Picking up where we left off, the doors are stretched 6", the quarters are shortened 6" in the front, 6" in the rear, with the rear leaned in slightly and widened as well. Terry then began work on the tailgate section of Capone. He went to work fabricating the caps to top off the quarter panels and doors....yep, no windows in this cruiser. He then created the F-100's roll pan that house a set of Lokar LED Taillights. After that, he designed and built the skeleton that would be the tailgate framework, and wrapped it in sheet metal.
With all the work put in to beefing up the rear end of this F-100 Panel, maybe Terry should have named it Kardashian instead of Capone.
Small details are very important to Altman when designing a vehicle. The F-100 has a very distinct body line at the top of the doors. Terry carried this body line from the top of doors, along the top of the quarter panels, and around to the top of the tailgate. The lines come together in the center of the tailgate to frame out the 3D machined billet aluminum V8 emblem designed and made by yours truly at Trique Manufacturing.
The V8 emblem was machined from a piece of 6061 aluminum. One press of the button located in the top circle of the "8" will release the two Altman Easy Latches that hold the tailgate closed.
The body lines were not created using body filler. This was all metal work done by Terry to achieve the look he was shooting for.
Take note of the gaps people. Every gap on this vehicle is executed with perfection.
Terry designed and built some seriously strong hinges to manage the tailgate weight on Capone. The lowering and raising of the tailgate is assisted with a cable and pulley system that resides behind the interior quarter panels. The "elbows" of the tailgate hinge system ride on a spring perch system. Terry created this to allow the tailgate to open enough to clear the latches when the release button is pressed, but not come completely open until you are ready to lower it.
As you can see in the picture above, there will be a nice sound system housed in the back end of this beauty. The center panel, located between two speaker enclosures, is mounted with spring loaded pins and easily removable to reveal storage space. By lifting the hinged floor section in the storage area, Terry can access the air ride system that manages the ride height of Capone.
Next week, we will dive into the frame, suspension, engine and transmission selection for Capone. Find out what kind of horsepower this F-100 will be putting out.