I have just edited and sent some photos from Sunday School off for ill.motion, so that means I can get to the shots for my own blog now! It’s hard to believe the show was already almost a week ago.

I had been trying to figure out a decent way to sort the photos from the event into parts but decided that to do so chronologically – rather than by booths, makes, import/domestic, etc – would be the best. With that said, part one will be a few photos of the prep before the show, and then the coverage of the show itself will start in part two.

Last year Derrick and I attended, and were placed together as the ‘Bill MacKenzie Group’ (that was ill.motion’s category for us. Haha). This year, I wanted to try to organize a larger group and have it registered under the combination of ThreeTwenty and the UCCC. In the end we had eight vehicles ranging from 1974 through 2014 and were lucky enough to get a really good spot in the show. I’d like to say thanks again to everyone who joined the group!

Mario, Brenda, Derrick and I had a detailing day on the 17th, and spent a number of hours getting the cars all ready. Unfortunately, that evening it rained so early Sunday morning we were back at it, rinsing off the cars and redoing a lot of what was done the day before.

Mario’s ST now has a Triple R Composites front splitter, a fairly recent addition which seems to get lots of attention.

Derrick’s Camaro was back on OEM 20s just in time for the show.

After the cars were clean we fired up the barbecue and cooked dinner; a nice way to relax after the detailing.

Much later that evening, I was still wide awake working on the Focus. It was clean but there were lots of little details to take care of and I wanted them done in time for Sunday School. These are just low-quality snapshots, but it was past midnight here and I was just focusing on getting the to-do list done.

First up was to re-do the center caps of the Volvo wheels. They had already been wrapped in vinyl but the Volvo logo stayed; all I did was change the colour to better match the car (the background was matched to the wheels and the logo to the lug nuts). This time around, I thought I’d be sneaky and blend Ford and Volvo together. This idea actually came from a fellow Mk3 owner who suggested I combine the two. I knew from when I first heard it that someday I would have to actually do it. As you can see, the design and font are the same but obviously they now say Ford instead.

It was probably around 1am at this time and there I was, wrapping center caps.

After the four were done and put back in place, I moved on to unwrapping and installing something special which had just arrived. I was able to get my hands on the Steeda Mk3 engine cover. The story behind this is that Steeda had prototyped it and displayed it on their SEMA car. For whatever reason they did not start producing these and eventually the prototype – this cover – went up for sale. It was purchased by an owner I know through a forum we’re on together. Recently, he began parting his car and when I saw that this was in the list of items being sold I jumped at the chance to grab it. This is a one-of-one part and my Focus now wears it! It sort of goes against the yellow and black theme but matches the oil cap I already had.

Note our awesome table cloth; we had just celebrated a birthday so some decorations were still up.

That morning I ultimately went to bed at about 2:30. At 7:30 I woke up and got back to work. We all met up and took care of the final preparations before leaving and driving down to Max Bell at 9:30.

I had mentioned that I’d be bringing a third vehicle with me (because cleaning and preparing two wasn’t enough work), and this was it: a 2014 Mustang 5.0. I was able to take it to the show on behalf of Metro Ford and I had a ton of fun driving it! The plans originally called for a Focus actually, but those changed and I decided that this would be a welcome addition to the group. Here it was getting rinsed off. Stupid rain.

With all of the madness that took place after, no photos were taken. Finally all of the cars were clean again and we hit the road. Part two will follow this, showing the ThreeTwenty group and starting the main coverage of Sunday School 2013!

-Bill