Cool McCool's Garage

I’d been thinking about the illustration I posted a couple of days ago of the ‘Bird with full skirts. Not really wanting to make a complete new set of skirts, so today I got started making a fender skirt for the fender skirt.

It turned out to be a little more complicated than I thought (like everything else I do), it ended up taking all day to get the right one roughed in. Well, not counting a trip to Tractor Supply to exchange the CO2/Argon shielding gas bottle I got the other day that turned out to be empty (Note, they exchanged it with no hassle, so three cheers for Tractor Supply!). The skirt changes its curvature from the front to the rear, and I wanted to incorporate the rocker panels little flare at the bottom at the leading edge of the skirt. This would be easy with an English Wheel, which I don’t have, so I ended up bending it over the CO2 bottle, in varying degrees, and then used a body hammer on the stump I have under the bench to stretch get the shape. The flare at the bottom I used the bench vise, my homemade anvil (a twenty inch long chunk of railroad track) and hammer and dolly to form.

It turned out pretty nice, and once I work it a little more and “finesse” it, it’ll look pretty neat. The photos show it clamped in position, roughly, with Vice-Grips, it’ll be mounted with pins and barrel bolts just like the primary skirt. I’m happy with it, and pretty proud of making this rather complicated panel with just a hammer and dolly, a stump, and bench vise.

Pull your skirt down!

This year the hemlines are below the knee…

It’ll fit better finished…

Bottom flare.

Again, flare.

Small skirt roughed in.

With just the primary skirt on.