KURT’S PIECE

JD came to me after the Bug [had] had its up-close meeting with the wall at MMP. He had a rough budget in his head and was open to ideas on a new look but also keen to retain the flamed theme — at this point, I could sense he had no idea what he was after, other than he didn’t want stickers on his car. I took an image of his car, digitally rendered a concept on Photoshop, and sent it to him. His reply was, in true JD style, “ecstatic”. (OK, I’m good with that, I’ll get everything repaired and get it to you!) The body and front clip were repaired and then painted gloss black and flattened back at Dzine Signs by Dion Crook and ready for pickup. The parts were unloaded and pieced together in true race car fashion — cable ties, blocks of wood, and roofing screws. I then drew up the biohazard logo, cut them to size on the plotter in stencil vinyl, and placed them on both doors as the negative mask.

This is where the artistic licence and fun really starts — mixing up base coat white to be used as the underpainting, and House of Kolor Pagan Gold, Tangerine, Apple Red, Cobalt Blue, and purple Kandy Koncentrates. The rough shape of the true fire was mapped out in a red base coat with Iwata airbrushes — and then the mayhem ensued. A layer of white flames followed by a drenching of red candy, more white then Tangerine, white again with Pagan Gold to get the fire started, then go back through and build the layers to push some depth into it.

I wanted to experiment with adding blues and purples into the flames, and this was done in the same manner as before, just very subtly. The factory Volkswagen headlights were biffed in a box, never to be fitted to the car again. The chrome bezels were retained — I cut some alloy blanks to fit inside and airbrushed them to look realistic.

A few nights after work were spent tweaking parts that I wasn’t happy with, and then it was loaded up and off to Supreme Automotive Refinishers, where Reon Madden slammed it in clear coat, blocked it back, and flowcoated it to seal everything and

make it really shine.

gloss black. It was then handed over to fellow racer and master airbrusher Kurt Goodin to lay down some killer new graphics, along with some realistic flames. Once Kurt had finished and put his crayons back into the box, the shell was drowned in litres and litres of clear. With the makeover complete and the chassis and running gear given the tick of approval, the hard-working crew reunited both parts back together in Kurt’s shed ready for the next meeting.

John couldn’t be happier with the new look and is confident that the car will continue to get quicker with more seat time. “The Bug is certainly fun to drive, but it also deserves some respect, because it will bite ya,” he says.

But don’t think for one minute that this is where the John Shepherd story ends. He has the desire to see just how quickly he can go from point A to point B in an FED, so that may involve the use of a magic fuel that creates its own oxygen and smells funny when it burns … so watch this space!