A "She Shed" she said?

There is still work to do, but at least it is fully painted.

If you've seen that insurance commercial that shows a "she shed" on fire after being struck by lightening, then you've got an idea what the ultimate shed would look like. That one has big windows, french doors, a small deck out front, and of course a chandelier.

I started hearing about she sheds a couple of years ago from my Wife and her friend. They are both into what was once referred to as scrapbooking, though that has morphed into more "artsy" pursuits. The idea was pushed by some some of the artist/crafts person magazines. These just used to be referred to as backyard work shops.

Backyard sheds are nothing new. Smaller, closet sized sheds have been used to house yard care products, such as fertilizer and insecticides, along with garden and yard tools. Larger sheds were used to house lawn mowers and such.

Even bigger ones could be used as an out door wood shop, or hobby shop.

If you had enough room in back a detached garage and auto shop could be constructed in the back yard. That is if the city ordinances allows it. I thought about that seriously for awhile, Then I could have a real shop where I could work undisturbed and out of the way.

This would be a major undertaking. Expensive and it would have to fully conform to all building ordinances. The proper access to the backyard is paramount, although I hadn't planned on driving cars in and out on a daily basis.

I even considered building a shed out back to use as my den (I hate the term man cave).

The alternate idea of setting up my den as part of the garage was quickly dismissed.

I was considering an 8' x 10' or 10' x 12' shed. My current, "in house" den fits right between those two sizes, it's roughly 10' 6'' x 11'6'' and its a very good size. I use my den to read, listen to music, and visit with my guests. It is a quiet relaxing haven.

Could I have achieved this in a backyard shed?

Sizewise, there wouldn't really be a problem, although the inside of the shed would have to be better finished and equipped with electricity. Though it might be located at only fifty feet from my patio door, it's still a long and inconvenient walk back to the house to use the rest room. Walking through the rain, and the dark in the Winter might not be too pleasant.

I did have a fantasy of making the outside resemble a 1940's style Spanish bungalow, painted terra cotta color. I thought that I might construct an archway and a fenced off front deck or patio. It might resemble a tourist cabin or a unit in a bungalow court.

This would be a sweet backyard retreat.

I like the looks of this relaxing bungalow courtyard.

I would imagine that tourist cabins were more like glorified single camper tents, and did not have inside bathroom facilities. There would have to be communal toilet and shower facilities like a KOA or National Park campground. Okay for a night or two on vacation, but not an arrangement you would want to live with on a daily basis.

Had my Wife ever considered using a shed as her artists' studio? Not really. She often works well into the night, and wouldn't want to be alone out there in the dark. She would also be cut off from contact with the family and that always important bathroom. There is also the always important security issue. Inside the house she is as safe as she is ever going to be. A couple of years back our neighborhood, our whole city in fact, went through an epidemic of residential burglaries, based on several factors. While our neighborhood had always been considered one of the safer ones in the city, it was hit pretty badly. Being outside the house could be somewhat hazardous in some conditions. Fortunately, municipal  issues were resolved and the burglary rates returned to normal numbers.

My (Her?) idea was to give my Wife plenty of workspace in the house itself. I had turned my Son's old bedroom into her scrapbook room a few years back, when he went off to college. I hung slatwall and shelves, set up a desk, cabinets, and a large table. It resembled a well stocked scrapbook store. But it was a bit small.

My (Our?) plan was to give my Wife the entire living and dining room "L" area. Our existing dining table was moved into the middle of the living room and became the main work surface. The former dining room now houses a work island and storage. Lots of storage. You can never have enough storage! Library card catalogs, printer's cabinets, old machinist and chemistry lab cabinets. All of those wonderful little individual drawers! Not to mention a slew of new stuff from Ikea.

And chandeliers! I've hung three of them in this work space. Though very "frou-frou" these actually are a very good solution to lighting. This space has very high ceilings, 14 ft. It's hard to distribute enough light to work comfortably in an area like this. It also has large windows, almost the entire west wall, as well as a sliding door to the patio. There have been more additions and decor added, but the overall effect has been quite satisfactory. We are still able to use the space for the Holidays and family get togethers.

