The Cal-look Lounge

I realise that the trend is to post pretty pics on Instagram, i do it myself and the days of long threads documenting projects is probably a thing of the past. However I did it for the 67 which is now about 11 years ago when i did that, and i think this would be a nice way to chronicle this project should Daniel ever want to read it. The 67 has evolved over many years and i fear that if i tinker anymore i will lose the vision i had for it when I built it, which was a Cal Looker with a bit of a punch that i could drive to shows in Europe and occasionally take down the strip. My lad who is now 9 is taking more interest in cars. (thankfully as he is train obsessed and has been for years) and in particular loved going to the Melbourne Drags near York. Now i could make the 67 more focused, but i took the decision to look for another project.

I've wanted a rag top for a number of years and at the start of 2023 took the decision to stop mucking about and take this seriously, The Hanz kindly looked in Europe for a suitable candidate but nothing came up, so i took the brave step (for my wallet) to ring everyones favourite purveyor of Gasser Garage Goodies, a phone calll, a return phone call 30 mins later. The oh shit moment of this looks like it's reality dependent on photos and few weeks messaging and waiting and we had a date arranged to pick it up. Given our locations in the UK, a half way spot was chosen and on Thursday 25th April the deal was done and the vehicle swapped hands.

So what had i bought? well I've the ex-Scott Bakken The One replica which is ex DKP i believe. It's a very solid base for what I have in mind, and just enough work to allow my son and I put our own spin on the car. It will not be returned to being a The One replica, but its heritage in terms of colour way will be retained, and we will put our own subtle twist on it.  I'm sure people will have their own views on what I should be doing with it, but please... this is a father and son project that I hope we have lots of fun doing and Daniel can learn how to hold a torch properly 😁

So anyway onto the pics.

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So now it is safely locked away in a secluded part of Northumberland the list has started, parts are arriving and after school monday 29th April. Daniel and i went up to see it, taking with us tools a jack (those low profile lightweight jacks, really aren't light weight) and some replacement front wheels to replace the ones fitted. There was nothing wrong with the wheels, just that they don't hold air, and as i have some  in stock...why not get Daniel to fit them. So that's what we did, Daniel gave the ragtop his approval and did ask whether we could fit Lamborghini seats, a careful "we'll think about it" meaning No, seemed to satisfy him. So new wheels fitted to the front a quick look over things and we were both smiling. We then moved onto carrying out some CAD (Card Board Aided) design to start on making a new dash plate. Once mocked up we could see that it needs to capture the line of the glove box opening and mirror that. Unfortunately Daniel ran out of enthusiasm so rather than sicken him it was wrap up time and head home with a Chippie tea. Mainly chosen to annoy the wife who had just come in from the gym. :)

And some pics:

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So that's the start of what i hope will be a fun adventure. The plan is that it is out in 2025, the engine is going to be the crux in that aspiration i think.  

Looks like an awesome start to a father son project!

Looking forward to this! Miss these threads  ::)

Rob,
I am glad you are posting on here.
We could use a good blog on here.

I don t have instagram, so much better to do on here.

Well the start is a good car, enjoy the time with your son.

Keep posting

Regards Eddie

Nice one Rob 8)   being an old fart i don't do instagram etc so appreciate when people take time to share there projects on forums still :)

Thanks for sharing looking forward to the thread! Good luck with the build.

great project and getting to do it with your son is amazing. You both will have many great memories from the build.
Larry

Thanks everyone, hopefully there should be some updates next weekend, assuming suppliers start getting me the parts i need.

What size turbo did you order? ;D :D

Great, we need more posts like this and I can relate to the fact your son wants to shim in with some "marvelous" ideas like the Lambo seats...  ;D  haha, I had a few of the same conversations with my boys in the garage.
Thx Rob, make the lounge great again!

Dem

Thanks for the comments guys, this should be fun, Richie i bought a dustbin size one, the spool is measured on a sundial  ;D

So how to get your son hooked on this,..well take him to the drags. So this weekend (11 May 2024) we went to Melbourne Raceway (York) to run the 1/8th mile. Much stress after work on friday, picking up the trailer, loading it, and early Saturday we as a family (even Sarah) headed to the drags. The sun was splitting the concrete, and everything looked to be set for a peachy day,....so obviously something went wrong. In this case i got that much wheel hop on my firsr run that i loosened an oil line, resulting in an exhibition of the size of my sump as i drained it down the end of the strip, back up the return road and back to the fire up lane before it dropped the rest of the system. At this point my wallet was puckering as I have only about 6 weeks to go until the 67 goest to EBI. So the 67 was loaded up after one run and we headed home after watching a few of the RYWB's, on getting home i found some oil, and the loose fitting, nipped that up, refilled and primed the system, did a little prayer and fired it up. It was all good and i breathed a sigh of relief.

