Part 3 - The trip to Theron's

   Among the mods planned for the Golf are Euro-spec bumpers and later model, "big window" doors.  The former were obtained at a deep discount on eBay from a seller in Texas who purchased them just in time to total his GTI.  One man's bust is another man's boon I guess.  The latter items, the "big window" doors, are a more interesting story. Club member Theron Bliss lives up in Granville, a small town on the Massachusetts side of the Mass/Connecticut border, and is the owner of an impressive collection of cars, both collectible and for parts.  The drive itself is worth the trip, with a collection of curvy paved and unpaved roads (stage rally quality to boot) greeting me as I drove from Granby northwest into the Bay State.

The Theron Bliss Collection

   Forget the fact that you're less than a half hour from two large cities, and you think you're in the middle of nowhere. Originally, the plan was for me to go up after the thaw and pick up these doors for a reasonable price.  The reasonable price soon became a straight trade for the grey leather Wolfsburg edition seats that resided in my Jetta.  Theron just picked up a nice GLI recently, and decided that kids and cloth seats don't mix.  Saturday, Fox, Shrub and myself met up at Kart Trak (Fox and I snuck in a reconnaissance run before Shrub got there from work) and headed up and over to Granville.

The proud donor GTI

  Theron was a gracious host; and many parts were exchanged.  The actual swap didn't take long; and in fact I ended up with seats that match the rest of my interior better than the leather seats ever did!  Amazingly, with a little creative packing (including my back seat in the trunk, I was able to fit two doors and a big front bumper cover (for a co-worker) in the Jetta. In the end we all had a great time.   After leaving Theron's, we met up with one of Shrub's co-workers, grabbed some quick Chinese food in Windsor Locks, then proceeded to try and get it to come back up at Kart Trak.   I was able to trade some parts I couldn't use anyway for parts I really wanted to achieve the look I was aiming for in Golf.

Chris Fox (l.) and the author get to work.

  Theron has even offered to host a club show/get together/camp out on his family's vast plot of land.  Might be an idea for a club thing at the end of Summer?

Theron (r.) leads Jimbo and Fox back to the barn.

Random notes...

• The doors are already at the body shop; being disassembled and prepped for paint.  Originally, I planned to swap over the single round headlight grille from my Jetta to this car.  As many of you know, you can really mess up a grille trying to remove the metal strip from the bottom.  After breaking a couple tabs off trying to remove the strip for painting, I've decided to bite the bullet and purchase a new grille & headlight setup.  Now before you start e-mailing me asking how much I want for the old one, it already has a good home; on the front of my rally car.

• In Part 4, we'll see the painting process for the doors, as they are transformed from Tornado Red to plain old VW silver.  We will also go over fitting the Euro-spec bumpers and 16v air dam.

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