[V8Vairs] Recent purchase of V8Vair

[GnKHOFFMAN at aol.com]

Kevin:

It was Mikie and his car, and that was 5 years ago.  Mikie passed away just 
after Thanksgiving that year.
 
The wrinkle on the left rear fender happened when the lugs sheared off the 
left rear wheel on his way to a cruise night.  Not sure, but we think he failed 
to tighten the lugs.  The tire bobbled around in the fender well, then popped 
out from under the car; as he was pulling over to the side of the road, the 
tire rolled into the back of the fender and buckled it!
 
I helped him cut a complete fender off another (donar) car, and after he 
passed away his body and paint buddy did a complete rear quarter replacement.
 
The front fender well trim he had on the car was on the leading edge.  He cut 
a slice out of the front bottom lip (inner and outer), then pushed it forward 
and welded.  Extremely clean, and is not noticable unless you parked another 
car right next to it.
 
Another trick item he did was on the front air intake cut-out under the front 
bumper;  he bent some tubing to meet the lip, tack welded it on the inside, 
and rolled the metal around it (and used some filler to smooth it out).  
Instead of looking like a metal slice job (like mine looks on my Crown car), it 
looks like a factory made opening.
 
He also dreamed up a modification to the Crown subframe, where the side to 
side beam is relocated under the pan instead of in front of the harmonic 
balancer.  The allowed him to use a low-mount alternator, which in turn allowed him 
to mount the driver's seat back another 4" or so.  He made about 4 other 
subframes like his (including modifying mine).  A trick piece.  Attached (hopefully) 
is a photo of my subframe (maybe not; the first time I tried posting, the 
photo size was too big to let the e-mail go through).  He thought of a lot of 
trick things for the car.
 
Lonnie, have a great time with the car!

Gary Hoffman
 
p.s.  Somewhere I have some photos of the car from around 2001, after the 
first time he painted the car.  Orginally he painted it the yellow with white 
stripes.  Later he decided he would like black stripes, so he repainted the car.  

 





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