If nothing else this has reinforced my decision to do this project. The 67 has too many good memories and emotional ties to screw it up. Anyway here's a couple of pics while I sort out what we did on Sunday.

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So onto Sunday (12th May) and I had to actually get a win on the board, (hold on i had actually beaten the golf i was paired with as I was leaking oil everywhere). But anyway I wanted to keep the momentum moving on the Ragtop, if i let things slip, then interest wanes, so whilst it's not healthy on the bank balance having small wins every week or so, keeps Daniels and my interest. There's a reason the 67 was originally done in 12 months, my utter inability to undertake long term projects.

So today i spent the morning cutting the carbon fibre for the dashboard, no pics as it's still a work in progress, then in the afternoon we headed to BossHogg's Speedshop off site location. Armed with a box of goodies, a boot full of tools and the piece of carbon to tweak to fit, Daniel and I put in a couple of hour. Ok so i put in a couple of hours, Daniel did one and then played on his Switch for the remainder, still that's one less hour of screen time.

So today the passenger door handle and radio aerial was put on by Daniel, and the steering column was bolted in place as it had been swinging in the breeze. The door handle striker unfortunately doesn't line up with the lock mech. handily i have a full set of reclaimed handles to pick up at EBI, so i can sort that later. However it gave Daniel a job today and he did well, not one scratch on the high speed finish.  He also mocked up the lucas indicators, they will need bolting in properly when the wiring loom is replaced :). So that's this weeks update, pics below:

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Cutting pieces of carbon fiber for the dash you say? I like where I think this is headed... Can't wait to see the end results!

Well you're in luck  ;D. So as the original dash had been removed to provide templates for The One rebuild, so I'm minus a dashboard, which opened up opportunities for a bit of artistic license, I thought about the original black plexi-glass, I even found a black plexi-glass with glitter in that i thought might give a cool '70s vibe, but in the end i went for carbon fibre. The gauges come from Autometer and annoyingly they all are the Black signature series apart from the Oil Pressure gauge which they don't do in that style, so i've got a slightly different bezel on that one. If i can find a busted 52mm gauge with the bezel i need i might try some surgery to swap them.

Now the key to keeping a 9yo involved is making sure you have things to readily bolt on, to keep the interest going. So to make sure we had something to do this weekend, i decided to make the dashboard afterwork. Now i still need to drill new fixing holes in the right hand side and perfect the corner radiuses, along with mounting the switches and lights, but it's 90% there and we have something to bolt up on Saturday morning. The final thing i need to sort out is the space on the far right, on the original The One this was an interior light as can be seen in the second pic, now i can either copy that and i don't think it'll look bad or come up with something else....remote shift light???

Anyway that's it for today.

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Rob, these are really good for finishing the edges on carbon sheet etc, removes the un-evenness of the fibers that are left when cutting it normally and leaves it nice and neat :)

https://www.easycomposites.co.uk/permagrit-small-sanding-block

Brilliant thanks Richie it was something I was looking to address and was wondering about a rubber finishing strip. But as I'm doing a carbon cover on the glove box as well I think it would look a bit naff on that.

Oooh, I like the idea of a remote shift light, keeps the spirit of the car alive while making it a bit more modern and unique which fits with the carbon dash concept. I can't wait to see it installed, it's gonna look great!

Very cool that you're reviving this car!

Thanks Stephen

Onto this weekends work. So on Monday i have made up the prototype panel (note the change in name more on this later) and had it almost complete apart from switch position and where i was going to put the warning light. So saturday morning (18th May 2024) Daniel and i headed out to get things fitted. Daniel ably assisted with the allen key as we bolted the dask plate in place, this allowed me to pick up a couple of missing bolt holes and sort out where the bolts on the right hand side were going to go. A bit of mucking around, including having to drop the steering column and remove the panel to drill the switch holes, we had the dash in place with gauges and switches fitted. Daniel even practiced his launches. though maybe a seat will help. (see pic below)

The first observation was.....the rev counter is not aligned to the steering column (see white line on the pic below to show correct position), so i'm going to have to re-make it as my OCD can't cope with that. It's no bad thing as some of the gel coat has chipped off the edges of the panel so this re-make will allow me to perfect the process and get a better product at the end.

The other simply bolt in place job that i was going to get Daniel to do was to fit the cruiser pedal....yeah that's not a bolt on job, but handily i have some talented friends who will get it sorted over the next few weeks when i lift the carpet. So not a big update, but some progress made. Excuse the finger prints over the panel it does look a lot better when clean. Next week i'll head up and make a new one and get it bolted in while the lad is at football.

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