Page 59, beginning

Page 61, last para

    Where now for an answer to an apparently unanswerable question? Other than back to oneself, nowhere really – there was neither refuge nor escape from the predicament in which we now found ourselves. 
    The inability during the break to get the engine and transmission to fit within the confines of the altered structure could have been a death-knell to the project. At this point, as the one who had been responsible for the final checks, I had to assume that I had overlooked something. Alternatively, Jack, Bruce and I together had made some obscure joint mistake. Perhaps ‘harebrained’, ‘conceived in childhood’, those early reactions of my friends, to say nothing of the warnings of that Ferrari-cum-Corvette debacle, had been right all along. That said, the prospect of scrapping the project during this less expensive, early stage had always been an accepted possibility.
    On reflection, possibly not enough is made of all this in ‘Sidetracked’: a few days with that weight on one’s mind, especially over an apparently joyous Christmas to New Year holiday break, is a very long time indeed.

Page 65, para 3

    When taking account of forming and attaching an outer body to such an unusual structure, every aspect had to be thought through, both individually and jointly with others, then checked three-dimensionally. We had to remember that we were trying to make a fully operational and repairable car: neither we, nor the coachbuilders, nor anyone else could simply bolt or weld something wherever they pleased, and certainly not without due thought given to adjacent components.
    We therefore spent many an hour mentally juggling ideas while trying to envisage a full-flowing body attached to the basic metal structure that we were creating. We therefore were constantly checking the fiddliest of detail in relation to each body fixing: where and what alteration or addition and in what form would be needed before going to the coachbuilders, and what else would the coachbuilders need when eventually applying their craft.
    The selected coachbuilders only made one visit to the barn. During this, Bill and I answered their many questions as to where essential components were sited, those that might conflict with the bodywork, and where the aluminium or its supporting framework could or could not be fitted. Similarly, they answered our equally numerous questions about the finer detail of how to finish each bit off in preparation for their own work.
    We agreed, slightly against our better judgement, to their suggestion of using a hand-shaped wooden framework – rather than a tubular metal framework – bolted to the structure to support the aluminium panelling. Having then discussed timing and cost, to which we received a very similar estimate to the original ‘guestimates’, we settled on early July to hand over our ‘bodiless’ car to be ‘bodied’.
    No sooner had they left than the ‘exercising of the little grey cells’ continued a pace. Certainly such mental juggling and brainstorming was a great challenge, but not something I would relish on a regular basis – and many a pitfall was only narrowly avoided.

Page 65, para 5

    Bill spent hour upon hour cutting, grinding and shaping the individual members of the space-frame. After which, he tack-welded each piece into place and then – when I appeared later each afternoon – we both checked their positions against the plans. For accurate referencing, we used bars running forward welded to each of the sills together with a forward-pointing wire ‘V’ attached to two known reference points on top of the bulkhead, one on each side. Once the framework was complete, and we were satisfied that all was within Des’s two millimetre tolerance, we asked the indomitable Sandy to send along one of his expert welders to ‘solidify’ it all.
    That was an eye-opener: in order to keep distortion to a minimum, Sandy’s expert had to wander back and forth from one side to the other, welding a bit here and a bit there, so that at no time did any one part built up too much heat. To complicate matters, half the joints were either barely accessible, or had to be welded from underneath. In the end, an expected morning’s work ended up taking all day.
    When he had left, Bill and I hung the engine back in place – just to be sure it fitted. It did not. During that disastrous Christmas to New Year break, we had omitted to carry out a final check with the exhaust manifolds fitted. The two inner legs of the space-frame therefore had to be cut and altered and, as explained in ‘Sidetracked’, it was then that the ‘3mm’ problem cropped up.
     With the space-frame eventually completed, Bill got stuck into the half-chassis. He removed the forward protrusions, to which the front bumper had been attached, added the necessary strengtheners to the rear chassis legs and finally made up and fitted the new engine cross-member. He then repositioned the forward pair of mounting points on the half-chassis and created mating brackets on the space-frame both for those and the centre mounts.
    To finish the exercise in home-grown structural dynamics, Bill – with Sandy’s and my unswerving help – made up our specially-designed A-frame to support the rear of the transmission. When done, we checked that the seventh chassis mount – situated in the top of the driveline tunnel over the front universal joint – worked exactly as intended. Yes and no: but after some modifications to the modifications, we discovered that our little brain-wave was not such a bad one after all.

Page 66, para 6

    Surprisingly, one of the most time-consuming alterations were the seat mounts. Neither seat would fit properly in its new position unless cantilevered backwards on its running gear. This not only meant extra brackets, but also extra reinforcing and heavier mountings – and all on an uneven pressed out monocoque floor. Using cardboard templates and/or bent bits of sheet metal to establish angles, one of us would drop in on the manager of the sheet-metal works, who, thankfully, was both willing and able to comply with our requests on an almost daily basis.
    We never queried the amounts charged – with good reason: they bore little relation to the true value of such a dedicated service. Moreover, it soon became apparent that none of their management time, of which much was expended, was being charged or accounted for at all.
    Later, interestingly, we were informed that members of the staff would often compete for the various challenges we set them, it being considered a welcome break from the monotony of modern high-volume mass-production. 

