mon-ay?

OK, HOPEFULLY I"ll be getting some money my way within the next few days. Then I'll be buying a new digi cam (if I get paid what I should...whole nother story....), and then I'll be snapping a whole buncha pics of my truck, with a few new mods, and THEN I'll update my site with some fresh new pickies! Yay!

I am going to update some page with a pic of someone who did my radio mod, but with blue....looked bad ass...I just have to find the pic...I put it somewhere and lost it, whoops...

I updated the Ranchero History page a little. Fixed a mistake with the exterior color, and added a little more info about it's history and where it's going.

site updates

I added a section about my new Ranchero...subsections include INterior, Exterior, and History...enjoy..

I'll be updating the rest of the site soon...I'm kinda putting it off because I'm hoping to get a new digi-cam here soon, so then I"ll be able to upload so much nicer and current pics of my Ranger. Until then, sorry, still the same ol' same ol'...

well i feel like a dumbass...

Ok, so I hear our new dog Gus scratchign at the back porch door, so I go down to take him out. It's about 1am so I'm dressed for bed already. So I go down, hook Gus up to the lead and take him out to do his thing. He gets done so we go back to the porch...I reach over to open the slidign glass door, and stop me if you've heard this before, it's locked. Seems the door likes to lock itself, at the most inopurtune times no less. Damint, now what? Lets try to garage door. Locked, damn. Lets try the front door. Locked, damn. So now what? It's chilly outside, I'm not wearing much, and I'm locked out of my own damn house. I ring the door bell hoping to wake my mom up to resuce me. Nothing, damn. Maybe I can pry the screen door open. I go out to the shop to grab a screwdriver. Pry, pry, pry. Nothing, damn. What the hell am I gonna do? I know, I'll grab the ladder and get on top of the porch roof and climb in through my bathroom window. Luckily my window wasn't locked, but unluckily it's not exactly large. Squeeze in through that small thing and I'm finally in. I'm just glad I didn't have to spend the nite fighting the dog for some covers...

what we have here is a potential supersonic chicken

Just doing a little bitchin' don't mind me...but anyone here ever done body work? Damn, its sucks. My ears hurt from the sounds, my fingers hurt from holding the dolly, i've got a few blisters from the body hammer, got flakes of paint all up in my eye, and I"m wore out. Let me tell you, if you've never done mostly metal body work, it really, really sucks. But, the good news is that the Ranchero now has a few less dings, is almost shaved, and starting to look good. Also, I found out I have a knack for this shit. I don't want to sound like I'm bragging, but I'm pretty happy with waht I've done so far, but the ultimate props will be at a car show, when I get asked "Whos your bodyman?", and I can say, "I am". The signifigance of that may be lost on some, unless your into customs, you might not get it. But yeah, it sucks, lol. OK, i'm done rambling now...

we didn't sink into the swamp

Started the tear down on the El Ranchero (just waht I call it, to throw people off, lol). It looks odd now...no headlights and grille, soon to be hoodless too.

The chopper is nearing completition. Started painting up the main frame and the wheels. The frame is flat black and the wheels are gloss red. Still have to paint the fork and the rear stays and the seat pan.

The truck is even lower now....how low? About 3/4" lower, for now. Looks damn good...Pic

a picture is worth 1000 words

So here are some pics of everythign from my last update-

Tank-
Pic 1
Pic 2
Pic 3

Ranger-
Pic 1
Pic 2
Pic 3

Ranchero-
Pic 1
Pic 2
Pic 3
(just in case imagestation is being an ass and won't remote link)

And no I don't have a 3 fetish, lol.

pot luck dinner

So much to say, so little time.....where to start?

1. Chopper-
REALLY coming along on this. If you've enver built up a custom before, then things can be misleading as far as time to completion goes. Not too long ago I was done with the initial mock-up, since then I"ve worked on it nearly everyday, at least 2 hours, but usually more like 4-5 at least, and I'm just now getting to where I can kinda see the finish line. I stripped the frame down, took longer then I wanted, that is until I got the right tools....did some trimming on it, took off needless bracts and shit, and now it's in grey primer. Been polishing up all the metal that I'm gonna keep unpainted...what a BITCH. Hand polishing SUCKS. But it'll all be worth it in the end when I have one kick-ass bike. I have also been hand fabricating out of stryofoam a faux gastank. I"m actually really happy with the way it's shaping up, I'll have to snap a few pics of it. Need to do some additional tweaking on the shape, but I think I"m gonna like it. It's taken about 10-12 hours of hand work so far, with still quite a few more to come.

2. Ranger-
How low can you go? Apparently lower then stock. Installed my drop springs today....man, does it look SIC. Right now the truck is ass-high, gonna have to remove a helper spring from the leaf pack to lower the back down. With the springs installed the front went down about 2 1/2" on both sides, will probably settle down to about 3" in the coming weeks. In an unexpected turn of events, the back actually lifted abou 1" on both sides. Thats still about 2" lower then stock, and about 3" higher then the front. So when all is said and done, with the helper leaf removed, I should be getting about a 3/4 drop, will look great...now I just need to get me some nice Boyd Coddington 18" wheels or something with some low-pro tires. Pics will be coming soon. Gonna have to watch out for those curbs, they suddenly seem a lot higher now...lol.

