Good to see you have your priorities straight Chuck. That Hammock view looks enticing, that's for sure.

David

 

It definitely was! We hiked about 6 miles that day and about 4 the next day. It's really hard to beat Michigan in the summer.

Back to the L88 hood...here's a few before work shots.




If you look closely you can see that the driver's side of the scoop was slightly shorter than the passenger's side.


I added 2 layers of fiberglass mat over the whole scoop. That really stiffened up the scoop. Before a light breeze would deflect the top surface of the scoop. Now it barely deflects when I push on it. I also used a piece of metal and a clamp to press the scoop on the driver's side to adjust the height while the new fiberglass cured. That plan worked perfectly and the scoop appears to be much more level now.







The scoop is much more level across the back now.


Tomorrow I will sand down the backside to remove any high spots and fix a couple of issues from today's round of fiberglass. The plan is to have the backside smooth and not look like hand laid fiberglass. I'm also on the lookout for a good deal on an L88 air box to bond onto the hood.

 

Keep going Chuck! Looks great! Am gonna have to reread your thread when I get to body work!

 

Haha, I'm the wrong person to look for inspiration from. You'll end up doing body work for 3 years lol.

Here's how the hood looks after a few rounds of VPA and sanding. I'm waiting on a straight line air sander to come in tomorrow to help sand the big flat surfaces.

 

Thats a lot of work you've done

 

Thanks DG! I go in spurts it seems. I really have squandered the time off from work during my furlough from work. I should have busted out all of this body work and painted the car by now lol.

I finally got around to fixing the passenger rear fender that had a prior poorly done repair. I repaired the fiberglass last night, trimmed it today, repaired the lower bonding strip today and got it bonded in. Still lots to do with fixing that section, but this makes me one step closer.

Lots of new fiberglass.


Fitting the new door lock pillar


The phone was dead, so no bonded in pictures tonight.

 

Making progress

Bonded in.


Beginning rounds of VPA work. Looks way better already.




And here was a before shot from awhile back.

 

Came across another old picture at mom's house yesterday.



Apparently this was the one and only time she attempted to drive the 68. She remembers dad having to yellt"give it more gas!" a lot. I'm assuming she stalled it quite a bit lol.

 

Haha, I'm the wrong person to look for inspiration from. You'll end up doing body work for 3 years lol.

IF I am doing body work for ONLY three years I will be jumping up and down!

Love the pic you found at your Mom's! Are you and the Mrs gonna have helmets like that or get your own matching? Good work on the door panels too!

 

You have done a lot work on your 68 and its looking great. It is a good thing to bring these early cars back to life. I love the back story on your car.

I bought a 68 from a young man back in 1980. It was totaled and the man was going to rebuild it. He had it for about three years and had only done a little work on it and put it up for sale. It was an original 427-390hp car per the build sheet on top of the fuel tank. He had installed a 350 short block and a 4 speed muncie transmission in it when I went to look at it.

I bought the car (probably a mistake) and totally fixed it and restored it. It took about 3 years and lots of $$$ to complete it. It was worth it and I am glad that I was able to get the job done. It was hard to find a lot of the 68 parts due to a lot of the one year only parts but, I managed to find everything I needed.


Before

Completed
Hang in there and you will get her done before you know it. Vincent

 

Figured I would check in here. As with most people, my 2020 was a bit crazy. Shortly after I went dark on the forum in August my time on furlough from my employer came to an end. Not in the way they kept assuring us though. I was laid off after 4 months on furlough. I did get a decent compensation package though, which was nice. I did take a multi day camping trip right before being laid off which was a nice end to my time off from work.

Thankfully I saw the writing on the wall shortly before the layoff and started hunting around. Luckily I landed a job at an industrial engineering firm that started the week after I was officially laid off making more money than I had been making. So all in all I came out pretty nicely after being in limbo for months. With the new job I travel a lot more though, so I found myself not touching the 68 very often this fall. But, the nice thing is I mostly work remotely at my house when I am not in the road for work.

Onto the car related stuff...As usual, my tiny 1 car garage has been trashed by my unorganized nature and lots of small house projects. I've started to get the garage cleaned back up so that I can get rolling again on the project. We'll see how I do with that soon.

Don't judge, here's my starting point...

