Less than week remains!  Six days and Seven nights to get ready!  After so long, it’s here.

Well, it all started in 2011, when Great Racers Chad & Jenny Caldwell showed up in the Awesome Auburn – a custom bodied speedster.  Inspired, I decided to attempt a similar trick.  I wanted something with truly vintage mechanics  – something unique and not available in new cars.  V-12?  Bah, even BMW makes those – I found a Straight-8, on a 1932 Buick Chassis – PERFECT.  I sketched up a body and Navigator Dave, used to the comfort of ‘NO XQS,’ the mighty 1961 Imperial we have used in past GR’s, said OK, so long as it has doors, fenders, and a top.  The wimp.  I sketched up another body and set to it.  Knowing we had just 6 months til Great Race 2012; I enlisted Bob Ensign a coachbuilder, to help (Hey, I still have a day job…).  Well, feature creep and perfectionism and other priorities (I’m still married!) slowed the effort a bit.  Finally, we’re almost done and ready for Great Race 2014!  Just two years late on a 6 month project – not bad, right?  Here’s the sketch, and a quick pictorial history from there to the result Jeff showed in his post earlier today (OK, fenders have yet to go on – picky, picky, picky).  If it all stays together, we’ll be Mainiacs and Floridians in Great Race 2014!

2011: From sketch to foam and clay model (then we built a full size mockup of PVC tubes and duct tape, too!)

Simple stuff!  Merely a minor tune-up!  Shoulda been done years ago!  Might actually work…  jc