This month, instead of my
usual meanderings I'm dedicating this column to a couple of experts in
the field of concours preparation, Chuck Imperatori and Lee Smith.
Both have achieved 100 pt scores in their respective and very
competitive JCNA championship classes, yet they use very different
approaches as you will read.
Eratta Before I turn this
over to Chuck and Lee I want to correct a few errors in past
columns. Last month I talked about how Jaguars have always been
assembled cars. I misspelled Harry Weslake's last name. I
can only blame my secretary. She's a lousy speller, but she takes
great dictation. Of more import is my oversight in the Suspension
Alignment column where I discussed the reasons for using the Ackerman
principle in the design of the front suspension. As was
immediately pointed out to me, race cars do not use the Ackerman
geometry. Most actually use reverse Ackerman where the inside
wheel turns at a smaller angle than the outside. The reason for
this is that under the high loads a race car experiences the outside
tire has a greater slip angle than the inside (it is much more heavily
loaded) and its path simulates that of a tire that is turned at a
greater angle. The trick with race cars is to get the best
compromise so that a tire doesn't become so overworked that it gives up
its traction ability.
DETAILING YOUR CAR FOR CONCOURS
COMPETITION
by Chuck and Sandy Imperatori
I'm flattered to be asked to speak on this subject. I
hasten to add that each time I show my car I learn of new products which
are constantly evolving. So, in effect my thoughts are only suggestions
or those things that work for me. Every person has their own special
formulas, secrets and pet products. My comments are to assist or to be
used as a check list. They are not in anyway an endorsement of products.
Your own pet brand can be used as a substitute. This is only one method
for preparing you car and yourself
1. Personal needs.
Take along comfort items as this will be a very long
day. You'll need a change of clothing such as a clean "T"
shirt to replace the exhausted one, a collapsible tent or an umbrella to
shade you from the sun. You need two collapsible chairs, a cooler for
beverages with lots of drinking water. You need a table or picnic
blanket. Bring your cell phone or walkie-talkies to keep in touch with
your partner to whom you have given your credit card. Above all, be nice
to your companion and make this event fun so that they will want to help
and come again. If you don't have a partner possibly these comfort items
will help you find one. It's at least better than shopping in the super
market.
2. Preparation at home.
Start preparing several days in advance as it usually
takes longer to prepare your car than you think.
You'll make innumerable trips to the automotive store. Do the major
jobs at home such as engine cleaning, painting fender
wells, fixing chips and dents, cleaning carpets, headliners .....
anything that is really tough. You won't have time at the
concours other than to wipe your car off as you try to talk to friends
who most likely want to borrow something from you that they forgot.
Usually you can get on the field about 8:00AM and
it's "rags down" about 10:00 AM. So you have to hustle to set
up your tent. In order to avoid the dreaded hustle and to keep in
harmony with your partner I go one day early. Make your motel
reservations ASAP. You can always cancel. Also,
send in the registration form early to help those working the concours.
Lastly, keep your head on your shoulders as it will keep your spine from
unraveling.
3. Tools
a. Water bucket or canteen and/or as a last resort wet
hand towels in a zip lock bag which can be wrung out. Also, bring
several dry, clean, hand towels.
b. Use "q" tips with wooden stems as those
with plastic stems will melt in solvents.
c. Nylon collapsible garden hose, which can be
purchased in a mobile home supply, with quick snap water-jet nozzle and
on-off valve which can be found in a hardware store.
d. Pliers to open the water bib or spigot for which
the key is probably missing.
e. Small scrub brush, tooth brushes, steel wool pads
and disposable rubber gloves.
f. Stainless steel cup for liquids, paint solvents,
etc. and paper towels.
g. Dustbuster and pressurized aerosol air cleaner used
for computer keyboards.
h. Lint roller for top and upholstery. Indelible black
magic marker for quick touch up.
i. Screw driver, scissors, knife, tweezers, bulbs,
fuses, blue masking tape and long medical foreceps
for those hard to reach places.
4. Cleaners and waxes
a. Blue Coral Dri Aerosol Cleaner for carpets,
upholstery and headliner.
b. Simple Green aerosol for rims, spoked wheels, brake
dust, degreasing or Turtle Wax 2001 foaming brake
dust wheel cleaner.
c. Black Magic Tire Cleaner can be use on any
rubber-plastic parts that require a high shine. If it's dull, leave it
alone. Don't start something you don't need to keep up.
d. Meguiars Quick Detailer hand sprayer for final mist
and wipe. Follow directions.
e. Water. Use under pressure to spray on canvas parts
or top. Do not use detergents.
f. Windex. This product is the best of the glass
cleaners. Rub briskly with a dry, clean towel.
