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Monday, September 2, 2013

Work In Progress; Not on the Table: Battle Damaged

 So, something a little different for Work In Progress.  I got back from the Grand Prix in the vintage kart, which was a heck of a lot of fun to do.  So I thought I would begin fixing my oval kart.  This is the remains of my oval racing kart from this past season.  The oval got a bit rough on it.

Below is the busted up right side, from my last race of the season on the asphalt oval.  I took a really hard hit in the rear when someone decided to dump me in a heat race and then got clobbered in the side while sitting backwards in the turn.
So WIP has become fiberglass repair and metal straightening.

The rear bumper and number plate are bent up pretty good also.
Left side wheel well is badly busted.
 The hit on the right side was so hard it bent my nerf bar and the steel tubes that they are set in.  Frame rails appear to be somewhat okay.  That blue tube below used to be perpendicular, front tube is just as bad.
 The hit also broke my seat.
 Side panel was broke in couple of places.

This aluminum plate use to be flat under the nose of my kart.
Top of the side panel.
Close up of the left side of the nose.
I spent a few hours removing all of the body work and began the dusty process of grinding away some of the damage to prep the body work for some fiberglass.  I then began the sticky itchy process of fiberglass and resin application.   
 
We also did some redneck bending and straightened out the supports and nerf bar to a reusable state.
 
So that was it for the day.  Thankfully my next couple of races are in the old vintage kart and this one won't likely see a track until February next year.  In a couple weeks, I'll sand it down, fill the imperfections and repaint and decal the body work.

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4 comments:

  1. DeanMSeptember 11, 2013 at 5:48 PM

    Ouch - looks like it went into battle. Hope you can repair it.

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  2. PsychosisPCSeptember 11, 2013 at 6:43 PM

    So far so good. The last couple of races were certainly a fight and I came out on the short end of it. Fiberglass work on this is like working on a large model. I should be able to fix pretty much all of the glass work. The bent steel is as straight as its going to get and should be fine. I'll likely have some WIP pictures in a few weeks.

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  3. DeanMSeptember 12, 2013 at 1:06 PM

    Growing up in Hawaii, I used to patch dings and broken skegs (fins) sometimes. I just remember that the fiberglass particles on skin would be crazy itchy. Best, Dean

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  4. PsychosisPCSeptember 12, 2013 at 6:12 PM

    Oh yea. My hands itched for 2-3 days after the initial glass work. Now that I have the cracks reinforced I'll grind the exterior smoother. Then probably block them, then switch to Bondo body filler to fill and smooth out further.

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