A 2026 Engineering Grad Just Spent Five Days Learning to Shape Aluminum by Hand From One of the Last People Who Still Builds Cars That Way
The Piston Foundation and Minnesota coachbuilder Runge Cars ran their first mentorship workshop this month, pairing Piston Scholar Vincent Ramirez with self-taught metalsmith Chris Runge to hand-form bodywork the way it was done before CNC machines existed — documented by Petrolicious as the pilot for what both organizations hope becomes a recurring program.
The Piston Foundation, a Greenwich, Connecticut nonprofit that trains young enthusiasts for careers as collector-car technicians, sent one of its scholars to Minnesota this month for a different kind of education. Vincent Ramirez, a 2025 and 2026 Piston Scholar who graduated from Worcester Polytechnic Institute in May with a mechanical engineering degree, spent five days at Runge Cars — the bespoke coachbuilding shop Chris Runge runs out of rural Alexandria, Minnesota — learning to hand-shape aluminum bodywork the way it was done long before 3D printers and CNC mills existed.
Runge is self-taught. He started building cars in 2011 after picking up a barn-find Porsche in rural South Dakota, and Runge Cars now hand-forms aluminum-bodied sports cars inspired by post-war European race cars and classic Porsches, chassis to finished panel, for clients who want something no factory sells. Over the five days, Ramirez worked the English wheel alongside Runge on fabrication, welding, and metal finishing, then paired that hands-on work with the digital side Runge Cars has folded into its process in recent years — 3D scanning, 3D modeling, and 3D printing — to study and develop components before they're ever hammered into shape.
"Coachbuilding has always required patience, observation, and a willingness to learn by doing," Runge said of the workshop. "Vince brought a strong foundation in digital design and engineering. Bringing that together with hands-on metal shaping is exactly the kind of exchange that can carry this craft forward." Piston Foundation president and co-founder Jeff Mason framed it as a pipeline problem the industry actually has: "Opportunities like this help young people see a real future in the collector car industry."
Petrolicious, working as a Piston Community Partner, documented the workshop on film, and both organizations describe it as the first of what they intend to turn into a repeatable mentorship program for future Piston Scholars rather than a one-off. For an industry that keeps citing a shortage of technicians who actually know how to work metal by hand, it's a small, deliberately unglamorous bet: pair the people who still know how, with the people who might carry it forward.
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