It rained. The in-laws' flight was delayed. I spent Tuesday and Wednesday driving to Miami and back through Expedia hell, rebooking connections and watching my weekend disappear into airport lineups. By Thursday, the sun came back, and I made it to the tent with about five hours of daylight left.

The marathon welding was done. The tent had been my workshop for six months. The work now was methodical. Grind down the welds. Brush all the surface rust off. Wax and dirt remover, the kind of thing that sounds like a spa treatment instead of car repair. Prime it. Don't think about paint yet. Just protect the metal.

I did a little of work in those first few hours back. Fibre filler first, hitting the rough spots where the quarter panels met the body, where tacks had made little peaks in the metal. Then body filler. Sanded in some places, used black spray to see where the cavities were. I think the bondo adventure will continue all weekend.

Someone asked about the primer choice. Why epoxy instead of self-etching? The reason was simple: epoxy primer lets you continue bondo-ing on top of it. Self-etching primer won't bond with filler the same way. At least that's what Eastwood's data sheet says. I had to prevent rust, had to create a working surface for bondo, and I needed to think ahead.

Friday morning. A little break from being a dad and son-in-law meant one thing: back to the tent. I had a list of things to complete: grind down the welds, brush all the surface rust off with a brush disk, use wax and dirt remover and clean the car, mix epoxy primer, spray it so no rust would threaten the project.

I only had black epoxy primer at home and didn't want to spend extra money on a grey one. The car will be some shade of grey eventually, maybe lighter than Nardo, maybe darker, not sure yet. But after sandable primer I'll use grey sealer anyway, so it's fine. After a few hours, all the goals were completed.

Then I took the jacks out from under Fastback and put the car on the ground for the first time since the conversion started. Just sitting there. On four wheels. Off the work stands. Ready to move.

The next step was supposed to be starting the engine, rolling it onto a trailer, moving to the garage at the new house. Less crazy work environment, as I'd hoped. Less weather. Less tent disasters.

I got home around 1pm. Stopped to get starter fluid on the way. It didn't help. First time start after a long pause is always a challenge on this car, but then I realised something wasn't right. The engine would roll for a short period and then stop, not quite like a stall but not enough to crank. I thought maybe there wasn't enough gasoline in the tank. So I brought four gallons of fuel and added it to the tank.

My guess: I bought too weak a battery. I was being cheap and got 500 crank or even less, and from what I understand, it's just not powerful enough after the initial spin to actually crank the motor. It's almost catching up, but just not enough to spin it. Tomorrow I will buy a normal battery. That should hopefully fix the issue.

Then the trailer comes. Then the new house garage. Then bondo forever, and paint forever, and all the things that come after welding. The conversion is structurally complete. Fastback sits in the tent, primed and waiting, grounded and still. One more night of rain in the forecast.