While this space is completely under my Wife's dominion, I still take a lot of satisfaction and pride in seeing it. I contributed the grunt work and a lot of running around gathering the components from innumerable antique and craft fairs. When the current reorganization is finished, I will do a post highlighting the studio as I did for my den. With my Wife's permission, of course.

So many times we homeowners feel bound by the old rules of room use that were decided upon by our home's builders, years ago. The dining room is filled with a formal table and china cabinet that are seldom used. The living room is filled with fancy furniture, sometimes wrapped in plastic covers, that is almost never used. So half of the main living space of the house is underused. It's not like our house has any extra room to waste. Our house has a family room adjoining the kitchen and this has become our main living space, although we also use my Wife's studio space.

My Son's old bedroom became my den, which I use to entertain my visitors, and other family members, can duck in there to talk on the phone, read, and we use it occasionally as a guest room.

All of this is kind of off the subject, but it is just to illustrate that there are different alternatives to using backyard sheds. Although our shed is pretty in pink, it is going to be used as a storage unit, not a workspace.


This is all part of the "life" that gets in the way of our automotive pursuits. Not always a bad thing.


All this to empty out the garage for me.

Why can't I be satisfied by a new car? Or at least a "normal" car?

photo source:www.istockphoto.com
So many choices!

Like almost everybody, our consumer actions face the harsh realities of our financial resources. We can only buy the car that we can afford, or at least get financing for!

We can have champagne tastes with a beer budget.

These things sell for over 200,000 dollars! 

I saw a new Bentley Bentayga SUV parked, and driving on the street as I went to the library today. So there are people out there with champagne tastes and a champagne budget! It obviously isn't me.

Why would I prefer an older car instead of a new or late model car? Can't I find something that I can afford that would satisfy me?

Objectively speaking there should be something out there that would fill my needs.

Of course there is. I once bought a new truck and  a new Mustang. Both of these cars have been very useful, and in fact, both vehicles are still in my family's usage.

If logic is not the dominant consideration, than what is?

Why, then it would have to be determinations based upon emotional reasons.


I got to thinking about this Today, while at work, looking out into the employee parking lot. Is it really possible that there aren't any cars out there that I could be happy with?


I've often written about the difference between "normal" automotive consumers and the "real car guy."
Normal people only want cars that provide drama free transportation. If they can find something that they like, that is fun, or can even convey a little status, so much the better.

All of this makes sense of course. Who needs headaches?

For some reason, it seems that I do.

At least I'm not the only one!

What am I looking for?

Not just for regular transportation with a little "t."

I have not been immune to the charms of a "normal" vehicle. They come in very handy for little "t" transportation needs. I recently drove a late model Hyundai Elantra and I have to say that I was quite impressed. This small car was plenty roomy for four adults, had excellent a/c, drove well, seemed well built and even had a pretty big trunk. Not to mention fuel economy in the high thirties. This was the second Hyundai that I've had experience with, I rented a new Sonata when I drove down to L.A. to pick up my XJ6 a few years ago. I was equally impressed by that model. I think that a nice Hyundai Santa Fe SUV could be a very rewarding vehicle to own.

But they don't satisfy the soul.

While a normal car would be very useful, I still want a car that provides me with recreation, not just transportation.

                                              --------------------------------------------------------------


Your choice of car depends on your automotive self image.  If you're going to be an enthusiast, you are going to have a special relationship with your car. After all, you are more educated about cars, you are more involved with them, and more in tune with them.

So if you are this "special" car guy, how can you get excited about driving something like a new Camry?

What can you drive that will mark your "specialness?"

I, like most of us, will never be able to just go out and buy some kind of super cool, fantastic, incredible new car.

