I'm a little confused by this.

Is that the size of the kit?

Cutting holes into the existing quarter and front bumper seems awfully scary compared to just bolting on new quarters and front bumper.

I realize it will be a whole lot cheaper this way.

Still, I love the look and the idea.

Can't wait to see final product.

 

The least amount of area will be used for these. There's a few things that led me to go this route. Here's a few to help explain why:

The time it takes for a body shop to fit even 'good' aftermarket fitting fenders and bumpers will cost a lot of money for the customer. Even then they may not line up like OEM.

To make a front bumper in urethane would require a LOT of upfront costs to make the exact molds with fog light mounts and flanges and holes. Because the number of these kits sold will likely be limited that would mean the per-kit cost would be obscene to most guys.... my goal is to get as many of these out to as many happy Vette owners as possible at a price that they can easily afford while giving their C6 the look of a $80-100k new C7 to the general public.

A fiberglass bumper will never fit the same as a factory bumper.

The price to ship an entire bumper and two fenders would require freight shipping - which is slow and EXPENSIVE.

And one of my favorite parts of this kit is that it should allow the retrofit to be done while still leaving the edges of the factory panels alone. That means FACTORY FIT and only blending on the panels! Not blending into the hood and door panels like replacing them entirely would require on all but a few colors like black.

The fact that everything is going to fit back perfectly with no adjustment because it is OEM and it just came off your car to go back on as well as the savings in not blending and painting the hood and doors is going to save you $1-2k in paint & body labor and materials alone! Then the shipping will be a fraction of the cost. The final look will be much more factory!

I'm going to do an install video for customers as well to guide the install. Literally once the retro panels are put in place you can remove them and have them painted off the car! That saves taping off the entire car and risking overspray on everything if it's not done right.

Lastly the cost of this kit will be a fraction of the cost of the other available kit.... I'm betting 70-80% less!

My goal is always to make the best product my customers can be happy with and get the best bang for their buck. Same with my partitions and insulation kits and backup lights.

OH and I'll be doing a standard body conversion soon as well

Thanks guys! Sorry for the run-on sentences I'm in a rush to get things done today!

 

thanks for the info...it always is a perfect storm making and shipping the parts...first money to do them and then money that is made in order to recover making them ...then making a profit...and then worrying about weather the parts will be ok to ship to someone...or recovering your money from a shipper if they damage them in the process...not one part is exactly the same...I am a high performance designer...and these were my original questions to you in the beginning of the molding process...I have a lot of respect for you coming forward and explaining to the forum with your reasoning...you made a very wise choice!!

 

I love this idea! Would much rather keep my oem parts on my car than try to make some fiberglass junk try to fit. Keep up the great work Crazy Cowboy! Looking forward to purchasing this kit when available.

 

Great explanation.

Thanks.

Looking forward to more progress.

 

Subscribing...interested for my C6!

 

I commend you on a job truly well done.

I personally would prefer to leave my oem body panels intact just to retain the option of going back to the original C6 look. I would pay a premium for a one piece fiberglass front end l. I understand the costs would be much higher, but the option of going back to stock C6 is worth it.

 

Very interesting solution.

David

 

A friend of mine sent me the link to this car and I saw your video on you tube, car looks amazing!!!! just wondering how do these parts bond to the oem panels, and how long will they hold to the test of time being that that the rigid fiberglass is being molded to both the flexible fenders and bumper? I twould also agree that a full replacement fender and bumper would be ideal

 

interested on this too. im not too worried about the bond to the fender but to the bumper..?there are some great products out there that i have used in the past to bond FG to FG and to metal...but FG to Urethane? IDK

 

 

If you're willing to pay for it I have no problem doing a full bumper and fender. I don't know many Vette guys who will pay what that would cost. Put it this way, I've had my car done and left in the sun intentionally for weeks at a time over the last few months in the FL sun with no problems. I can say that even IF the vinyl ester resin did shrink at all (it won't) the price to do a repaint one time would not even come to 1/4 the price of doing full fenders and bumpers.

That being said please contact me if you have the need and means to do the entire bumper and fenders (which will then cost probably 5 times as much for paint and bodywork). Not being difficult I just am trying to explain my reasoning.

 

I was just curious to how the fiberglass parts bond to the plastic fenders and bumper that's all, I don't understand your response, it's seems that you assume that most of us so called "vette guys" can't afford full replacement parts and dont want to pay what its worth to a bodyshop do the job right if we choose to do this convetsion. I'm sorry for simply asking you a question regarding how these parts are installed it just seems like too much to cut factory parts to get this look, but I would do it if you had full replacement parts

 

epic! if you get a good narrow body kit done for reasonable price you can count me in, i need to replace my headlights anyway so this looks perfect. nice work!

 

any updates on this question??


Originally Posted by randy watson View Post

A friend of mine sent me the link to this car and I saw your video on you tube, car looks amazing!!!! just wondering how do these parts bond to the oem panels, and how long will they hold to the test of time being that that the rigid fiberglass is being molded to both the flexible fenders and bumper? I twould also agree that a full replacement fender and bumper would be ideal

interested on this too. im not too worried about the bond to the fender but to the bumper..?there are some great products out there that i have used in the past to bond FG to FG and to metal...but FG to Urethane? IDK

 

interested in seeing what this will look like on the base bumper and fender front ends..im thinking its going to look really good without the air dam in top of the z06 bumper

 

Is your narrow body kit going to be installed the same as your widebody kit? Are panels going to be full replacement fenders and bumper?

 

I have been watching this thread since it started and I would like to congratulate you on your innovation and skill. I think it looks awesome and it seems there are many more people that concur than nay sayers. I am sure you have a winner. I love it. Not in my budget but if I ever damaged my front end it would be a no brainer over putting i back stock.

 

For those with the big bucks can just buy some used or replacement bumper to cut up and paint and leave their originals in stock paint in garage or hanger to return to stock if need be. I understand that us regular folks will not tackle this ourselves and some will do conversion and never look back but I see that as a better option than using aftermarket fiberglass parts if you want to go that route ebay has z06 fender going about 500-700 a piece.

 

how is the conversion holding up crazy cowboy?