13th Annual Breast Cancer Fundraiser & Car Show

Join Almost Everything Auto Body in supporting a great cause and see a whole lot of fantastic cars. Team District 10 has been holding their Breast Cancer Awareness Fundraiser for 13 years. Each year it has gotten bigger and better. We have included just a few of our photos from last year when there were over 300 cars. This year moves to Newpark Mall to accommodate even more cars and people.

Event:  Team District 10's 13th Annual BCA Fundraiser Car Show
Date:  Saturday, Oct. 12, 2019
Time:  12:00 - 6:00 PM
Place:  Newpark Mall, Newark, CA 94560

Almost Everything has donated $300 to this event plus $1000 in gift certificates. We encourage you to make a donation too.

Almost Everything's Painter Saves Priest

Almost Everything Auto Body's painter, Jose de la Torre

Today's article has nothing to do with cars and everything to do with the quality of our people. Jose de la Torre has worked at Almost Everything for years as a painter and body technician. He moonlights as a superhero.

Last week de la Torre saw a man, Juan Perez, knock 89-year-old priest John Coleman to the ground. Perez is suspected of being high on methamphetamine. Perez beat the priest with the priest's own cane until the cane broke. Our painter, de la Torre, ran from his car to help. As reported in the July 17, 2015 San Jose Mercury News, the priest said de la Torre, "tackled the guy so quickly. . . like a football player. He was really outstandingly selfless." Two other men pinned Perez until police arrived. Coleman, de la Torre and the 2 other rescuers sustained cuts and bruises and were treated by paramedics. Perez is charged with four felony counts of assault with a deadly weapon and one count of elder abuse.

De la Torre never mentioned any of this to us. We learned of it by reading the newspaper. That's pretty typical of de la Torre. He is as honest, hard working and humble a man as you could know and we are proud and honored to work with him.

De la Torre shows his injury from fighting off the meth addict and saving a priest.

First Guiness World Record for an Auto Body Shop?

At Almost Everything Auto Body we were flabbergasted when this plaque arrived via our friend Mike Camicia and his cabal of students & ne'er-do-wells. Mike is the local racing legend & Gunn High Auto Tech Instructor.

Gunn High School Pizza Planet Replica at Speed during 24 Hours of LeMons, Sonoma Raceway

Mike & team won the award racing their their Pizza Planet Delivery truck (a replica of the cartoon version from the movie Toy Story.) According to Guiness, "Almost Everything Team Pizza Planet participated in the following record event: The most participants in a car race was 216 cars at an event organized by John "Jay" Lamm and The 24 Hours of Lemons racing series (USA) at Thunderhills (SIC) raceway park, California, USA on the 13-14 September 2014."

Gunn High School Pizza Planet Truck Replica

Almost Everything's admittedly small part in the adventure was sponsorship and moral support.

Almost Everything-mobile in front of Gunn High Auto Tech Team & Pizza Planet Racer

Gunn High Auto Tech Team: Micah McElravy, Matts Lark, Karl Rodgers, Mike Camicia & Nadine Camicia with Pizza Planet Racer

Believe it or not, this is NOT the first World Record that Almost Everything has been a part of. We also sponsored the "Beaver Geezers" 2009 World Speed Record Volkswagen Beetle.

Almost Everything Sponsors Gunn High School LeMons Racer

Almost Everything Auto Body is extraordinarily. . . no. . . stupendifically proud to sponsor Palo Alto's Gunn High School Auto Tech in the infamous 24 Hours of LeMons! This year's super enduro for sub-$500 vehicles takes place (at least in California) at Sonoma Raceway, Sears Point.

Join Us!

Date:    March 22-23, 2014

Time:    . . . it's a 24 hour race. . .

Place:

           Sonoma Raceway

           "Sears Point"

           29355 Arnold Dr.

           Sonoma, California 95476

Spectator Admission:   $30

That's right, unlike the $140 NASCAR race a few weeks later, this one is nearly free!

Gunn Auto Tech students created as their LeMons entry a replica of the Pizza Planet delivery truck made famous by Pixar's Toy Story. 24 Hours of LeMons is a humorous take on the oldest, most grueling and prestigious auto race, the 24 Heures du Mans. The real LeMans race is held annually in LeMans, France with top auto manufacturers competing with the fastest cars in the world. The 24 Hours of LeMons is NOT like that. It was established in 2006 by Car & Driver editor Jay Lamm as “Endurance Racing for $500 Cars” (i.e. lemons.)

Before:

In Process (Painted at Almost Everything):

After Customization at Gunn High School:

Almost Everything provides support for youth programs in the San Francisco Bay Area through regular sponsorship of the Washington High School Car Show, California School for the Deaf internships, Gunn High School and many other local events.

Before:

In Process:

 After Customization at Gunn High School:

Mike Camicia is the Gunn High School Auto Tech Instructor, an SCCA (Sports Car Club of America) champion and local racing legend. Mike quips that his wife has actually won more SCCA championships that he has. Our kind of family!

Before:

After Customization at Gunn High School:

Frank Barnard, Almost Everything's General Manager, says, “Kids that learn to build and race cars for the 24 Hours of LeMons better understand the need for safety, the potential and limitations of cars in general, and the potential consequences of an accident. It's a great education."

