How do you know where his mouth is?That japanese kid sure has a big mouth!
How do you know where his mouth is?That japanese kid sure has a big mouth!
Wait...you never let me drive the car.....Nothing much expected today except the front and rear glass.
It always amazes me when I stumble across guys like Dave. Willing to do so much for somebody, despite the fact that they already do so much for their employer.
At the same time,...it's amazing to me that this current election year has become personally so divisive.
In all of my past project cars, one of my friends that does glass work has installed my glass for me. I'll admit that we've fallen out of touch (mostly because I've dropped out of drag racing). The shop where I used to travel to is a 75 mile round trip. The owner works out of that shop, the rest of the guys that frequent that place just hang out. He is not there on Sunday.
I'm sure that the friend that I'm referring to is miffed that "I don't come round here no more."
He was my go-to when I started considering having the glass re-installed. I asked if he could help me and told him I'd pay him, but he was "too busy" to get to me. He referred me to another guy that didn't know me from Adam, (who was also too busy to get to me) but when he could,.thought that it would be around $300.00 to set the front and rear glass.
He wont have to remove the trim or the old glass, or clean the pinch weld....(I told him that it was newly painted). He won't have to replace the trim either. Just set the glass.
$300.00. For what will probably be 60 minutes work.
Seems a little high.
So I call the friend, and tell him that the guy can't get to me any sooner, but if I have to pay anybody, I'd just as soon pay him.
"I'll do it for free if you'll vote for Trump" he says. "How bout I just pay you, and you vote for him instead?"
I never heard back from him.
While at work, I ask one of the service managers if they know a glass guy that does this stuff on the side, and he refers me to our (BMW's) glass guy. Greg Shelton. The service tech manager. He knows me just from my business interaction with him.
The conversation goes...
"Hey would you be able to help me set the front and rear glass on my project car at my house?" "Sure,.......When do you want to do this?" "It'll have to be a Sunday, I work on Saturday." "Name the day." "How about the 9th?" "How much?" "How's $25-30 dollars sound?" "How about I pay you $100 instead?"
This guys works 5-6 days a week for BMW, and still makes time to help guys like me out. It's certainly NOT because he's making soo much money,...he's doing it because he's that guy. A guy like Dave, a guy like Steve, a guy like Nick, and about a dozen more that I interact with daily either here, the other web forum I frequent, or at work.
All with out asking me to ride in the back seat while I let a drunk crazy man drive the car.
*** If you're one of those guys that actually reads what I write,....let me tell ya,...If I can't work on the car,...can you only imagine how much written worthless blather that I'm gonna come up with because that's all I can do?
Dad had multiple knee surgeries and then a replacement a few years ago. The replacement isn't fun but better than a tendon/meniscus surgery(for recovery time). Good luck Mike! I know a few people who have had it done...you'll be back in the garage before the rest of your body will probably want to.Yeah, there's a guy i work with that had a replacement and he said he was good as new in just a few weeks.. apparently it really is easier to recover from than a meniscus repair. I wanted to kick him in his fake knee...
Firstly,..Thanks for all the well wishes,...I know that the trade off in after surgery/therapy pain will be better than what I'm currently dealing with in the long run. So it is what it is I guess.
As a testimonial to the 'I'm not one to sit around" type, I did in fact wrap my knees, and hobble down the stairs, and out into the garage. Walking on the knee isn't the bad part,....going up stairs is the bit ch. So,......I just didn't come back up the stairs unless I absolutely had to.
The wife hears me hobbling down the stairs "Post wrap" and she says "Really? you're still gonna go into the garage despite the fact that your knee is killing you?" I swear, you love that car way more than you love me"..
Decisions,.....decisions......
I tell her that there is no contest, and the the car is a distant second to my love for her,...and with that said,...turn and hobble down the last of the stairs into the garage.
I hear "Yeah, right".....as the door closes behind me. I would've turned around and went back up to discuss it further, but my knees hurt too much to climb the stairs,..so........what could I do?
I decided to focus on what will be impossible in two weeks.
none of the holes were drilled this morning, so that is where I started. Once they were all drilled, I placed the panel in place so that I could locate the two center holes for the door bar. The "L's" on the yellow tape on top are the reference mark for the carpenters square that I used to do that.
Once I had the holes referenced, I made a threaded backer that floats on the door so that the door bar could be adjusted after it was bolted on. I bolted the door bar on, and made another reference mark so that I could locate the front mount.