Page 66, last para

    In order to achieve the best possible result with the sandblasting and repainting, we contracted an industrial de-scaling company. I remember saying to their manager at his suggestion that the power of their commercial equipment could damage the thin metal on modern cars: “There’s no thin metal on this car, I can assure you.” I crossed my fingers and hoped!
    They arrived and put their mobile compressor and blasting gear on the concrete slab outside the barn and set up the spray booth in the barn itself. Complete with their space-like helmets, two of them set about sandblasting the main structure, one on the nozzle and the other feeding sand into the hopper adjoining the compressor. At times, the power of the compressor, with its hose and nozzle nearly two inches in diameter, almost knocked the operator off his feet, leaving him leaning forward as though struggling in some violent wind.
    Once the main structure was done, they followed up with the half-chassis, the individual pieces of the front suspension, the newly constructed transmission support A-frame, and the rear axle and springs. When it came to the smaller pieces, the innumerable bolts, brackets and the like, wired onto bars supported on axle-stands, they were blown almost horizontal and the operator had a near impossible time directing the sand at each piece and on all sides.
    Two others of their team toiled away in the barn covering the newly blasted pieces with several coats of Finnegan’s Smoothrite paint (something the vintage car fraternity seem to swear by) while the rest of us manhandled the main structure back into the barn to await its turn.
    As the work continued through the day, then into the evening, I had to marvel at their stamina. When finally they had finished – near nine o’clock – they had at last transformed our multicoloured crude creation into a shining one-tone black hulk. 
    During the final stage of the painting, we had  left the structure balanced on its side, stabilised simply by a couple of wooden slats. Very conveniently, in this position Bill was able to attach the new underside brake and fuel pipes in a more leisurely manner – sitting on one of those forever-at-hand trusty deck chairs.

Page 70, para 2

     Apart from the work on the doors, there was still much to be done before the deadline agreed with the coachbuilders. To make things worse, we had decided to fit the original motorbike-like front mudguards into each side of the space-frame. Whether or not this hugely time-consuming operation was warranted, we reasoned that, if the original rear mudguards – an essential part of the strength of the monocoque – were acting as a stone protection for the outer aluminium wings at the back, it was only logical to do the same at the front.
    After that, the radiator support frame, which fitted directly inside the stainless steel radiator cowl, had to be made up, and the cowl and support frame properly mounted. Secured rigidly onto the space-frame below, they needed some form of rigid support at their top. To achieve this, the Seville’s original wing stabilising struts were altered and used to link each side of the cowl to rigid anchor points on the top of the bulkhead, those that had originally held the front wings. An additional strut, running from the left of the cowl to a centre anchor point on the bulkhead, would act as the third side of a triangle of forces, thereby rendering the top of the cowl as rigid as the bulkhead itself. However, to create this central rigid anchor point necessitated welding a set of fan-like stress-bars into the top of the narrowed bulkhead, a most inaccessible of places and one which would be impossible to get at once the aluminium panelling was fitted. In fact, if this hugely fiddly and boring undertaking was not done satisfactorily, the radiator cowl would undoubtedly, forever and a day, be doing a jaunty sideways jig at each and every bump or wallow – hardly praiseworthy for a bunch of enthusiastic amateur engineers who were intent on impressing the outside world.
    Brackets for all those components that had been deprived of their original fixings on the wings now had to be fitted both to the stabilising struts and the support frame, while account also had to be taken of the need for the struts to support all the wiring and hoses running fore and aft. 
    Other necessary jobs included making, fitting and testing the extended steering shaft, having the prop-shaft shortened and re-balanced, arranging for Jack to fabricate the special hollow bolts and angled washers for the headlamp bar and have them, together with the headlamp bracketry, correctly positioned and welded onto the heavy-gauge pre-bent stainless tube – conveniently provided by the same local company who were eventually to help out with the window surrounds.
    Finally, apart from those dratted windscreen wipers (the nightmarish scenario of which is amply described in ‘Sidetracked’) the brackets for the alternator and air-conditioner compressor had to be altered to fit within the new narrower-fronted bonnet. To accommodate this, the cruise control unit at the front of the engine had to be carefully and accurately repositioned at the back instead, which itself necessitated alterations to the accelerator cable linkage. All this was just added complication when we were fast running out of time.
    And so it went on – and on.