Pizza Planet Rocket under development:

Pixar/Pizza Planet Trivia: amazingly, the Pizza Planet truck has appeared in nearly every Pixar movie to date including: Toy Story (where it first appears), A Bug's Life, Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, Cars, Ratatouille, WALL-E, Up, Brave (apparently, pizza and Toyota pick-ups have been popular since the dark ages.) See Wikipedia for the complete list and descriptions of how/where the truck appears.

More info. on Gunn High School Auto Tech, 24 Hours of LeMons & Sonoma Raceway:

http://www.gunnautotech.com/ (Gunn High School Auto Tech Website)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hIkpOIwSV4 (Gunn High School Auto Tech Video)
http://www.24hoursoflemons.com/
http://www.racesonoma.com/

Fremont's Washington High School & Almost Everything in Autobody News

Washington High School hosts their 9th Annual Car Show & Food Drive this weekend. Almost Everything Autobody returns as a proud sponsor. The car show raises funds for the auto program at the school and for Mission Valley Regional Occupational Programs (ROP.) The event doubles as a food drive for the Tri-City Homeless Shelter.

Join us:

Date:  Saturday, May 12, 2012
Time:  7:00 - 4:00
Place:  Washington High School
38442 Fremont Blvd.
Fremont, CA 94536

Washington High School Car Show v9.0

Join Almost Everything Autobody for fun, great cars and an easy opportunity to help local students at the 9th annual Washington High School Car Show. It is a truly great show that brings lots of cars of every imaginable variety.

Get close & personal with impeccable classics, smoking muscle cars, wild rat rods, choppers & custom bikes and a few vehicles that may be more dance club or video arcade than car. In addition to the street candy, there will be food, raffles, prizes and music. The event raises funds for the auto shop program at the school and at Mission Valley Regional Occupational Programs. You can win a free paint job from us in the raffle!

As an added bonus, the event helps the Tri-City Homeless Shelter. So bring a couple cans of food to donate.

Date:  Saturday, May 12, 2012
Time:  7:00 - 4:00
Place:  Washington High School
38442 Fremont Blvd.
Fremont, CA 94536

Almost Everything Welcomes Intern Jinkie

Student Intern Jinkie working at Almost Everything Autobody 

Almost Everything Autobody welcomes our most recent intern, Jinkie. She comes to us from the College of Alameda and the California School for the Deaf here in Fremont. Jinkie has been studying auto body repair at school. She's proud to be a woman in what is often thought of as a male dominated field (although Jinkie is certainly not Almost Everything Autobody's first female employee.)

Jinkie is helping to prep cars for paint by learning to remove pinstripes and decals and to protect chrome mouldings in preparation for sanding.

Almost Everything Recognized for "Outstanding Contribution" to California School for the Deaf

Almost Everything was very honored to receive a special award on May 28, 2010 "for outstanding contribution to the Job Placement Program" from the California School for the Deaf.

Almost Everything partners with the School for the Deaf on two programs. Almost Everything hosts a body repair competition at the school's body shop that awards prizes for highest quality and most complete repairs. Almost Everything  lso runs an internship program for students to get hands-on experience.working in a real auto body shop.

Frank Barnard, Almost Everything's resident & General Manager says that the experience has been great for both the kids and Almost Everything's staff. The kids that have interned with us have been enthusiastic partners, quick learners and have become very skilled in the aspects of the auto body business. They also learn life lessons about expectations and requirements of a real job. They earn a little spending money too.

The Almost Everything staff has a great time working with these kids. When the program first started, there was some concern about communication issues between Almost Everything employees who did not know sign language & interns who could not hear. We were surprised and a bit amused to realize that the regular noise from machinery in the shop made verbal communication difficult at best. We had not realized that our normal mode of communication involved a good deal of improvised sign language anyway. Communication with the students came more naturally than we expected. Training for inexperienced workers is essentially the same whether they can hear or not--a trainer demonstrates a procedure and the trainee attempts to duplicate it. The trainer stops the trainee and re-demonstrates or adds nuance until the trainee is proficient. We keep pen & paper handy for the occasions when there are still questions or comments can't be communicated by gesture and example.

In the past few months, one of the winners of an Almost Everything  Duesenberg" award from the Bodyshop Class Competition worked as a Almost Everything intern. He progressed from basic scuffing of a vehicle to prepare it for paint to feather-edging of chips & scratches and removal of delaminating paint using a air-powered dual action sander ("DA") to masking, priming bodywork and block sanding. The quality of his work was excellent and he came to work with a great attitude and a real eagerness to learn.

Almost Everything staff have learned a lot too from the program. The communication in the shop has undoubtedly improved for everyone now that we are thinking about the best and quickest ways to get information transmitted in the shop where everyone has a hard time hearing. I think we have also become more adept at working with our deaf customers. We are very familiar with using e-mail, text messages and interpreters by phone for remote communication with Fremont's relatively large deaf population.

Thanks to the California School for the Deaf for this recognition and a special thanks to our interns for helping make the program a great success for Almost Everything and the school.