Building an Alfa Sports Racer

Past and Present Alfa Part 3: Final Details

November 17, 2015 By pete

Photos by David Gooley

Final Details

With the mechanicals completed and the chassis painted, the body sections were installed and final prep began. The location of head lights and taillights were determined, and the modifications made to front and rear fenders. To keep the front-end design as clean as possible, turn signal fixtures were installed in the head light buckets. With the headlight buckets welded in place, weeks of aligning, filling, and sanding followed until a coat of primer could be applied. In this state, devoid of any distracting trim pieces, the virgin bodylines could be evaluated for balance, proportion, and overall conformation.

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Past and Present Alfa Part 2

November 10, 2015 By pete

In Part 1 Restoration expert Alex Bacon begins a project to create a 1950s era-Sports Racer based on Alfa 2600 components. After completing the chassis the body is now taking shape.

Photos courtesy Alex Bacon

Next came a classic use of CAD-derived inspiration; CAD, meaning Cardboard Aided Design, in which cardboard templates are cut for front fenders, hood, cowl, doors, rear fenders, and trunk to quickly simulate the body shape. The cardboard templates were revised multiple times until a satisfactory shape was achieved. Plywood forms fashioned from the cardboard templates were installed to provide references for body panels and the locations for the small diameter tubing to support them.

The initial template for the rear section is place over the frame.

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Past and Present Alfa Romeo Part 1

November 3, 2015 By pete

Above photo by David Gooley

Creating a a stunning 50s-era Sports Racer from a derelict Alfa 2600

Alex Bacon grew up a student of automobile design. He cut his teeth as a teenager with a ground up restoration on his father’s ’63 Ferrari 250 GTE and fell willing victim to the allure of its sexy design, exotic engineering, and the quixotic addiction that comes from driving something you meticulously rebuilt piece by piece. He liked the car but he wanted less; less concession to creature comfort, less performance-robbing accessories, less overhead to wrangle through curves. An idea began to form, an idea about something light, fast and nimble, something simple but exotic: A purpose-built vehicle like the cars competing in the 1953 to 1961 Worlds Sports Car Championship. But first he had a skill set to acquire, experience to gain, time to refine a vision of just what that idea entailed. [Read more…] about Past and Present Alfa Romeo Part 1