What's in the workshop today Loony?

[Manky Monkey]

If you've been following my Ford Pop truck thread in Hot Rod Tech, you'll know that I'm renting a corner of my mate Lunatic's workshop to build it in & spend a couple of hours every day there.
Loony's a body repair/respray guy, working from a converted barn on a farm just outside Basingstoke in Hampshire. Although the bulk of his work is modern hatchbacks, he's looking to branch out into more custom/race stuff & will prep & paint just about anything that doesn't move.
Rather than filling my own thread with pics of other projects, I thought I'd start a thread just for him & show you some of the stuff that comes through the door.

[Manky Monkey]

The latest job is this drag car body. It's a fibreglass copy of a 1930s model A Ford, but scaled down to form a single seater shell. These are used in the States for low budget circuit racing, kinda like our stock car racers.
This one's destined for a Rover V8 engined slingshot dragster. There's a trend at the moment for nostalgic 60s style dragsters with bodies like these. By bolting a simple shell over an existing slingshot racer, (one where the driver sits behind the rear axle), it's elligible for the Competition Altered race category, giving teams twice as many runs down the drag track. They also just look kinda funky.
The car belongs to Pedro, who lives on the Isle of Wight. My brother Brock's been doing some work on the chassis at his workshop in Wiltshire. From there, Scottie the hotrod haulier's taking it to his place in Berkshire to work on the engine. So he dropped the body off at Loony's workshop in Hampshire on the way past & will be back in a week to collect it, bolt it back on, then deliver the finished car to the docks for Pedro to collect. No pressure then.
There's a lightweight tubular frame inside, but the the fibreglass is still pretty wibbly wobbly, so Loony will use a shot of plasticiser in the paint to give it some flexibility.
Colour's going to be metallic British racing green.
In the foreground is Archie's part built XS650 Yamaha chop.

[Manky Monkey]

Of course, we were tempted to bung some spare wheels on it & go cruising, but that would be childish & unprofessional. 
Brum, bruuummmmm.

It's a real shame there's a bulkhead in it, cos it would've fitted perfectly over the top of Flap's Reliant trike in the background.

[Manky Monkey]

"Heavenly shades of night are falling, it's twilight time".
Evening at t' shop & the sun sets over Doug's split screen camper van.

[cunningplan]

it's elligible for the Competition Altered race category, giving teams twice as many runs down the drag track. They also just look kinda funky.

Come on now Mankey Its Competition "Coupe"  (Comp Altereds have the axle behind the driver like in Funny Cars )

[Manky Monkey]

Yeah, you can tell I'm a spectator & not a racer can't you. 

[Manky Monkey]

Another day, another bunch of muppets at the shop.
Archie, who owns the Yamaha chop, is also part of the local VW Golf scene. Lots of young lads on a mission to get their Golluffs as low n loud as possible. Seems there's not a lot you can do to customise a modern car -everything's so integrated now that removing one piece buggers up everything else. So paint, pipes & wheels are about all you can change.
The boys drove into the yard in a cacophony of scraping plastic, (they're now so low that the front bumpers are being worn away by constant ground contact). Not personally my thing, but hey, that's what customising's all about ain't it -being different. And mad.
Today's job was to remove the silencer boxes from Archie's mate's Golf to make it a straight-through system. Yeah, I know, but it's not my car. Several hours of work under the car produced a V Dub that sounded like -well, a car with a blowing exhaust. He went away happy, & loud, but might be back next week to fit a competition silencer.

[Manky Monkey]

Anyone remember Mr Flap?
The One They Call Flap used to be a Postie & we worked together at the Basingstoke depot. He rode with me on my trike to a couple of bike shows & decided he wanted a Reliant trike of his own, so we set to & built him The Flapster. He won several trophies with it & showed it at the Bath & West show a couple of times, plus it was featured in Back Street Heroes magazine. A lot of people have told us his is the trike that inspired them to build one -which is kinda cool ain't it.
After a few years of riding, Flappy Boy changed jobs, got involved in the Terratorial Army, (weekend, reserve soldiers), & gradually disappeared from sight. But now he's back. He's grown some tattoos & is all enthused to tackle the trike again, so it's a good job he hung onto it while he was away. He's decided to fit some rear mudguards & tidy up a few other odds & ends to get it back on the road. It wasn't originally designed to have guards, so finding suitable mounting points for them was a bit of a challenge, but they should look O.K.
His name's Darren by the way -"Flap" was his little girls' nickname for his canvas roofed Landrover.
Good to see you again matey.   

[Manky Monkey]

.

[hornet6]

In the last photo.....whats that leaning by the green door behind the xs chop ?

[Manky Monkey]

"What's that leaning by the green door?" -that's a song isn't it?
It's one of Dig Darren's, (different Darren, not Flap), collection of off road 3 wheelers. I'll get a photo for you tomorrow. It's a tiny little 1980s 50cc Honda of some sort, but Daz has fitted a 125cc "pit bike" engine. Does 60mph with 18 stone of Darren on board. Loony cut a chunk out the side of the fuel tank to clear the carb, then resprayed it Honda red & added repro Honda graphics. They're going to upgrade from rigid forks to telescopic ones then make up a twin exhaust system for it. Yes indeed, Daz is quite, quite mad. 

[Al]

that is a nice trike flaps i can see on the main page his write up for it but did he do build diary iv had a look but cant find it anyone help thanks
al

[bigdarren]

hay mr manky if ya gunna call me mad please get it right im barking msad woof woof !! lol 

[bigdarren]

right lets see if this works !!

[bigdarren]

yippi i got it right so here are 2 more.....