Last night I sanded the main bumper down and shot everything with a coat of black semi-gloss.
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I’m totally doing this with whatever new car we wind up buying, and definitely with the Scout: How To Turn Your Car's Ashtray Into A Smartphone Dock.
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Last night’s progress: cleaned with Acetone, primered, and bondo’d. While I had everything out, I filled in the holes on the driver’s door, scuff-sanded the softtop hardware, and got as much ready for paint as possible.
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After Finn went to bed, I used the evening to wire wheel the rest of the bumper. This section went a little faster because I wasn’t dealing with as many compound curves, but there were still a few areas I couldn’t reach with the angle grinder. After taking off the rest of the high spots, cleaning it all up with the flap sander and wire wheeling flat areas, I covered all of the welds, angles, and unsanded sections with a liberal coat of POR-15 and let it sit overnight.
Tonight it’ll get a rubdown with some acetone and then a coat of etching primer; while that’s drying I’m going to mix some Bondo together to fill in pinholes and other imperfections.
While I had the POR-15 open I put a coat on worn sections of the soft top bows and hardware. Tonight I’ll scuff it with some sandpaper and get it ready for a coat of paint as well.
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I got a little time this afternoon to drill some holes and tap for screws, and the result is a side mirror that I can actually use:
It’s about freakin time. The whole setup is really set up for a more upright window pillar, so the final angle I wound up with pointed the mirror outboard and upwards. I wrapped the end in a rag and bent it with a pair of channel locks, and wound up with something useable. While I was at the hardware store I added one of those little rounded puck mirrors for blind spots.
Update: Here’s a shot from the driver’s seat.
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I’ll write a little more later. For now, a picture of the Scout with spare tire mounted, temporarily. I need to find some lug nuts.
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I got some good work done on the Scout this weekend–the license plate bracket is mounted and ready. Seatbelts should be in this week, and all I need is a pair of fine-thread 1/2 grade 8 bolts.
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I got a Facebook message from Mike in Colorado the other day, who said he’d found a local junkyard and scored a pile of Scout badges for his resto project. He asked me if I needed anything, and I told him I was looking for a set myself; Peer Pressure was clean-shaven when I got her (minus one IH badge on the driver’s fender). Lo and behold, look what appeared on my doorstep yesterday afternoon:
The real miracle is that ALL of them still have their mounting posts. Getting pot-metal badges off without breaking them is something akin to magic; he was able to keep them all intact. Now I must find a suitable gift to return the favor.
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I haven’t posted in a while, but here’s the latest update to the bumper saga. In short: it went very very well. I’m thrilled.
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In other news, the Hefeweizen is chilled, carbed, and pouring. It’s very good! So good, in fact, I may brew it again this summer. It’s a quick, easy recipe and very refreshing to drink. My neighbor also got my Co2 tank refilled for me, which is a relief. Unfortunately I lost about 200lbs of pressure before I realized one of my hose fittings was loose. I have a list of items to buy at the homebrew store this weekend to set up long keg leads from the cooler to the basement window and I’m going to mock up a wooden stand to place in the opening for people to pour at. I’ll post a sketch here when it’s ready.
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Last night I had Finn help me transfer a batch of American Wheat Ale from the primary fermenter into a secondary. She was awesome, and I couldn’t have asked for a better helper. I had her stand on her stool at the sink as I explained each piece of equipment, showed her how I wash and sanitize it, then put it all together and siphoned from the first tank into the second. Then we took a gravity reading and I showed her how to find the numbers (it’s going to be right around 4.1% ABV) before cleaning up all the parts and putting everything away. She was fascinated by the siphon, and I was able to hold her attention span all the way up until the end.
This batch was my first blowout. On the second day of fermentation it was at about 69° and foaming heavily; sometime between midnight and 7AM on the third morning the airlock blew off and I got foam down the sides. I was worried it had gotten infected, because the krauzen never really receded (it mainly dried on the upper portion of the fermenter) but a taste test last night proved my fears wrong. It starts out smooth and flavorful, like a heavier domestic but finishes brittle and sharp to my taste. I’m hoping a few weeks’ conditioning in the fermenter will smooth it out before I keg it.
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About a year ago I set up an eBay search for 6×9″ speaker covers for the Scout, and I’ve gotten notifications in my inbox since then. The backstory is that the speakers I got for Christmas didn’t come with covers, so they’ve been installed without any protection for a year. Having shoved three loads of very sharp and brittle brush into the back of the truck this last week, I decided I couldn’t put off purchasing something any longer, so I pulled the trigger on a pair of Alpine covers for $12 with free shipping (about $12 cheaper than the average listing). Here’s to hoping they’ll fit.
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Jen had the cable guy out the other day to check on our wiring, because after a few follow-up moves the set-top box wasn’t pulling a signal at all. He futzed around with it for a while and said something about the barrel connector in back; whatever the case it’s functional again, and that room is shaping up nicely.
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