It’s a Bugeye with a Flux Capacitor!
It’s actually more of a Lava Lamp, and its brain lives in the grill of our speakeasy Bugeye we’re building, which will be departing for Harrison, NJ in about a week, where the car will be entombed in a condo lounge for life. She has no drivetrain, but puts on a high horsepower light show, which seems appropriate for the application.
I’m not one for the latest novelty at the local auto parts store but I love this LED kit we installed here, because it gives this display Bugeye just the right “Wurlitzer juke box in the corner” glow, and in this case, modern technology has made that vibe possible (along with 87 other light show programs!)
Here’s Austin again, stuck in the boot of our display car. We made the butt protector (for folks who might sit on and otherwise dent the back deck, and allowed just enough room for Austin to get into the trunk to help mount the license plate light and rear emblem.
I’ll let you know on Monday if he ever got out!
This week, Kenny put together the dashboard for the display car. Here you will see the finest non-working switches and dials in the land, all designed to entertain anyone who climbs aboard. I felt like a pre-school toy designer as we laid out the maximum number of cranks, switches and dials one can turn. The choke and starter both pull, but there are stop nuts on the back of the cables to limit their range and to prevent users from pulling the cables all the way out. Remember, there is no battery and no wiring harness in this car. This is an interactive sculpture!
Above you can see George’s green Bugeye, here from Indiana for a supercharger, five speed upgrade and interior upgrade. When we removed the carpet to replace the interior, the rusty floor pulled up with it, so this car will also get new floor panels on its visit.
Below you can see Denim, now without roll bar, ready to head to be loaded for California, and Jinx II, a nice unrestored red Bugeye, that just arrived from California in the same truck. One in, one out!
Below you can see the red hardura mat we just installed on “Harris,” which will soon be heading to Morris and Linda in Massachusetts.
And below you can see Rick’s Bugeye we restored, soon to be heading to Houston. We recently recovered the top dash bar in black vinyl, and it looks great, to complement the black knee crash pad that was already in place on this later Sprite dashboard (note the non bugeye/later Sprite key switch). This vinyl covering was correct for top dash bars, and it is significantly nicer than the raw aluminum finish that had been on the car, especially since this car already had black under dash trim.
It has been another very busy week! See you next Friday!