5. Chemicals and paint
a. Xylol, a medium/slow evaporating solvent or thinner
can be used with paints, for tar removal and clean
up. Try on an inconspicuous place on the car and to be safe; follow the
instructions. It can be purchased at Ace Hardware.
b. Acetone and Naphtha are very strong solvents and
highly flammable. Use with utmost caution. Be careful wearing rubber
gloves as they can melt onto your skin.
c. CD-2 is an aerosol engine cleaner which I have
completely sprayed over my entire engine innumerable times and washed
off with jets of water with no problems. There is also an aerosol engine
detailer made by CD-2 which really brightens things. Both come as a
single package and can be purchased at Pep Boys.
d. Rubbing Compound in liquid form is a must. It can
polish as well as being a tar remover, polish chrome and remove over
spray.
e. Aerosol engine paint, high temperature in semi
gloss black and/or silver is perfect for exhaust manifolds and under
carriages or anything else that needs to be painted. If the part is not
subject to heat use Rust-Oleum as it really holds up.
f. Sand paper. Wet-dry 240 grit, multi purpose. A
small piece cut and glued on a bottle cap can be effectively used to
sand down touched up paint pimples.
g. Paper matches after being torn from the book can be
used extremely well as a dripless paint brush for paint chip touch up by
using the torn back end.
h. Finding a paint match can be done by putting a
sample on an inconspicuous place in the engine
compartment or trunk area of the car.
i. Leather or such material can be paint matched by
soaking a small patch of cloth with acetone and repeatedly wiping a
paint matched area; say under a car seat and then transferring that
match by blotting the area that needs to be painted. This process may
have to be repeated many times to acquire the desired cover up.
6. Miscellaneous
a. XK's Unlimited, (800-444-5247), will overnight to
you any part that you require in an emergency.
"Dent Tech USA", "Dent Pro" and "Dent
Wizard" all can get small dents out of your car for approximately
$75.00, more or less. Explain your emergency need and one of the three
will come to your rescue at once. They can be found in the yellow pages.
As a last resort call your Jag dealer as they also use these firms.
b. Step plates can be covered with heavy, flexible,
clear, vinyl taped over the plate to avoid heel
scratches and then be removed for the concours. It can be found
in fabric stores. Other items which can be damaged such as a luggage
back plate in the boot should be removed, provided that chore is a
simple one, does not require special tools or real
time, and can be easily put in place at the concours.
c. On the field, grass can be removed from the tire
treads by using a brush. Then apply Black Magic to
the treaded surface and wipe with a towel to dampen the shine.
The tires will look brand new and set the car off. Do the windows last.
d. As the judges cannot touch your car they will ask
you to open doors, trunks, work the instruments, etc. Wear a glove or
use a rag so that your hand does not leave a fingerprint or smudge;
which can earn you a dirty deduction.
7. Conclusion.
Yes, you are nuts! But you have to admit you and your
partner had fun, met great new friends and saw new places. Most
important, you found other cars in your class, had a chance to chat with
the owners and most likely gained some great information.
In any event you'll have the cleanest car in your
neighborhood. Good luck.
Obsession
by Lee Smith as interpreted by Jerry Nuijen
Lee and Jule’s ‘61 E-Type is the antithesis of Chuck and Sandy’s
XJS. It is never driven. It was a total restoration of a car that had
not been driven in years, rather than a car that was meticulously
maintained from new.
If you are going to win in the class that the Smith’s compete in,
whether it is championship JCNA or SCCA, you have to have a car that is
used exclusively for showing. It must be a car that was restored from
the ground up in the past two or three years and you must be totally
committed to preparation or have a professional preparer work on the car
for a week before a show.
Lee started his presentation by explaining that he had to get a Ph.D.
in physics before he felt ready to compete seriously in concours. Since
cars are judged solely on appearance and the way light reflects from a
car into the judges’ eyes is what really determines the appearance of
a car you must look at a car in all possible lighting conditions. Lee
starts by looking at the car in the dark. Once his eyes have dilated
completely he turns on a very bright spotlight. Shining the light away
from himself at a low angle he can see all the scratches and specks of
dirt and other miseries on the surface. This technique is used in many
scientific fields and is called dark field microscopy. Lee claims it is
100 times more sensitive than looking at the car in normal light. The
reason you must eliminate all scratches, wavy surfaces, and dirt is that
you don’t know for sure what the lighting conditions will be when your
car is judged. Direct sunlight, cloudy, shady, low angle, directly
overhead, light reflected off other cars, all can influence which flaws
will show and which will be hidden. To be a sure winner you need to
eliminate all flaws.
Cracks are particularly difficult enemies. Lee isn’t talking about
cracks in the paint or upholstery that would never exist on a show car;
he means seams, crevices and joints that are part of the car’s
construction. The midday sun of a concour can bore down into the depths
of even the most perfect junction. If there is any wax, dust, overspray
or irregularly shiny areas in that "crack" it will detract
from the appearance of the car. A particularly tough place on an OTS
E-Type is the joint between the top and the rear deck. This seam is
deep, collects lint because of the top, and is extremely difficult to
keep a consistent width and depth because of the "mobile"
nature of a soft-top. Under certain lighting conditions it looks like
hell no matter what you do. The best color to have inside a crevice, if
it is allowable, is flat black. Flat black won’t reflect any light
back to the judges’ eyes. A "sharpie" (magic marker) works
wonders.
