Whew. 3 of 4 fenders are mounted. Seriously, I never thought these would be so annoying. Trying to get the fender beading perfectly even, smashing my knuckles when the wrench slips...etc. I might just leave the big blood smear under the front fender! (kidding). It would have been four fenders, but I snapped off one of the fender nuts on the front driver's side. ARGGG!! I hadn't got more then 4 or 5 threads into it, put maybe 5lbs of force on it and snap! spinning away. We replaced any of the ones I snapped off removing the fenders, so this one must have been on it's last legs and/or had something in the threads. Getting the bolt out was a fun experience...
Once I was done free-handing the hacksaw blade, it was onto grinding and welding...mere millimeters from where the fresh visible paint would be. Welding that close to fresh paint is ultra scary...but it's done. Waiting for paint to dry so I can't mount up the fourth. Once the black POR15 dries, I'll paint on the silver.
Following Fenderama I tested the rally tire out back.
I only have one of the 5.5" wide sport wheels at the moment, and it's the ET26 version. Porsche 914 wheels, which look identical, were 5.5 ET40. That will move me in a nice 14mm, which should still clear everything no problem and give me the clearance on the fenders I need. Thinner rally tires are also an option, but I own four of these (two are brand new) so if I can use them even better. Gravel will still destroy the lower few inches of the fender, but perhaps with mudflaps and a trick that a friend Bruce has for me...we might solve that problem. Well, for the rear at least.
The rear apron is currently a problem. The opening I have is 28" wide at the bottom. My rear apron? 30". Hmph, guess we bent things more then I thought! I'm going to wait until I have the rear bumper mounted. I anticipate that will stretch things out to the correct width and I can then see if I can get the Apron in.
Tomorrow it's off to do a parts run, and then I'll have more things to play with this coming week.
-Dave