4. Project?-
Got a new project truck...a 1966 Ford Ranchero. It's in pretty good condition. The body is fairly straight, gonna have to block sand it, file it, and beat out a few dents, but all in all, the body is in workable, and recoverable, condition. No major rust has reared it's ugly head yet. Most of the trim is there, I think the emblems are missing, but all the major trim is there, and in pretty good condition it looks too. The interior floorboards will need renforcement, no biggie. Gonna put some bucket seats in that bad boy, slam the HELL out of it, and get it into a nice cruiser. Progress will be slow right now, no jobby job (well, not a REAL one at least) so no money....maybe this will be my motivation, lol. The engine turns...not sure if it cranks yet or not, my dad and I have yet to dive into it to see whats up. Three on the tree, hell yeah...guess I have to learn to drive a stick now, lol.

I'm sure I'm forgetting something, but I can't remember, if I do, I"ll post it.

BTW, The Crow kicks ass. A damn, crying shame Brandon Lee died filimg it.

one lump or two?

Top 10 Reasons to Adopt a Penguin:

1. The perfect conversation peice for parties!
2. Make great foot-warmers.
3. Lovely lawn ornament.
4. Man's true best friend.
5. Good dancing partner.
6. Bring (the) South Pole home!
7. Come fully dressed in thier own tuxedo.
8. Rid house of pesky krill.
9. Good Christmas decorations!
10. Have you seen a penguin?!

um, right...

I've been pretty freaked out all day over a dream I had last nite...this wasn't one of your average, 10-15 min dream...this one was over an hour in length, what you call an epic dream. I'm not really go into details of it, but it was a deeply emotional and engrossing dream, I'm talking about some serious stuff going on...not one of those ones that is just pure randomness full of strange metaphors, this was deep on a literal level. I have no idea how to react or what to think about it all, I've been keeping myself busy all day to get my mind off of it, but it isn't working. I mean damn, the things I felt in it, the things I said, the things I thought, the things I did, the things that happened, all were on the serious side of things, some real serious. It woke me up it bothered me so bad, but it wasn't a nitemare (well, sorta, I wasn't being chased by a three heated monster, I'll put it that way), and when I fell back asleep, I picked the dream back up again and continued it...how many times can you say that has happened to you? As you can see by my rambling, its got me rattled a little bit.

Well, onto other things. I've got the pre-build on my bike done, tweaked it all out so that it's nearly perfect. I sure do wish I had a MIG welder to really finish it off, but nuts and bolts will suffice for now. i got a few pics of it...The proportions look like you couldn't ride it, but for me (6'0") the ride is VERY comfortable (outside the rock-hard seat) and I could easily ride it all day. It looks like the handle bars and pedals are one helluva a reach, but they aren't, trust me, lol. In order to keep my mind off the aforementioned dream, I tores it back down and primerd out the frame. So now it's in grey primer, and not puke-yellow.

Pic 1
Pic 2
Pic 3

mmmmm...pedal powered chopper

Kinda excited about this, I'm lame, I know, anyway...I finished the pre-build of an old 2-person bike into a really cool chopper-esque bike. You sit super low..just above the rear tire, on the rear seat post and pedal using the front pedals. You obviously steer with the front handle bars, I titlted them down to make it easier to steer. I'll try to get some pics of it, but right now it's an ugly puke-yellow. Still have some tweaking to do on it, but it is up and running, just got done doing some test rides...hell yeah.

down low in chopperville

Gonna go to the junkyard tomorrow to pick up some springs so I can cut them down and finally get my front down to the level it needs to be at. probably going to to go with a 2" drop....we'll see how it turns out.

Started work on a chopper style bicycle. It originally was an old, rusty two person bike from JCPenny. Got a lot done with it today. Stripped it mostly down to the frame, then modified the rear seat post so that the seat sits right above the tire...which is actually a problem, as the seat squats down into the tire preventing it form turning when you sit. I had to add some bracing to prevent the frame from buckling under the weight of a rider. Gonna have to remove the rear pedals, they hit the ground for some reason, I think U bent the frame during the testing before I added the braces, whoops....lol. The seating position is a little odd, but still cool, hope to get it done soon. Wonder how I should paint it? Hmmmm...

get low get low.....you scared you scared

Really coming along on my bodydropped, shaved/smoothed Sport Trac. I've gotten it pretty much all shaved and smoothed out, just one last pocket where the tailgate handle was, it's got some body filler on it now. The roof is pretty much smooth now, that was really a task, the body filler would shrink just enough to cause a depression when paint was applied. Some sandable primer and 250 grit helped that out. I've got to get some 600 (at least) grit sandpaper to finish out the smoothign and shaving. I finally got the bed worked out too. Had to remove some material on the inner rear fender to get the rears to tuck even more (can you say laying pumpkin?)...took a bit of work to get the bed to sit on the sides like it's supposed to and clear the tires at the same time. Next up: Interior.

Random quote of the day:
If open your mouth enough times, your bound to be right eventually....