I don't have that kind of money and I never will. I will never be able to buy a new Porsche, Ferrari, or Aston Martin. These are seriously cool cars, and they sell plenty of brand new ones to the fortunate guys that have the coin. Even buying a fairly common, high performance car like a Shelby Mustang, Camaro or even a Corvette is not in the picture. Not everyone that buys one of these desirable cars are true enthusiasts, probably most aren't. But almost any of us would buy a cool car if we had the money. But what do you do when you don't have the money?

Stay Golden, Pony Boy.

Do you remember the book "The Outsiders" by S.E. Hinton? This teenage melodrama centers around a classic class struggle. The affluent Socials and the much poorer Greasers. Of course the Socials enjoy all the benefits of their parent's affluence and influence while the Greasers have to struggle with their precarious financial and social positions. Sometimes all the Greasers have to fight back with is their fists.

Hopefully, most of us didn't grow up in such a tumultuous environment, but maybe some of us can remember high school. We can remember that the "rich kids" got to drive the new cars their parents bought them. The blue collar kids got to drive their parent's beat up, old hand me downs or some clapped out beater they managed to buy with the meager earnings from their Summer and Weekend jobs. If you can't compete with a new car, you've got to make your car "cool."

Hot Rods, Kustoms, Lowriders, Street Machines, V Dubs, and JDM Ricers, Rat Rods. Every generation of blue collar kids has given rise to a new genre of customized automobile. Our response has always been, "Your folks can buy you a new car, but they can't buy you a cool car. You've got to build that for yourself."

Well, at least we try to.  Our car is a reflection of who we want to be. It is a showcase of our enthusiasms, our expertise, and our dreams.

If we don't try to build some kind of customized machine, we choose some esoteric old car. Something that the mass consumer would never think of driving. In the last thirty years the grown up "rich kids" have been co-opting our automotive territory, first with classic hot rods and then with classic muscle cars. They've been buying up all the cars we used to play with. It leaves fewer choices for the true gear head. But we can still find something that is "different." We just keep looking for things in that obscure niche.

I remember  when these old GTOs were cheap.
Not anymore.

This line of thinking doesn't make much sense to most people, but as a low buck enthusiast we don't have much of a choice.

"Real car guys" versus "Tourists."

image source: learnedalongthewayblog

There really is no division.

One of my favorite blog sites, "My Jaguar Experience," recently presented a dichotomy of this nature. The story was the experience of trying to Daily Drive a series three XJ6. The never ending series of little problems finally resulted in a major breakdown that brought the ownership experience to an unhappy end.

The author places a lot of blame on himself, which I feel is pretty unfair and unnecessary.  He is not a hands on enthusiast, and is not the kind of person that will diagnose the problem and perform the repair himself. He has never made any claims to the contrary.

He breaks the enthusiast community down into two camps. The "real car guys" and the "tourists."

The real car guys motto is "We can do it!"

That's the attitude!

The real car guys are those that have quite a bit of mechanical knowledge and experience and will perform much of their cars needed maintenance and repairs. They also possess the necessary tools and equipment. The real guys also have the proper attitude which is something like the following: Any older mechanical device will eventually wear and need repair. This is no big thing. Identify the problem, secure the needed part, and just fix it. When there are no apparent problems, just keep your eye on probable avenues of future failure.

When a problem exceeds their skill or ability then they might just perform part of the repair. Remove the transmission and take just that to a repair specialist, for example. This alone will result in a substantial savings.

"If you're going to be a tourist, be a rich one!"
Thurston Howell III

Tourists on the other hand, are just visiting the territory, you might say. They might mingle with the natives, assume some mannerisms in speech and dress. You would never mistake them for the real thing. So in the automotive hobby they might even be described as posers.


They may have an actual interest and even preference for vintage or classic cars. They can be quite knowledgeable and well versed in the enthusiast lingo.

Usually they are not "hands on" guys. They are usually lacking in the skills or aptitude to turn wrenches on their own machines. Often they will say that they are "all thumbs" or "mechanically challenged" or use some other self deprecating phrase.

