Volksters Choice Award, another fine how to with Catbox.

[CatBox]

So I have been asked by the powers that be to build the coveted "Volksters Choice Award" for the 2011 Woodburn BugRun.

I guess I did a good enough job with the 2009 Winter Rally trophy...


Well I want to do something different this time around and I think that I have found just the right combination to satisfy my creative juices.  As always I have my assistant Max helping out, he will be assiting as well when I am at the blow up board so stop by and say Hi.

Here we go!
I started with a concept that I had seen somewhere on one of the many automotive related web sites that I travel upon.  I went out into the garage and found my raw materials.

A sacrificial wrench.


Two Chevy intake valves and a ginuine 311 VW rod.


I had my assistant remove a perfectly good Chevy rocker arm to sacrifice as well.  The VW ones don't have the correct idea.  They look funny.


First we start with some heat to get the marked and measured wrench cherry red.

[CatBox]

Whenst it is hot enough we need to apply some force to get it motivated to move.  Todays force is brought to you by craftsman...


The force had to reposition.


Back at it...


Now if you will compare to the first pics you will see that I have turned one end around so the offsets are now on the same side.


See.


Gotta get it straight....


Here is the finished product thus far.


I have pleased him.

[CatBox]

Here is where the rod comes into play.  I have to see and measure where the wrench will wrap around the rod.


Then it is back into the vise to be heated and beaten over.


I then turned it over after cooling it in a mud puddle in the back yard.  I applied the heat yet again and bent it over the other way as far as it would go.  Then I removed the cherry red wrench and tried to bend it the rest of the way I wanted it to go and it didn't like it and broke as it cooled.  Pisser.

[CatBox]

Poop.  So I moved on to clear my head.

Lets see what those intake valves become, shall we?
After figuring on the lenght that I needed I marked them with a file and slapped them into the vise of doom.


I would have used VW valves but somebody still has my valve spring compressor...you know who you are

Well I sawed the stem in like half for both.

Then I put the boy to work with my brand new Dremel (I have killed three of these things with use) to clean up the areas at the top that I have marked with an ink pen.



Before I hear about it I have a fire extinguisher at my feet in the garage, Safety First!

Back to the busted wrench.  With it out of the works Max stepped up and made a brilliant suggestion.  Use the rod cap where the wrench was to go and VIOLA!  It will work marvelously.

So here we have our parts.  Marked to be cleaned by the man.

[CatBox]

Well I dun tried to braze the cap to the rod and that was ok but I dropped it on purpose to see if it was durable and it really wasnt so I remove the silver solder and started to look for a wire hanger to use as welding filler.  High tech joining material it is.

My assistant slacked off a bit whilst I was welding the first valve into place after placing them into the rod. So here is the second valve gettin' hitched to the rod.





I think its a wee bit hot.

[CatBox]

Here his legs are welded on but that is all.



It will be able to stand on its own and hold a plaque that has the information on it about the award.

I would usually hide this but i want it to be seen by any traffic bump that comes to visit due to any publicity we get for the event.

Here are a couple of pictures just for fun.  I had to use magnets to hold all the part togther but it is fairly representative of the finished product.








And discuss!

[coolblue57bug]

That is pretty dope Peter. Will it be painted or raw?

[CatBox]

Thank you very much.
I have not quite decided on the finish just yet.
It looks good to me in the raw, but it might also look real good painted in a cast iron grey.

We will see when I get it all welded up and clean.

I went home yesterday and tried to do some more welding but I have run out of acetelyne for my setup and I dont like to weld through the flame popping and hot spatter flying around.  So we wait for me to get a new cylinder, maybe on wed-ness-day

[CatBox]

Tough crowd.

All those views and only the one comment....

I know, you all have been left speachless.....

 

[Tiphanie]

I think it looks pretty fantastic

[CatBox]

Thank you.

 

[LooseNuts]

Tough crowd.

All those views and only the one comment....

I know, you all have been left speachless.....

 

VERY GOOD JOB, GOOD BOY       
       
       
       
       

[Thanney]

As always Peter you never fail to impress, now if you can only remember to bring me my cookies!

[jbjetta]

I wasn't going to comment until I seen the finished product... And I'm still not going to besides letting you know I'm not commenting on it until it is done... 

[LooseNuts]

I wasn't going to comment until I seen the finished product... And I'm still not going to besides letting you know I'm not commenting on it until it is done... 

maybe we should use this logic in your threads.   

























  :rotflmao:JK