Page 70, last para

    The stainless steel window-surrounds, which protruded upwards from within the doors to hold and guide the glass, caused more than a little concern. These landed squarely on the manager of the sheet-metal works; he who had claimed that, “no fabrication job would be too complicated.” As was so often the case, the task turned out to be yet another unexpected and unwanted mini-challenge.
    In order to create the smooth flowing curves as drawn on our plans – and from these we would deviate for no one – the inverted U-channel needed to be bent against the uprights of the U. Try as he would every way possible, time and again the uprights simply buckled either inwards or outwards. In desperation, when he was on the verge of removing sections of the upright and welding in pre-cut curves – not a very satisfactory solution either in cost or looks – he contacted the company who had pre-bent the headlamp bar and who possessed a powerful roller-bender with a set of recessed rollers.
    Between the two of them, they first experimented with mild steel mock-ups. Cleverly, when convinced that success was within their grasp, they fitted a mild-steel square bar of the correct size inside the stainless steel U-channel and, while the U-channel was held within the right-size recess roller, bent the bar and channel as one. In order to give a smooth transition from curve to straight, the rolling was done a bit at a time and, on each occasion, stopped further away the straights. The recessed rollers prevented the uprights of the U from buckling outwards, and the bar inside prevented them from collapsing inwards. When complete, the mild-steel bar was simply prised free and relegated to scrap.
    Several years later, this bit of local inventiveness caused a senior motor industry executive to observe: “We would likely have had a whole team working on that for days, and still not come up with such a simple and obvious a solution.”
    So, not only was another awkward hurdle successfully overcome but also, with dedication and perseverance, a much-appreciated compliment received too.

Page 71, para 2

    The ‘Cadillac’ embellishment on the radiator cowl was a stroke of luck really. I happened to arrive one afternoon at the sheet-metal works with some of Bill’s templates and by chance bumped into the owner of a local engraving firm.
    After normal pleasantries, I asked him what was the possibility of copying the Cadillac name off the front Seville molding and engraving it, prior to us making up the new radiator cowl, onto a piece of flat stainless-steel. Then, half seriously and half in jest, I added: “I don’t know whether it’s legal… but if Cadillac or GM don’t like it, we’ll just have to cover it up with something.”
    He walked across to the Seville, inspected the name cast into the bonnet molding, and without hesitation, replied: “No, that won’t be a problem... no, not a problem at all.”
    Oh yes, on the contrary, his new computerised engraving machine disliked very much having to ‘digitise’ from the chromium-plated casting removed from HLN 827V’s discarded bonnet, and there followed no end of excuses as to why the end result was unlikely to prove satisfactory. Yet, eventually, one perfectly engraved piece of stainless steel appeared and, to top it all, he only charged the modest amount he had first quoted – typical of the local support.
    The actual fabricating of the stainless steel cowl surely had to be the greatest artistic achievement of the entire project. After minor adjustments had been made to the rusty mock-up cowl, templates were taken from the curved top, the V’ed front and the base. Finally, two reversible templates were made to account for the sides and the short angles that joined the sides to the base. All these were then used to cut pieces from heavy-gauge stainless sheet.
    After forming the necessary angles, the sidepieces and the base were neatly welded together and held open at the top with a temporary tie. Next, the pre-curved top section was welded to the sides from inside, then the V front,  having been bent to the correct angle down its centre – complete with its Cadillac engraving – was lined up with the curved top and delicately trimmed, inner edge to inner edge, in order to meet up as accurately as possible.
    Then the real trial began: the welding of the two most noticeable pieces of the car’s bright work without any visible imperfections or distortions. Another expert welder – of which the locality seemed to more than its fair share – proceeded to Tig weld along the entire length from the centre outwards. First he went steadily along the left and then all along the right, carefully finishing around the curves at each end – and all this without so much as the slightest waver. As I watched the operation semi-mesmerised, I became convinced that, quite literally, he must have eyes in his fingers. One slip, even the smallest of distortions, and we would have had to start all over again – Cadillac engraving and all. The relief and congratulatory ‘whooping’ when he had finished was met with bemusement from others on the shop floor.
    The stainless steel grille was yet another but entirely different challenge – in many ways an early computerised one-off. First, the dimensions of the Seville’s toughened plastic grille were noted, as were the new longer lengths of the uprights on our plans. From this, the sheet-metal company’s drawing office determined the width of stainless-steel sheet needed to form equivalent uprights when bent to shape, as well as the position and size of the grille’s horizontal supports at its rear. When the uprights had been cut, the positioning of the horizontal supports was fed into the relevant cutting machine and the pieces slotted down one edge at the correct vertical distance between the cross supports. Afterwards, each upright was bent to shape in their mechanical bender.
    Next, the angle of V required on the cross supports was noted and, having fed that information into the cutting machine, the centre of each support was V-notched, while, at the same time, slots in the correct position and at the required angle to accommodate the uprights were created. The V-notches were subsequently bent closed and welded up. Finally, two of the fabricating team patiently assembled the uprights and cross supports, slot to slot, and, having made sure all were straight and square, welded each join at the back where they could never be seen.
    The construction of the grille and the cowl was certainly not the cheapest of operations; but, without the quality both of design and of finish to match the other bought-in bright-work, the idea of producing a limited edition of thirties-style supercars would not stack up. All did eventually go according to plan; but, looking back, it could so easily have been an unmitigated disaster with repeat after repeat attempts, and possibly never getting the desired finish.

Page 72, para 5