I propose that what most of them lack is the real need to work on their own stuff. The tourist usually has more resources available than the grass roots gearhead. They can either easily afford to pay for a shop to handle their repair work, or they choose to save and budget money for the inevitable repairs.

If they are not really affluent then they might have to restrict their hobby to a single vintage car. It becomes the focus of their carefully planned expenditures.

On the other hand, If they are really affluent then they just buy the best examples out there. Low mileage, well preserved or restored vehicles. They are the ones that pay top dollar for the best cars.

Compare that to the typical "real car guy," Sometime refereed to as the "gearhead."  He often acquires a stable of worn and broken down cars with the hope of someday fixing them up. He will often pile way too much on his plate. Oftentimes this gearhead is of the bucks down variety. As a consequence of this, many, if not most, of his projects will never see completion. He might keep several vehicles in service as runners or daily drivers. While a rich guy can boast about how much money his project is costing him, the gearhead will often brag about how much work they are putting into their cars.


The low bucks gear head knows that the only way that he can own and enjoy "interesting" cars is to buy them in a "challenged" state. The kind that are advertised as projects that need a lot of TLC. As if love alone could ever fix anything mechanical.

Having a stable of project vehicles reduces the amount of cash available to spend on any specific car. This will make anyone, even someone of average means, behave somewhat like a bucks down guy. This provides plenty of incentive to do it yourself.

The fact that a Tourist occasionally finds himself over his head in a certain car does not mean that he was a "poser."  Unless you are like old Thurston Howell III where cost is never a consideration, everyone runs into their financial limits. People in both camps have run into that situation.

Most "normal" people have no real interest in buying, maintaining, using or preserving a vintage car. They may murmur about some car from their high school days. Or wax nostalgic about their buddy's '57 Chevy or '65 Mustang when they see one on the street. But their reality is about having a vehicle that takes all the risk and pain out of daily transportation. Who can blame them? We all have "lives" to lead. A brand new car, or at least the newest that they can afford, makes the most sense.

Some of these new car owners are passionate about their newly purchased vehicles. If they bought some type of specialty vehicle like a sports car or 4x4 truck. They can be quite the fan boys. They just might just prefer, and have the means, to trade up to a new model every few years.

The old car car enthusiast is an entirely different matter. For some reason, not only does he have an interest in vintage cars, he even wants to own one! Even worse, he actually wants to drive it, sometimes every day! Most older cars are cheaper than a new model. Most of us low buck enthusiasts depend on massive depreciation to bring desirable cars down to our financial  level.

So is there really a conflict (chasm?) between the Tourist and the real car guy? I don't think so. For one thing, there is actually quite a bit of crossover that takes place between the camps. Many car guys cross over into the Tourist camp when conditions change or improve. Old age and more disposable cash combine to limit the car guys direct involvement in the day to day wrench turning.

On the other hand many Tourists become quite familiar with their cars and will start to stick a hand under the hood once in a awhile. Even if they don't start tearing down motors, they can be adept at minor repairs, like tune ups, belts and hoses. Little things like changing bulbs and chasing down minor electrical gremlins can make it much easier to keep an older car on the road.

Besides, many tourists actually provide the pay check for a lot of real car guys. A lot of real car guys are in business providing services to the tourists. Like the artist/ patron relationship, some of the best and most creative builders and restorers rely on that blank check provided by the wealthy patron. It keeps them in business.

So what do I mean when I use the word poser?

Or as they are sometimes referred to, as "Gold Chainers." A much harsher term of judgement.

I don't mean the guy who just recently developed an interest in older cars. Lot's of guys couldn't afford the money or time for a hobby car when they were in the middle of career and family responsibilities. It has been an interest that they have only been able to indulge as they got older.

And it's not just because the owner is affluent, and can afford to have the work done properly by a shop. Or that they can buy those best examples. I think that every enthusiast would choose to buy the best, if they could afford it.

I would only refer to a person as a poser if they claimed that they performed the work done on a car as something that they did, when they didn't. Or if they didn't bother to learn anything about the car that they had built for them.

