DIY wide body fender flares – Yep it’s really happening!

I’m still plugging away at the flairs and you know I'm starting to warm up to the idea this just might work! 

As trial an error goes the first layer of fiberglass was both a trial and an error.... I'm not sure why but it bubbled and pulled away from the frame in several spots leaving rather large bumps to deal with.  It's hard to see in the photo but it was pretty nasty.  

I really could see no way to fix it other than to get out the grinder and take off the high spots.  That led to a week of grinding, patching and filling to make the high parts low and the low parts high.  The good news is I figured out a way to keep it from lifting like that again and they are starting to take shape and look good now.



With the fronts now covered I had one of my many sit on the garbage bucket and stare at the car till I figure out how to proceed sessions.  


The more I pondered the more I knew I had to toss everything in the back and start over.  They were just way to small compared to the front and if I don't go really bold back there the big tires will look like a monster truck.

  
So I took the lessons learned from the front and started with an entirely different approach. I pushed things out as far as I could on the quarter and also went straight up at the top about a 1/2" to give it a muscle car sort of shoulder.

I used roughly the same top to bottom curve of the original fender but exaggerated it a lot front to back and came up with this..

 

The photos don't do it justice they have some pretty sexy curves in them.

 

I made each piece for both sides at the same time to keep things as identical as possible.

I also was very careful to make things smooth so no drill holes this time because that distorted the metal.

It's slow putzy work but so far I have about 55 bucks into it so can't really complain. I would have less than that in it if I did have to turn all the fiberglass bumps into dust!

Psalm 37:3-5:

"Trust in the LORD and do good;

Dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness.
Delight yourself in the LORD;
And He will give you the desires of your heart.
Commit your way to the LORD,
Trust also in Him, and He will do it."

Hard to believe that one year ago today I cut the tunnel and made my first weld on the car...