Hood alignment

With the new door installed and adjusted, I could get the hood fitting better.  When I got the car, the passenger front corner of the hood wouldn't even latch.  I finally got it to latch, but the edge of the hood was a full 3/4" higher than the fascia.

I couldn't figure out how to lower the hood any further, and the hinges were definitely not bent.  After a few hours of head scratching, I realized that that the hood wasn't high, the bumper was low.  Turns out that when the nose slid under what ever it slid under, the whole bumper assembly was shoved all the way down in it's slots.  I also discovered that the headlight on that side had been replaced.  I'm guessing the original was shattered in the accident.  After nearly 12 hours of  screwing around, I finally got the doors adjusted to the body, hood set to the doors, bumper set to the hood, and headlights fit to the openings.  All the gaps are good, but not great.  Since I need to take it apart to do bodywork anyway, I decided they were good enough for now.

The door

The driver's door on the Viper is a total loss.  Not only is the skin smashed, the inner structure and door jamb are all bent up too and it wouldn't latch properly.  It's not worth the effort to fix. The door panel is in great shape though.  Fortunately, one of the biggest Viper salvage yards in the world is right here in Wisconsin.  Don Scharf Automotive had a door shell and glass for me.  It was even the right color.  The missing hinge cover was in the trunk, and I reinstalled it too once the door was on.

There was another problem with the door, the inner and outer stanchion covers were broken when the door was smashed.

The outer looked fine from outside, but all three of the molded in attachment nuts were broken off, leaving nothing to hold the cover on.  Fortunately, the covers are made from ABS.  ABS is great because it's very easy to repair.  The best glue for ABS is...ABS.  ABS very readily melts in acetone.  What I did was melt some LEGOs(also ABS) in a jar of acetone, effectively making an ABS paste glue.  When the acetone evaporates out, you're left with solid ABS.  I went to the hardware store and got some stainless nuts the right size, ground the paint off the inner surface, then glued the nuts on with my ABS paste. 

The inner cover was cracked and had a piece broken off.  Somebody had tried to repair it once already, and didn't do a very good job so the broken piece didn't fit well.  I first used just acetone to melt the pieces back together.  Then I used some of my ABS paste as a filler to fill in and reinforce the cracks. 

When I get the time, I'll sand, fill, and repaint the cover, you'll never know it was fixed.  For now, it functions the way it should, and most people are so taken with the rest of the car they don't notice it's been repaired anyway.

The Dinged Up Dodge

I've been a Viper fan since I first saw one at the impressionable age of 12.  I liked them so much that when the Dodge dealer in Madison first got one in stock, my Dad took me to see it(and have my picture taken with it).  The RT/10 was something, but when the GTS came out a few years later, it instantly went to the top of the Dream car list.  Not only did it have killer looks, with 150 HP more than the Corvettes of the era, it had the performance to match.  Like most people, I'd always considered them out or reach for us mere mortals.

That all changed when my Dad sent me an e-bay link to a wrecked 1997 Viper GTS.  It was the best year, it was my favorite body style, and it was in my favorite color.  Best of all, because of the damage, it was in my price range.  The owner slid the nose under something, then spun the driver's side into a pole.  The body was rough, and the driver's door completely smashed.  Much of the door glass was laying in the Driver's seat.  It didn't look great, but the owner said it ran and drove fine.  I'm pretty good with bodywork, and spent years working with fiberglass in a kit car place, so it's crunched exterior didn't scare me.  Since it was across the country I couldn't inspect it first hand so it was a bit of a gamble. 

When it showed up, I wasn't really sure what to expect.  I knew it needed a door and window, and didn't really set my hopes to high.  I was pleasantly surprised when it showed up.  The body was rough, the interior was dirty, but the chassis and running gear looked absolutely phenomenal.  Everything that wasn't the body was in near perfect condition.  Here's how it looked when I first got it, and the most damaged areas of the body:

The big kick off!

To kick of this chronicle of the semi-random things I do, I thought I'd post one of my my proudest achievements.  It's the only project that I've ever actually dubbed "finished."  It's the build of my 1975 Kawasaki H1 Cafe Racer.  If I get to it, I'll post the whole build long.  For now, enjoy :)