This little dude is missing from the driver's door. I have a piece of 1" wide stuff that wedges against the door sheet metal and is on the back side of the where the factory door handle used to go.
You can also see that this door is butchered. Originally, I intended to stick that window motor mechanism inside, so this door was cut up to allow for that. That has changed however, so consider it door lightening instead.
With that thing welded, drilled, and threaded,.I was able to bolt the door bar on again so that I could fabricate the piece of 1/8" plate the will become the cap that butts against the dash bars. (It doesn't butt actually,..there is an 1/8" gap)
And that looks like this when it's installed.
So all that's left to do to check my work is to shut the door....so that's what I did.
And that took the better part of the day to get to this point. There is still a day left on the door bar fabrication alone to build and bend the mesh and the trim pieces that go on that bar. Then It's gotta get smoothed,primed, and painted. (probably another day).
Then the speaker box will take a day,...the center mesh a day,...and door panel upholstery is another day. When you back away from it, you add that up,..and say "meh.....it's just a week,...what's the big deal?"
I got 5 days left to do this before the knee surgery,....maybe I can get that all done,...I'm gonna try at least.
But in the end,...I'm happy with the progress today,...It's been a long time since I had a welder in my hand,....I thought I was done with that,..but I was wrong. I'm still not done with it.
So on this special edition I'll cap it with two pics,...The cynical Mike, and the content tired Mike.
That Damn Monster,..photo bombed the pic...
Awesome job mike,sorry you had to 'Play through the pain', hope your recovery goes quickFirstly,..Thanks for all the well wishes,...I know that the trade off in after surgery/therapy pain will be better than what I'm currently dealing with in the long run. So it is what it is I guess.
As a testimonial to the 'I'm not one to sit around" type, I did in fact wrap my knees, and hobble down the stairs, and out into the garage. Walking on the knee isn't the bad part,....going up stairs is the bit ch. So,......I just didn't come back up the stairs unless I absolutely had to.
The wife hears me hobbling down the stairs "Post wrap" and she says "Really? you're still gonna go into the garage despite the fact that your knee is killing you?" I swear, you love that car way more than you love me"..
Decisions,.....decisions......
I tell her that there is no contest, and the the car is a distant second to my love for her,...and with that said,...turn and hobble down the last of the stairs into the garage.
I hear "Yeah, right".....as the door closes behind me. I would've turned around and went back up to discuss it further, but my knees hurt too much to climb the stairs,..so........what could I do?
I decided to focus on what will be impossible in two weeks.
none of the holes were drilled this morning, so that is where I started. Once they were all drilled, I placed the panel in place so that I could locate the two center holes for the door bar. The "L's" on the yellow tape on top are the reference mark for the carpenters square that I used to do that.
Once I had the holes referenced, I made a threaded backer that floats on the door so that the door bar could be adjusted after it was bolted on. I bolted the door bar on, and made another reference mark so that I could locate the front mount.
This little dude is missing from the driver's door. I have a piece of 1" wide stuff that wedges against the door sheet metal and is on the back side of the where the factory door handle used to go.
You can also see that this door is butchered. Originally, I intended to stick that window motor mechanism inside, so this door was cut up to allow for that. That has changed however, so consider it door lightening instead.
With that thing welded, drilled, and threaded,.I was able to bolt the door bar on again so that I could fabricate the piece of 1/8" plate the will become the cap that butts against the dash bars. (It doesn't butt actually,..there is an 1/8" gap)
And that looks like this when it's installed.
So all that's left to do to check my work is to shut the door....so that's what I did.
And that took the better part of the day to get to this point. There is still a day left on the door bar fabrication alone to build and bend the mesh and the trim pieces that go on that bar. Then It's gotta get smoothed,primed, and painted. (probably another day).
Then the speaker box will take a day,...the center mesh a day,...and door panel upholstery is another day. When you back away from it, you add that up,..and say "meh.....it's just a week,...what's the big deal?"
I got 5 days left to do this before the knee surgery,....maybe I can get that all done,...I'm gonna try at least.
But in the end,...I'm happy with the progress today,...It's been a long time since I had a welder in my hand,....I thought I was done with that,..but I was wrong. I'm still not done with it.
So on this special edition I'll cap it with two pics,...The cynical Mike, and the content tired Mike.
That Damn Monster,..photo bombed the pic...
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