Another basic physics principle that Lee never fights is gravity.
Gravity is always with us and it’s everywhere. You can’t defeat it.
Make it work for you. Start cleaning at the highest point of the car and
finish at the lowest point. Anything that you remove from the surface of
the car is going to move down due to gravity. Work with it. Physics is
your friend.
Prepping a car is like doing brain surgery. You must be properly
dressed, and follow strict operating procedure. No rings, no belt,
nothing that will scratch the car should be worn or carried. Lee
reminded us of the little sign,"Unless you’re nude, don’t even
come close to this car." Get all tools that aren’t being used to
do the prep away from the car. We’ve all heard the story of the guy
who put a screwdriver in his back pocket, forgot it, then sat in the
car. This, of course, happened at midnight just 8 hours before he had to
place his car on the field.
Don’t scratch the car! Scratches cannot be repaired to show
standards. "One scratch, $15,000. You need to paint the car."
You, or your assistant need to stay with the car at all times to make
sure no one, including the judges, touches it.
Top show cars are detailed underneath, even though the judges
supposedly don’t look underneath. Good judges will kneel way down to
inspect the suspension, the wheel wells, the exhaust system. They will
look at the car from a long way off if they know it’s a top contender
in its class. The preparation you’ve done underneath can make or break
you. Lee has waxed the underside of this car twice since it was finished
in 1998.
Originally this car was metallic bronze with tan interior. Purchased
from Mike Mueller in Dallas in the early 90’s. The car was in a garage
all apart (10 boxes) and covered with spider webs. Rust was everywhere
because the car had lived in New England most of its life. Dave Ferguson
did all the metal restoration and paint. All the rust was removed and
the metal neutralized. Parts of panels were replaced. The sills were
reinforced. Lee says, "This car will outlive me." Lodi Plating
did all the chrome to Pebble Beach show quality standards (you must
specify and pay for this when rechroming) and Al DeLong did all the
mechanical. Lee thinks he has $70K+ in the car, but hasn’t kept track
lately. The upholstery was done by Rich Elliot. It was actually done
twice because when the mechanical work was done it was damaged.
Mechanics don’t respect show preparation. Make sure you cover
everything that must be done before the mechanical buildup and postpone
everything you can until after the mechanical is done.
"Do you want a piece of art to look at, or do you want to drive
it? I don’t know how to do both." Lee was candid that he hardly
ever sits in this car, let alone drives it. If you sit on the seats very
much they will lose their shape. The leather will wrinkle and scuff.
Many people restore a car, show it for a few years and when it isn’t
winning firsts anymore they start to drive it and restore another car
for show.
Lee conducted a long discussion of paint formulations,
paint-upholstery color combinations and what constitutes authenticity in
these areas. Lee feels that Signal Red with a tan interior is the hot
combination for grabbing the judges’ (and the public’s attention).
Paint is formulated differently today and the top cloths and plastics
and leather dyes are different. It is impossible to be truly authentic
in these areas. The group jumped in with facts, opinions and a few
fallacies about what is acceptable and what isn’t. If a judge
challenges you you need documentation. The original dealer invoice would
be the best. Failing that, you can get some information on original
color and equipment from a Jaguar Heritage title search.
"You’d better enjoy the competition whatever the outcome
because strange things can happen when you are judged. If you don’t
win and know you were beaten by an inferior car you just say to
yourself, ‘We had a great time, we didn’t win this time, but we’re
already thinking about the next show‘."
Lee finished his presentation by showing us some of the tools and
materials he uses for prepping. Always have a complete set of spare
bulbs. The plywood knock-off tool is a must. You should never apply a
hammer to the knock-offs. Artist paintbrushes with long, soft bristles
are great for cleaning in crevices. Used dental tools can be purchased
cheaply and they work great for cleaning off the harder stuff like
"plaque" and "tartar". The dental pick is
particularly handy for stabbing recalcitrant judges. "You can get
in and out and the judge won’t even know you did it."
Getting serious again . . . wooden meat skewers are good tools of
intermediate hardness. As the points wear down discard them. When you
buy your upholstery purchase a bottle of the dye that was used on the
leather. Lee uses Goof-Off as opposed to Xylol for removing stubborn
spots. It can even be used on paint if it is washed off quickly.
Goof-Off is available at hardware stores.
Lee never washes his car. Water can get in places and leave a residue
that is extremely difficult to remove. The exception is the cloth top.
Water, mild soap and a soft brush with a gentle circular motion not only
cleans the top it makes it shrink a little as it dries in the sun,
pulling creases out and giving it a nice taunt look.
Lee made it all seem so easy you end up wondering why your car doesn’t
look like his.
On behalf of the Board of Directors I would like to thank Lee and
Jule for taking the time and trouble to share a few tricks of the trade
with us and we all applaud the dedication and single mindedness that
makes them winners.
