Ok, here all the in progress pics from the wrap that I didn't get a chance to upload before:
Fender trimmed and stretched:
Almost done with the fender:
Fender wrapped and trim reinstalled:
Door trimmed and stretched:
Door wrapped:
Hood wrapped (no in progress pics; it was pretty straightforward):
Wrapping the passenger front fender:
Wrapping the passenger door:
Passenger door done:
Starting the front bumper.. this one sucked to do:
My friend Dan helping with the decklid:
Car done!
Wow, that wrap really turned out well............it's a beautiful car!!
Yeah, really suits the car and looks good!
Now I'm thinking that I should wrap my car (since I hate sanding paint by hand).
If your paint is falling off you do still need to sand and prime it so you have good substrate to apply the vinyl to. I had to sand my Fiero before I wrapped it.. that sucked. If the paint is good, but just the wrong color or whatever, wrap away!
A few quick questions. Where did you get that wrap from? Is it hard to do for a first timer? Yours turned out so well it's hard to imagine a novice could do that good. How long did it take to put on and how long do wraps last? OK in the winter? Thanks in advance.
Installed new pads and rotors and flushed the nasty brake fluid out before hitting the road at 10 PM Friday.
Ready to go:
I drove through the night and made it to Las Cruces, NM yesterday afternoon. 800 miles! Got double sleep last night :)
The night sky over the middle of nowhere, Arizona was stunning:
Picacho at sunrise:
Next stop: Texas!
In reply to Feedyurhed:
I get my vinyl from Metro Restyling. You could achieve a good result on your first wrap, but you'll need to buy more material so you can redo a panel if you make an unfixable mistake. This was about 18 hours of work. Double that for your first time. If your edges hold up (use 3M 94 primer!) It should last 5 to 10 years. Its fine in the winter... Again, as long as your edges hold up. That's where it starts to peel from. Since I intend to unwrap mine after I get home, I wanted to minimize the risk of pulling up my factory paint, so I didn't use primer.
You are living the dream!
Another 870 miles today. I'm in Beaumont. Tomorrow: Pensacola.
Onward to Daytona Beach!
Have you been to any tracks yet or competed in any events?
First track day(s) will be this weekend at CMP.
Any updates? How's it going??
I had a great time at Carolina Motorsports Park over the weekend. The track consists of 14 turns and 3 straights, the longest of which is interrupted with an element referred to as "The Kink". The track is relatively easy to learn but has a lot of nuances, so like any good track its challenging to master. By the end of the weekend, my best lap was a 1:56.4 with my 255 Michelin Pilot Super Sports.
Unfortunately, a rock launched by another car impacted and cracked my windshield at CMP and the crack grew to be about a foot long. NASA and SCDA don't really care about it, but TrackDaze (VIR next weekend) does.. So I have to schedule a replacement during the Watkins Glen - Boston - VIR transit.
Immediately after the last track session at CMP, I headed up to Durham, NC (about 3 hours away) to visit a friend and stay the night. Then it was off to Watkins Glen, over 500 miles to the North. I first went west towards Greensboro so I could avoid the traffic around DC. On the way into NY I ran through a pretty powerful thunderstorm, and didn't make it into Watkins Glen until about 11 PM. The Michelin PSS tires handled the water great!
The next morning I arrived at the track. Watkins Glen is an old track; as old as road racing in the US. It was every bit as good as the stories say. Massive camber on almost all turns, grippy asphalt, good flow, and walls, walls, wall. This track day was run by SCDA and has only HPDE run groups, so each session was 30 min long. Plenty of time to learn the course,get in the flow, and get out of traffic.
I'll update this post later with more pics and video - I only have a tablet with me so big updates are hard to compose.
After my last session at Watkins Glen, I returned to the paddock to find it mostly empty with everyone rushing to pack up and leave as quickly as possible. I was informed that a massive thunderstorm and hail storm was coming in quickly from the West and everyone was trying to get out before it arrived.
I quickly threw all my stuff in the car and headed toward Boston. The sky was clear ahead, but darkness was chasing me. The rain caught up for about 30 minutes but I was able to outrun it. It caught up again when I stopped for gas and I contacted a friend in California to get an update on the storm. It turns out the storm system covered a large north-to-south refgion and was moving in exactly the same direction that I was. The only way to get out was to keep pushing east. Apparently I had just passed through two tornado advisories and the storm warnings weren't clearing up until closer to the Massachusetts border. I kept a steady pace and by midnight I was in Boston.
why did the updates stop? ... :(
...because I was too busy driving and tracking to be able to post any updates while on the road, and I didn't have internet access very often... and my landlord called me during the trip to tell me he was selling the house. As soon as I got home from the trip I had to find a new place to live and move everything. I'm still not even done unpacking, but things are starting to settle down so I hope to write up the rest of the trip eventually.
I don't know how I missed this the first time around, but it sounds like an awesome adventure! I hope you are able to finish the write up.
Don't worry, I will finish the story. Still working on going through photos. Almost done. Then it's on to videos.. and then the story will continue. It was the trip of a lifetime, so I want the writeup to live up to it ;-)
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