Has anyone had any experiences with Spredway Motors fiberglass? I'm looking to buy all four fenders and both running boards for 41 Ford pickup. I was quoted $1500 to the door which seems fair, but they say it will be 6 weeks before they get here. Just figured I would check, before I bite the bullet with a large order.
I've got a pair of rear fenders for my dad's 37 Chevy truck. They fit like most fiberglass fenders. Their was a few pin holes in the body line gel coat but nothing to worry about. They do however seem a little thinner than what I expected, so make sure you have all your fender braces. If I did it again I would get them again, they had the best price and delivery time for my situation.
I have no experience with their fenders or stuff like that, but I have used two of their bodies so far..........a 27 and a 23 T. They are of very decent quality with very few flaws to fix. Even the best and most expensive glass parts have some issues to correct, just the nature of the beast, but dollar for dollar Speedway glass parts seem to be a good value. Their fiberglass is also not paper thin like some I have seen, but are actually pretty heavy layups. Don
About 6 years ago I bought a 27 T body from Speedway. Nice thick fiberglass, like any fiberglass part it needed some work but overall worth the money.
I have held those same fenders up to a pickup a gent here was building. They were pretty nice and I would not be afraid to run them. He ended up finding steel fenders in the end. (his bodyman wanted steel and this was a hiogh dollar ride)
I got a set of rear fenders for my '33 PU that I was told were from Speedway, glass is thick and fenders were well done. I would buy again.
My buddy, Tom put a full set on his 41 ford pickup. He painted it in satin black and they looked great...er, until I was driving it on the freeway and came in contact with a great big metal cooler that jumped out of a pickup in front of me...a new fender and front end alignment later and it was fine again.
Just as a point of information THICK Fiberglass does not equate to high quality. If the resin to fiberglass ratio is too high you will have a thick part with little strength. If the part is a chopper gun layup it will be thicker than a hand laid part, but not necessarily stronger.
Just an option for you, but I just bought (2) rear, (2) front and (2) running boards from Superior Glass works in Oregon for my '38 Chev pickup. The complete order came in a week and a half. They did make a mistake and send me a car fendor for my truck, but sent another in less than a week. I did not find any pinholes in the gelcoat on anything, anmd it will take minimal work to get them rady for paint....I m only pre-fitting now, but am super satisfied so far... Tom
Thanks for all the great replies. I was on the phone with the guy from Speedway Motors about to order them and he told me that I can't get the rear passenger side fender without the spare tire dimple. And I'm not sure that I want to try glassing over a brand new fender. What a buzz kill! I checked into Superior Glass, unfortunately, they dont make parts for a 41 Ford pickup.
I guess I am the only one that had problems with Speedway glass. I bought a 27 T,with opening doors in 1998. I finished painting it in 2001. It was my best paint job ever. After a few hours in the sun the chopped glass started printing through. It gets worse every year. The sides are not too bad but the rear deck looks like spagetty. It did make a mag feature in Rodders Diegest,in 2005.
Wescott's does make the rear fender without a dimple. Not sure how the price compares with Speedway though...
$460 a piece. They like them bad boys. Thanks for the suggestion. I have steel rear fenders on there now, not in too bad of shape. They are 42-46 fenders and they don't line up with the running boards very good. For the price of two of these I can do some metal work and have my body man fill in the ones I have quite nicely.
No problem. A guy I know bought a pair from Wescott's a few years back so I knew they made 'em; just thought I'd throw it out there. If you can work the steel fenders into shape at a price that fits you, I say go for it.
All fiberglass bodies (or parts) should be sealed real well before you start priming them. The body on my 27 is a 25 year old Speedway and when I redid the car a couple of years ago I had about 2 gallons of Featherfill sprayed on it, most of which ended up as sanding dust on the garage floor. But it prevents any shadowing or bleedthrough. Don
I'm sorry, but I would have to disagree. If the resin/ catalyst ratio is set correctly in the gun, and the glass feed speed is set correctly into the gun, the difference between hand laid glass and chopper gun will be little. A comparison is using a brush to apply paint or using a spray gun. If the settings of the spray gun are not correct it will produce poor results. The common misconceptions are that an equal thickness throughout the part is preferable. This is not so. In higher stress areas thicker material is needed. Bolt flanges are great example. In that area you need thicker amount of resin/ glass to help spread the stress of the bolts. The funny thing here is that If you look at some steel fenders there are extra layers of steel in high stress areas for exactly the same reasons! The reason people prefer hand laid glass is they think that everything is better controlled. I have seen a lot of resin rich hand laid parts. These parts are weaker because of the high resin/low glass ratio. A lot of people like the thought of the " hand laid" as it implies that it was lovingly hand made for them. I hope these people insist on having their cars brush painted for the reasons! Chopper gun laid glass gets bad rap from poor application or poor gun set-up, just like a paint gun. There are some areas where hand laid is superior though. We used to hand lay our deck lid skins and door skins. I wanted a uniform thickness on these parts, and they were not bolted to anything so there were no high stress areas. Hand laid was perfect for this application. But the technician still had to be very careful when mixing and applying the resin to keep the correct resin/glass ratio. To return to the OPs original question. Several years ago Speedway had a reputation for producing inferior fiberglass parts. Not any more. Last year I built a'27 roadster for a customer using one of their bodies. I was impressed. I can't speak to the '41 truck fenders though, but if their standard is of the same quality as their bodies, I would buy them. Sorry for the rant. Cheers, Stewart.
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