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CURRENT INVENTORY IS SHOWN IN THE SMALL PICTURES JUST BELOW THIS TEXT!
(if a car is not pictured here, it has been sold)

Done-for driveshafts

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A Bugeye’s driveshaft is a vital link between the transmission and rear axle. Without it, you’re going nowhere. It is important to make sure your shaft is in good working order, which means checking the universal joints for play.

An exploded view of a Bugeye driveshaft.

A customer’s car came to us recently with a “clunk” coming from the drivetrain- watch the video below and you’ll immediately understand why!

Ideally, you want your driveshaft to be free from any amount of play in the joints. This way the power from the engine and transmission can get transferred to the rear wheels with the least amount of lost motion.

[Read more…] about Done-for driveshafts

Owner-tested, owner-approved!

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It’s pure bliss for me to be able to test drive a client’s car on a meaningful 60 minute outing because it allows me to confirm that we haven’t missed anything in our restoration process.  It also allows me to enjoy the satisfaction of driving a very well sorted classic sports car that can compete in the modern landscape.

I wish there were more business owners who thoroughly tested their products like this… customer service in the world would be at a much higher level if this were the case.  Be that as it may, at least in our little world, all of our cars are owner-tested and certified before they go home. 

Click “read more” below to see a video tour!

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Battery Tray Decay

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Battery trays rust. Like death and taxes, this is an inevitability in Spridget world. It’s a popular moisture gathering point and 60-plus years of battery acid exposure, (which is corrosive to metal),makes matters worse.

This one above (on a client car here for restoration) was exceptionally bad, so much so that a battery could no longer safely be installed in this car. As such, we cut it all away and welded in a whole new tray, which is a job most easily done with the engine out of the car. 

Click the photo above to order a new battery tray for your Bugeye today!

You will find below a series of photographs to show you how we did it; view them by clicking “read more”. If you need a new tray, we would be happy to send you one… or if you prefer, we will pick up your car and bring it here and weld in a new one for you! You can buy one from our parts catalog by clicking here.

[Read more…] about Battery Tray Decay

Suspect suspension: have you checked your king pins lately?

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New Kin pin bushings are nearly useless unless up/down play is properly shimmed (not so here!)

Most Spridget front suspensions have excess play (they’ve had a hard life). Tightening things up pays immediate dividends, both in performance and sure-footedness. Spridgets (and lots of other cars of the era) ride on a solid king pin. The swivel axle that rides on the king pin has bronze bushings pressed in place, and those bushings are prone to wear, especially if they are not greased regularly, as the pair of videos in this post can attest.

Lower swivel axle bushings need frequent greasing

King pin suspension systems have a lot of parts, many more than a ball joint system does. That means many more opportunities for wear, and for part failures. The threads on the fulcrum pin, constantly turning in the control arm as the car goes over bumps, hills, and around curves, wear out, creating slop in the control arm. The repeated vertical motion wears the thrust washer, creating up-and-down slop. Years of constant contact with the road and turning wears the upper and lower bushings, creating lateral slop. The lever shock, which also serves as the upper control arm on Bugeyes, wears internally, creating a harsh ride and affecting the suspension geometry.

[Read more…] about Suspect suspension: have you checked your king pins lately?

How to break a Bugeye Sprite Windshield

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This is a Bugeye public service announcement.

Don’t push your car by the windshield frame, and when removing yourself from the cockpit, don’t use the windshield frame to pull yourself up, or you can break the glass as shown in the photo.

This particular car has a dried and rotten glazing rubber anyway, so it was overdue for a change, but this breakage was completely avoidable.

When pushing your Bugeye, the safest places to push from are from the rear edge of the cockpit and the front edge of the cockpit. These are some of the most rigid areas on the car and no damage will result from pushing in these locations.

Should your Bugeye windscreen need restoration, we can help! Send us your windshield and stanchions and we can repair your windscreen frame, re-tap any stripped threaded holes (a common occurrence after almost 70 years of steel screws in aluminum frames), powder coat the frame and stanchions in silver, and even install new glass for you! We offer this service in our catalog, which you can view by clicking the photo below or by clicking here.

Should you want to tackle this project yourself, we offer all of the parts necessary to do this job. We even sell the glass for the windshield! However, as this is a complicated and expensive item to ship, we do not list it on our website, so call us if you would like to order the glass. Click on the photos below for more information on each component or click here to view our full catalog!

Windshield glass glazing rubber with lock strip (Bugeyes with 2-stud windshield through 1962)
Windshield-to-body gasket (Bugeyes with 2-stud windshield frames through 1962)
Windshield post pad set (Bugeye through 1962)
Windshield stanchion to frame screw kit (Bugeyes through 1962)
Windshield stanchion to body hardware kit (Bugeye through 1962)
No-drill windshield post mirror set (takes the place of the rearmost stanchion screw) (Bugeye through 1962)

Horsing Around

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The view from the barn-bound test-drive… drives wonderfully with new five-speed, but clearly a new windshield is needed. I phoned it in, and a new windshield and glazing was waiting on sawhorses when I returned. I have to personally sign-off on each car before it can leave our workshop.

A Bugeye Sprite is a wonderful antidote for the fast-paced modern world. With no lane-holding, auto-cruise control or back-up camera (and no facebook posts or bluetooth while driving), the focus is pure and basic transportation. Not that there is anything wrong with modern vehicles and their many wonderful high-tech features… it’s just that as the world seems to keep accelerating every year, a Bugeye feels more and more like comfort food. Simple. Unencumbered. Basic. Old-fashioned bliss.

“I can take you.”

I have had my Bugeye Gumby since 1978, and with each wave of global transformation and population growth, these cars just seem the perfect anecdote for all that ails. If you long for simpler times (even if just on weekends), then a Bugeye Sprite is powerful medicine.

Given this underlying sentiment, I found a new state of nirvana this week when I took a client’s Bugeye on a 60 minute road test (after a two month restoration project) with one goal in mind… to master an even simpler mode of transport. My wife and I head to the UK this May for a tour of a few cottage motorcar factories followed by a horseback trek across Wales. We will ride a total of 100 miles in those five days, ending in Aberystwyth with a ride on the beach. While I have ridden a horse before, I am not a rider (my wife has been riding all her life) so I have a lot of work to do. And a lot of sore muscles to develop!

This is Beau wearing his tonneau. He leaks no oil.

To drive a Bugeye to ride a horse left me feeling ecstatic. As the world gets more complicated around me, here was a new way to attain an even higher level of lower-order simplicity. 45 horsepower is good. One horse power is bliss. Give me leather and straps. And an olfactory escape from hydrocarbons.

I wrangled my horse in the field, removed his tonneau and tacked him-up, and rode around an indoor ring for 30 minutes with a coach barking at me to push my heels down and keep my head up. Then, I returned the horse to the paddock, gave him some hay, and proceeded back to my luxury vehicle.

Horse-eye, meet Bugeye.

After my ride, imagine the pure delight I experienced upon firing up my far more sophisticated multi-horse steed. No girth to tighten, no pesky straps to fasten and no pile of manure to clean on the barn floor (I’ll take an oil stain any day). I turned the key and my Sprite roared. No squeezing, kicking or clucking is required. Ahhh, the ease with which the foot actuated pedal is applied, instant power and steering no less, unencumbered by the fickle whims of an untamed four-legged creature. 

I galloped home in my fine motorcar, feeling quite sophisticated and sublime.

Contact us at customercare@bugeyeguys.com or call (203)-208-0980 Monday - Friday | 8 am - 5 p.m. EST