Remodeling The Cockpit

Well after looking at the back of the cockpit on this roadster and realizing that I am a big guy, I decided to do some remodeling and increase the length by about four inches , this way I will sit further back and gain more room inside and wind up with a much more comfortable ride.  So here I go to build a better ride.

You can see how and where I cut the back of the cockpit and then I moved it back about four inches and laid it on top of the remaining piece and bonded it together with some fiberglass bondo.  This is really great stuff!  Whoever came up with it should be in the hot rod hall of fame.  if there is such a thing. 

Next I cut a piece of 1 x 2 inch piece of poplar and glued( bondo) it to the top sides of the body and clamped it in place.  Actually the cut piece of the body is not fiberglassed in place yet , but I wanted to show how it was cut and “glued “ down.  So I got a little ahead of myself but now it is hopefully a little clearer.

Here is a closeup of the 1x2 in place and ready for the removed fiberglass piece to be bondoed in place both on the back and on the front.

After It has set up, I took some small pieces of fiberglass matt and tied the ends to the body.  I used three layers of 1 oz matt to do this.  Then I used fiberglass bondo to finish shaping the contour so that it would blend in and flow.

This picture shows how nice the whole process came together and flowed out.

When you look at the rough finished product, it flows nicely, looks good, and the benefits from the added four inches will make this two hour remodel worth the effort.  When I get to the actual finishing of the body, I will use ultra light bondo and this will smooth everything out and get it ready for primer.