Opening it up:   

Allen James - Bloomington, Minnesota ~ March 2000

After receiving Snowball, I went into my office and studied it for about an hour. I finally decided that I’d open the doors. After several sketches and a couple of marker passes on the body, I decided upon a shape for the side windows and the shape of the door cutouts. I decided to give the back edge a slight rake and hinge the doors from the front, plus make them a little larger.

I created a template of .02 thick styrene for scribing the doors out. This helped keep from inadvertently gouging the door face with the Xacto blade. For scribing, I've made a special Xacto blade that has been sanded down on its thickness as to make the escraped cuts as narrow as possible. I then blunt the tip on the sanding disk with a slightly acute angle. This helps to keep the scribe sharp. I have never tried one of the panel scribes, but I hear they work well.

After scribing out both doors, I cleaned up the edges, and put a chamfer on the inside edge of the door where it will hinge. You will see why later on. Then I sat back and looked at what I had done. I decided that the side windows needed to be longer, as they kind of disappeared when the doors were opened. So, I lengthened them another 3/8 inch. This greatly improved their appearance.

Now it is on to hinging the doors. I determined that the hinges should be about .50 inches tall, based upon the size of the door remaining after Jeff's chop job. (which by the way is incredible, as is Paul's hood resculpturing.)

(diagram A) For creating the hinges,  I used brass tube with an inside diameter of .031 in. and piano wire that was .028 inches in diameter. I bent the wire to shape AFTER sliding on the .50 inch length of tube. I checked to make sure that the tube turned freely and that there was no end play (sliding of the tube along the hinge wire). note: You can vary the dimensions shown to accommodate any shape of any door. Allow enough length in the legs of the hinge to attach them to the inside surface of the door rigidly. I try to use as much length as possible. This will get covered up when you the interior door panels are added.

Diagrams B and C illustrates what effects the location of the hinge pivot point has on the way the door opens. Notice that as the pivot point gets closer to the edge of the door, the more likely the door is to rub on the body of the car as it swings. (it’s swinging in a smaller arc.) Consequently, I placed the hinge pivot as far from the mating edges of the door and body as I can get it. This is why I chamfered the inside edge of the door, near the hinge.

To attach the hinges, I taped the door in place on the body, with correct spacing at back and bottom edges, flush to the outside of the body. I then laid the body on its side and located my hinge. I used scotch tape to hold the hinge in place as I epoxyed it to the body.

NOTE:

Examine the hinge as it lays in place on the door and body. In the case of snowball, I needed to arch the wires that attached to the door so that they would lay flat against the back side of the door. This keeps the profile as low as possible.

I also scribed small channels in the back side of the door, to further lower the profile of the wires. I then mixed just enough epoxy (Devcon 5 minute) to do one door. I carefully placed the epoxy around the tube of the hinge, being careful not to get any on the hinge wire, or anywhere near it.

After it was dry, I examined the operation to be sure it was smooth and lined up correctly, and then repeated the process on the other door.

I discovered that this is a freeform process and design, but there are a few rules you must abide by, such as chamfering the inside edge of the door, and locating the pivot point correctly. Other that that, you can pretty much just have a ball with it.

click one:

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