It was Wednesday night about midnight. I had 9 hours before load in at COBO Hall for Autorama, and I had no taillights. Becuase of a series of untimely events, I got my car back 2 weeks later than I though I would. That meant that all I really had time to do was put the bumpers on and rig up some taillights before I had to skeedaddle. So what could I do for taillights? Desperation set in and I went with the only think I could think of: mouniting the lights in the bumperettes. I went to Murray's to look for something that I could adapt. I took the bumperette with me and found some clearance lights. like the ones on top of trucks, for a couple bucks each. But they only have one tiny bulb in them, so I grabbed some replacement taillight sockets and a coulple fancy LED replacement bulbs from the import/tuner isle and went back to the the bat cave. I grabbed one of the bumperettes and drew a rough pattern on it that I though the light would fit perfectly. Then I used a cutoff wheel and a carbide bit in a die grinder to hog it out. Then I used the carbide bit to get rid of the ridge around the perimiter of the clearance light, and stuck it in. It totally didn't fit. There was a huge gap at the bottom. #$%^!
Well, I knew I had 2 more bumperettes from the back of the car somewhere, so I dug around and found them. They were really crappy and one was mangled. So I did what I should have done in the first place and made a template out of bristol board and masking tape. First I put the light in the messed up bumperette and drew a reference line on the light with a sharpie so I was always sure to put it back just where I wanted it every time I fit it. Then I taped it in place in the messed up bumperette. I used the tried and true Cole Foster Dirty Finger Reference Mark system to get a line on the "cast" and cut out the hole.I cut and taped and made little fillers and taped some more until I had a paper-mache'-like cast of the bumperette with the hole in the right place. Next I taped it to another bumperette and used a sharpie to trace the outline of the hole and hogged it out. I was sure to leave the line intact so I would have 1/16 to 1/8 of an inch of metal left so I could fine tune the fit.
By now it's like 5 o'clock in the morning (I took these pics this afternoon folks). I have two matching bumperettes with holes in the right places. The hardware store will be open in a few hours and then I can get some hardware to mount the bumper bracket and bumpers. Meanwhile, I need to find a way to mount the lights in the bumperettes. I made a couple paper templates of what I though the mounts should look like and fished around in the scrap pile 'til I found a couple chunks of inner roof brace that were left over from the chop. I cut em up and bent em up and got them just where I wanted them. I drilled some holes and plug welded them to the bumperettes. Next, I ground the rivets off the L bracket that was on back of the clearance lights and made a hole in the plastic back to shove the replacement taillight socket into. About this time, Tim called me and told me where we were supposed to meet before we rolled in to COBO. "uh, guys... I ain't ready just yet..." So, to wrap this up, I welded the L brace to the taillight socket and stuck the socket in the clearance light and marked where to drill the holes for the L bracket to mount... actually, I did that BEFORE I welded the mounts into the bumperettes. Don't forget that, it's important. As you can see in one of the pictures, I had to drill a couple to get it right. Or maybe I din't. I don't know. By now I had gotten up in California, flown home, driven an hour to get my car at midnight from the windshield shop, left my truck and thrown my suitcase in the Heap and driven home in freezing rain and gone straight out to the garage. Whew! I had been up for a good long while. I made a third eye out of an old 30's taillight pod and rigged up a bracket in the rear window so no one would ass-pack me because the taillights are about 18" off the ground. Then I went to Autorama and had a blast! The End
oh yeah, P.S. I was about 5 hours late to set up, so when I got there it was all done and I didn't have to do squat! Perfect timing! Thanks guys!
That's cool. Not only good looking but in a hurry. O/T, how is Pistol Pete? I haven't heard anything for about a year--is the C gone?
Pistol Pete's doing great.He's been getting his checkups all along, and nothing new has shown up. He takes pretty good care of himself. He eats vitamins like we'd eat popcorn.
The Jalopy Journal