The other case is when the focus of the car is not on the car itself, but on the amount of money spent on it. And they make a point of constantly mentioning the cost of things in an obvious attempt to impress the onlooker.

Like many things in life it's not an either /or proposition. The tourist and the real car guy, and even the poser, are in the same camp. They are all interested in vintage cars, as opposed to the greater car consuming culture. They are like two ends of a continuum or just different facets of the same gem stone. We have much more in common then the differences that separate us.

I think that wherever we currently fall on the continuum, we all got involved in old cars just to have a little fun. As long the hobby is still primarily fun, we should enjoy it and cut our fellow enthusiasts, as well as ourselves quite a bit of slack.

I'll admit that I never measured the back spacing of the original Jaguar wheels. Oops My bad!

As you can see the backspacing is pretty deep.

I measured the original wheel's backspacing at approx. 4 inches.

There are several factors that have to taken into consideration when trying to fit non original wheels. First of all there is the wheel lug pattern, in this case they are identical at 5 on 5 spacing.  The second is the diameter of the rim. Generally you can usually fit a larger wheel than stock. I replaced the original 14 inch. wheels on my '70 Mustang with 15 inch Ford Ranger wheels. In the case of my Mark VII my plan was to change to a 15 inch wheel that accepts a more conventional and easier to source tire size.  Not to mention much. much, cheaper. Since I had an old 15 inch Riviera wheel lying around I tried it on front position. It cleared the brake drum and didn't seem to have any interference with the tie rod ends. The backspacing on this wheel was 3 3/4 inches. I think that this wheel came off of a '77 Riviera. This was disc brake equipped vehicle and I believe that the backspacing is greater with disc brake wheels.

When I was looking for replacement wheels I thought that wheels from a drum brake equipped car would be a better fit. As I posted last week, I figured that a wheel that could fit over the finned Buick drums would fit easily over the Mark's rather large brake drums. I should have measured the Mark wheels before I bought those Wildcat wheels. When I arrived in Cotati I measured the backspacing on the Buick wheels.

The backspacing of the Wildcat wheels was only 3 inches.  I decided that the wheels would probably work okay, especially since they were only going to be used temporarily. I didn't anticipate any problems using them on the front wheels. There was a lot of space surrounding the wheel and it doesn't seem that there were any problems. 

Obviously things were going to be much tighter in the rear, especially with those tight fitting spats. As I was fitting the wheels I discovered that there was some conflict in between the sidewall and the bottom front edge of the wheel opening. This was while I had the car jacked up. I trimmed off the small triangle of metal and when level there was plenty of clearance. That little bit I trimmed off won't effect the fit of the fender skirt. You won't even be able to see it with the skirt in place.

 The tires are spaced out almost an inch from stock.
When the body was jacked up there was a bit of conflict with the sidewall 

What will affect the clearance is the wider track of the wheels. The tire rubs against the inside of the skirt. So I won't be able to run the skirts with these wheels. I wonder if the cut away skirts used on the Mark VIII would clear the tires. Or maybe some "Coombs style" radiused cutaway skirt might be employed.

It didn't take much to restore some clearance.

I think that Ronnie Adams just ran without skirts
 when he won the 1956 Rally de Monte Carlo

Coombs style open wheel arch.
I might try this if I find an extra pair of skirts.

So what is the final result? 

I have a set of tires with good amount of tread left. The tread is almost twice as wide as with the original style tire. The track has been widened by around an inch and a half. The car sits about an inch and a half lower due to the smaller diameter of the tire and wheel. It seems to me as though this could only have a positive effect on the handling. 

I really don't have any impression of the way it would of handled when new. What I was looking for was a set of tires that I could use while I was trying to get the car up and running. That's what I've got.

Modern radials are much better than old bias ply tires.

I've always hated the way those tall side wall, pie crust tires look.

I put the skirt on just for the photo.
I have always had a preference for whitewalls.

Now, I've just got to get this thing running.