 

It's good to hear you made like a cat landed on your feet!




PTSD......"That's my story and I'm sticking to it!"



Throw in a motorcycle...and THAT could be my work area.

 

I was just thinking that I hadn't seen progress reports from you in a while. I always enjoyed seeing your progress! You can't help any of the BS Covid delays and then the getting laid off. Good thing you were looking and that new job fell into your lap. Do what you have to do for your family and when you get back to posting we'll all be looking for them!

Take care,
OLE442

 

I'm around, I swear lol. I'm just now getting to work on the vette for this summer. Spring and early summer have been immensely busy. We have been doing quite a bit to our house, new roof, new siding, new porch overhang, and soon a new front door and storm door. It looks quite a bit nicer, but has kept my father in law and I busy.

I finally got the car cleaned off and out of the garage last weekend for some spirited country driving with a stop out to the local track the local vette club was racing at. When I got home I tightened all the lugnuts and one of them decided it was time to snap off. So I replaced the 40 year old steel wheel spacers with a nice new set of aluminum ones.

Tonight I swapped the L88 hood onto the car, drilled out the holes for the hood pins and installed new good hardware for the pins. I also started the fitting process for the FIA wiper door. It needs lots more work since the wipers hit, but that's a project for another day. I also need to track down a 69-71 hood support since this hood apparently doesn't use the support I have on the car already.

I'm planning on hitting a big car show tomorrow and may take the vette to the Gilmore vette show on Sunday, that's still up in the air due to the length of the drive there and back.

Onto the pics.

 

Hey Chuck - Glad to hear about the new job. ALso good to know I wan't the only one snoozing on their Vet project in 2020. I think Doorgunner is the only one that has made substantial progress! I am getting going again myself. Nothing flashy, but something. Stay at it and don't give up. What you DO get done is quality!

 

I had hood pins on my '68 Camaro vert....kick me hard for selling it to my brother.







This pic is the closet I could find the color on the internet...yep, it was a modified 4-speed 307 cu. wimp and had the chrome hood stacks rather than the high rise hood in the pic below.
Short story....my wife and I were in our honeymoon in 1974. She put her shoes on the dash tapping then to a song.
I kindly told her to take her nfeet off the Virgin dash....she repiled "WE'RE MARRIED-THIS IS HALF MY CAR NOW!"

The Nam doorgunner in me took contol....I replied
"Your half is on the floorboard-now take your F***ing feet off my dash NOW!"

 

I bought a new Camaro coupe in April 1969 on leave before I got out of the Army in October. One year in Vietnan, and a year and a half in Germany. I had it three years and three months and sold it to buy my 68 Corvette coupe. Everyone said that I was crazy to buy a year older car.
I loved my Camaro, but there is no comparison between the Vette's handling and the Camaro's. My ex-wife would not let me keep it. I am sure that Cleveland salt ate it up eventually. Lou.

 

I figured I should swing by to check in with everyone. The last year has been a whirlwind and it seems to be finally slowing down a bit. I'm hoping to get some time soon to knock out some work on the toy.

First off, my wife and I welcomed our son to the world in February. Hard to believe he's already 6 months old and growing like a weed.


Second, we traded in our 1 car attached garage house on a postage stamp lot in the city for a 2 car attached garage and 1200 sq ft pole barn on an acre 2 miles outside of town in November. We ended up putting a ton of work into the house over the last 9 months. First was rebuilding the staircase to eliminate a trip hazard while the wife was pregnant. Next was new hardwood flooring upstairs, a remodeled master bath, and all new kitchen cabinets and granite counters. Still plenty to do on the house in the long run, but we are nicely settled in now. The sailboat did not stay with the house, but it could have if we had wanted it lol. I also started a new job in April that came with about a 50% pay bump, which is really going to help us fulfill some of our dreams and long term goals.




The next project is to clean up and organize the pole barn so I have a usable garage space to work on cars. I need to have a concrete slab poured in the back half and would really like to install garage doors on the front to make the shop more car friendly and of course install a lift. Pics are from when we first took possession of the house, before the pole barn became the dumping ground for most of my stuff.

 

Nice start in life, congratulations on your new son.
Enjoy them, because before you know it, he’ll be wanting the keys to the Corvette.