Sorry for the absence, I have been off work and mostly off the internet as well for the last week or so as I scrambled to get the van together.
This'll be a long post. Lots of random pictures. Nothing in any particular order, but the build stuff will be first and the Gridlife showcase will be after
Alright, so the floor panels got finished up and fit to the floor shape: There will be better pictures of the floor covering later on. I kind of forgot to take pictures as we finished some things.
It took a few of us to get the flooring glued down to the subfloor, but it turned out pretty good. So thankful to have good friends helping through this whole process
My dad doing more of his amazing wiring work in the main panel: (wiring isn't completely finished in the pictures)
This panel is on the passenger side and mirrors some of the switched features from the driver's side. For example, when I turn on the underglow, the right side and rear connect to this panel instead of having to run across to the other side. Everything is pre-wires to be modular later.
Got the CB antenna wired up and working
My wife found some cool pillows for the rear seat. They should tie in a little bit of old school with the modern JDM/VIP style of the interior:
Here's my wife being annoyed that I was taking pictures while she was trying to put seats together:
And the finished set: We didn't get the headrests done/on yet, but after this weekend, we're still a little torn on if we will add them at all. The seats look better without, but it would be nice to have them for long trips.. Anyways. I am so impressed with this being her first time doing any sort of auto upholstery!
Overhead console installed and wired up!
Here are some pictures as we finished up the assembly of the interior:
And pointing towards the rear: The rear speaker mounts are marine ski tower pods: We didn't get a chance to build custom wall panels inside, so we came up with the idea to cut up a couple of old black tablecloths and make temporary curtains that cover the walls. I was skeptical of the idea, but they look as good as I could have hoped for what they are. Way batter than the alternative, uncovered walls.
Here is the 2AM pic 2 days before we need to leave for Gridlife Midwest. The wiring is 90% done at this point, the seats are mostly bolted in, and there is still a bunch to do. Had to stop and get a picture of the UFO in the shop:
The next morning I got the seat belts installed and the A/C charged. No pictures of either activity, but trust me the A/C is cold, and there are now seat belts.
Here is a cool idea that my wife had. The day before we left, she made up sole quick temporary door panels to cover the side doors so that they could be displayed open. We decided to have everyone who helped with the project sign the 40 door. It's not complete yet, but I love the idea! Once we make the permanent custom panels, we'll hang this one on the wall.
I had a friend and one of the best local detailers in the area come and do a full job on the paint the week before the show. Full wash, buff, paint correction, ceramic coating, etc.. Granted we were chatting a bit, but he was working on it for over 12 hours! Here are a few pictures of the during and after. I was blown away. The finish is so smooth now that my phone camera will pick up facial recognition in the reflection..
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Thursday afternoon after a delightful 1.5 hour drive, WE FREAKIN MADE IT!!!
Shortly after my upholsterer got a well-deserved nap. She's gonna kill me for posting this:
There was a ton of stuff to look at and do at the festival, but I'll keep this strictly about the van..
There was a pre-show on Friday. We got staged up and had a ton of people check it out. Everyone loved it!
"Hey go pose"
A friend drove the drift car up there as well so after some sweet-talking we put it in the show too.
Saturday was the judged show. While we didn't win anything this year, they did love it so much that they parked it right between the main stage and the entrance to the show field. Took up 2 spots and everything.
We had so many compliments and everyone loved the lights. They were on all day!
Even many of the pro drifters and celebs came and loved the van. It was so exciting to have people who I have followed for years compliment my project!
We even had Nads and a few other guys from Hoonigan come and they were geeking over it. Made my whole weekend!!
The weekend wasn't completely without incident however, while moving the van into the show field on Thursday morning, we ran over a nearly invisible hole/dip in the grass and the front splitter smacked the ground. Luckily my "break-away" clips did their job and the splitter pushed up behind the flare a little bit. The flare has a very small crack but the splitter did not crack at all. The flare and splitter will both need some paint work, but it is very minimal considering the sound it made. I'll have it repaired soon enough. Could have been worse, the same hole also took out the super expensive carbon fiber splitter on a 5 series BMW.
I am so happy that we were able to get everything that we did done in time for the show. I am going to keep working on it and I have a ton more planned, but I'm probably going to take a week or so off and catch up on sleep and the other things that I have been neglecting the the last several weeks.