I must at this stage mention Trev D, a professional metal shaper and member of the Locost forum. His help and patience have been an inspiration to me and enabled me to produce shapes that I would not have though possible. He has built a Locost to an amazingly high standard and one of the features that I particularly like is

To pre-empt any SVA problems, I have removed the screen and the “Lift the Dots” fasteners. If you remember, I have raised the body by 30mm and whilst the standard body height and thus the screen height maybe acceptable for our friendly SVA tester, it is possible that the odd 30mm might put the screen into the realm of needing wipers and washers. In actual fact, driving the car at Haynes was a very comfortable experience because of the protection of the screen and, I guess, the general aerodynamics of the car. There was absolutely no buffeting nor any need to wear goggles. My eyes are just above the top edge of the screen so in the wet there should also be no problems with the rain anyway! In any event, I thought it best to play safe. I’m fairly certain that the Dots are unacceptable so best to replace them with button heads for the time being. In the long run, I am going to have another tonneau made that fits over the screen. This will not only be easier to fasten but I hope will give a sufficiently sloping surface for rainwater not to puddle on it.

I’m still waiting for the bonnet to be painted and I am putting the time to good use by making the backings for the crash padding that will run along the sides of the car. I am using 20swg mild steel folded into a right angle to give 30mm and 25mm sides. Using the shrinker/stretcher, I have reproduced the shape of the side of the car and attached it with M4 countersunk s/s screws. I shall either weld or silver solder the screws to the angle, as the heads will be inaccessible once he padding is in position. As many of you may have gathered, I get bored by repetitive jobs and so I am not looking forward to making the second backing piece for the offside. It doesn’t look much but in fact it took between 3 and 4 hours to get the shape exactly right. I lost count of the number of times I had to change the jaws from shrinking to stretching and vice versa. The shape that I have achieved follows the bodyline nicely and gives the added bonus of stiffening the fibreglass along the top edge; good because this edge might be strained by the less agile or panic stricken passengers trying to abandon ship!!