of the fender well.

Here are pictures of the finished product:

It is a bit tough to see the actual profiles but here is a view from the front of the vehicle:

Well I have to say that I am TOTALLY happy with the way that the new front end looks, it adds a much needed touch that was initially missing as well as adding a slight curvature to the previously flat fenders. It definitely helps round out the front end and added some styling that initially just was not there.

I removed about 1/4" from the cut area and put the canopy back onto the vehicle. Next I cut two sticks that would push up on the center of this area and applied some heat, I would guess about 250 degrees or so. Then I hung some weight onto the side to help put some pressure against the bow while supporting the far end so not too much pressure was applied, and left it overnight. It looks a bit crude but appears to work well.

In order to glass in the support 'wings' on the rear canopy with it mounted on the vehicle I have to remove the swing arm and engine subframe, so I removed the canopy to allow easier access into the engine area and removed all of the mounting bolts. I did get the subframe loose but not completely out yet, a job for another night.

I did however decide to use externally mounted hinges though as the semi-concealed hinges that I had are just too much a hastle for removing the rear canopy. Shep already went through some problems with bent hinges on his vehicle and switched to using 1999 Ford Explorer hatch hinges. Shep modified them so that external screws can be used instead of the studs. I will be using them as well but with one exception of using 2 screws on the passenger compartment instead of one.

After work last night I finished removing all steel components and disassembling them in preparation for sand blasting and painting during this coming weekend. Once the parts are sand blasted and painted any writing on them would not be visible, so I used some stamps to identify the parts, associations and locations on the vehicle so that I could re-assemble them back to their original positions.

They are nice and clean and you certainly do not want to handle them with your bare hands as any body oils will get onto the surface and spoil the paint adhesion. Immediately out of the sand blasting cabinet they are handled with plastic gloves and then primed. Once the primer has dried they are treated with a coat or two of finish paint. For all of these components I opted to use Krylon anti-rust primer and finish gloss black paint. I did not want to bother using the spray gun and feel that most of the success in finishing parts is cleaning them (aka sand blasting or grinding) keeping them clean (free from oil) and immediately primering them, and once dry putting on a finish coat. The fact that it comes from an aerosol can or spray gun is immaterial.

The better primers today are ones that have a sandable finish, so you put on a thin coat and hit it with a sanding block to see where the high and low points are, then more bondo in the low areas, more sanding, etc. I think that you see the point. This is pretty typical of finishing out a body, however after an entire day of just this small area am happy that I will be leveling out the body using some sprayable body filler as it will help greatly as squeeging an even coat with no ridges or gauges is difficult, and the sprayable filler is self-leveling..

I am not happy enough with the area and will put in some more work to get it looking better, I want it to look nice as it is the first thing that is seen once the rear canopy is opened. I also need to remount the rear canopy so that I can put in the locator pins/buttons prior to finish painting.

Here is dimensional drawing of the spacer:

Here is a picture of the finished spacer:

And with it temporarily on the rear axle:

The rest of the day was spent cleaning out the new garage bay so that I could move the Vortex from the pole barn into it's new home for finishing the project. I needed to be able to use the new compressor that I recently installed as from here out with the body finishing I need the additional output of the new compressor for tasks like the inline-sander as well as spraying the body filler.

Quite a few hours were spent on moving the Vortex as I did not have the front or rear suspension on the vehicle (being painted) and did not want to put back on the vehicle until finished. So I used the dolly that I originally used for moving the bare chassis around almost 1-1/2 years ago. Well it turnout to be quite the fiasco loading this onto the trailer and then subsiquently unloading it, did I forget to mention that the heat was into the high 80's?

I decided to modify the dolly slightly by adding a couple of horizontal boards so that I could put on some concrete half blocks and then short lengths of 2x4's to cushion the bottom of the vehicle. This added height puts the underside of the Vortex about 20" from the concrete floor and makes it a comfortable working height. It is interesting to note that a majority of the weight of the chassis is forward of the passenger compartment, this should be a good thing as I have always heard that the center of gravity on a three wheeler should be as forward as possible to maintain good stability.

Todd is also working on the engine modification for Dustin and putting an external pulley onto the engine so that Dustin can drive an alternator and air compressor.

Once I got back home I started to tear down the front brake calipers and realized that they were in such bad shape that I could not use them, so I started looking around on the internet for rebuilt/new Triumph Spitfire calipers. Well after a long search I finally found a great source for American/British/Japanese calipers Apple Hydraulics in NY state. They either sell them outright or will rebuild your existing ones. They had both the early and late model Spitfire calipers and are sending me out a pair of the late model calipers. It seems that they are pretty much interchangable, the early model used 2 bolts to hold the calipers together, while the late model uses 4 and were recommended by Apple.

Spent part of the day re-plumbing the compressor, Paul Schreiner advised me to mount the air filters (2 of them are best) at the lowest point so that water could naturally flow into them and replace the hard pipe coming out of the compressor valve with a flexible high pressure hose. The flexible hose will take the abuse of vibration from the compressor better and ensure that the regulator also does not get all shook up as well.

More sandblasting and painting of components, pretty much all that is left to do is the engine subframe.

I used some more bondo and did some more work in the area of the engine compartment, it is now pretty much ready for finishing.

Once the hinges were in place we put the rear canopy on and attached the hinges to them. We then used a binder strap to pull the sides down into position and I glassed in the triangular inside supports using two layers of mat and two layers of cloth tape.

Next I shaped up some foam to create a form so that I could start making the feet. These two feet will support the weight of the canopy onto the chassis pontoons. Initially I put three layers of cloth tape to create the shape and later on I will have to add additional layers to strengthen them. After words I realized that I forgot to space them back so that I could put in the latches at the rearmost part of the pontoon, so will have to modify them.

I moved my attention to the headlight areas, the mount for the headlight mechanisms placed them too high and I have to lower them by about 1/4" so the first task was to remove the mechanisms. Well it seemed that I had initially put some long bolts in to hold them in place and I had to use a forstner bit to remove a couple of small openings in the body so that the bolts could come out - will fix later on.

First thing that I did was to cut back the canopy "feet" that I previously made by 4" so that the side latches could be installed. Next I made up some mounting plates similar in the past using some 20gauge steel, drilling it full of holes and welding in some 1/4" bolts at the proper spacing. Next I used three layers of matt to backup the plate and put four layers of matt on the surface and compressed it using a piece of wood covered in plastic. Here is a picture of the mounting plate glassed in and one of the side latches mounted:

LATE UPDATE: the latches can not be installed parallel see update here!

Next I sandblasted the base of the locator pin mounting plate to remove the paint, and using the same layup as the latches installed the plates at the proper position on each side. Once the resin went off I cleaned up around the plate and transferred the hole location onto the bulkhead. It is important at this point that the canopy is positioned EXACTLY where you want it prior to drilling the hole for the buttons!

The button diameter is 1" that protrudes through the bulkhead so I used a 1-1/4" forstner bit to drill through the bulkhead, the reason is that I wanted to fiberglass the inside area and needed some extra room for glass mat. I temporarily installed the button plates and drilled the screw holes and then removed the plates. Next I wetted up a bunch of mat and stuffed it into the hole, reinstalled the plate, screwed it into place and closed the canopy. This will make a hole exactly the size of the button and seal up the area, once the resin went off I removed everything and cleaned up the buttons and plates, the series is shown below.

So I went to my local PPG (Pittsburg Paint) shop that I have been buying all my painting supplies from to purchase some (hopefully) cheap paint. I did not want to practice with Acrylic Urethane paint as I did not want to mess with spraying a clear top coat, so instead wanted to get some Acrylic Enamel.