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  #61  
Old 05-04-2018, 08:29 PM
Mr fixit Mr fixit is offline
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Default Another basic question

Hi pplace,

In today's post you show the underside of this "box structure" and doing plug welds. since this is in the wheel well, will you, or do you do anything with the open edge (weld ?) so that it wont take on water and rust from the inside or cause other problems?

Beginners question and learning a LOT from your posts!


TX
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  #62  
Old 05-05-2018, 02:04 AM
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pplace pplace is offline
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Originally Posted by Mr fixit View Post
Hi pplace,

In today's post you show the underside of this "box structure" and doing plug welds. since this is in the wheel well, will you, or do you do anything with the open edge (weld ?) so that it wont take on water and rust from the inside or cause other problems?

Beginners question and learning a LOT from your posts!


TX
Short answer. Yes. Any and every seam that I have access to that will be in the weather will eventually be seam sealed. However that is obviously a long ways off⛄️
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  #63  
Old 05-05-2018, 11:27 AM
Mr fixit Mr fixit is offline
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pplace,

I appreciate the answer. I figured it was a ways off, just asked to learn the procedure, and that's what I'm learning from you and the other great posts here on this site is the process's.

TX
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  #64  
Old 05-08-2018, 06:45 PM
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The last day or so I've been tinkering with a couple things I was putting off on the engine / chassis as I wanted to keep plugging away on the roof rail structure.

In order for the engine to fit into the chassis and clear the front cross member it was know that I'd have to swap out the oil pan that came on the crate LSA engine and switch it to a different year / style pan. I did that as well as swapped out the exhaust manifolds for the headers the customer purchased. I also had some mental questions about some of the sensors and how the wiring harness would be on the driveline so I roughly routed the engine and transmission harnesses.

My mind has been constantly thinking, planning, brainstorming about many of the other components of the vehicle that I'll eventually need. Everything from how the exhaust and mufflers will be built and routed, what and where are my options for a brake master cylinder and booster, firewall location, steering, etc. etc. etc. The list of items I need to plan for is very long and will grow more.

I decided to do the first initial test fit of the body on the chassis. By doing this I could get a much better idea in my head of what I'll need to do for many of these future components. I can sit and think about this stuff while I'm making the driver's side roof rail and such.

Another big "what if" that we knew was going to be close in our planning stages for the chassis was the engine to hood clearance. Setting the body on (even roughly) would give us a pretty good idea where we sat with that question.

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Laying out the engine wiring harness and routing / connecting it up.

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It's a rat's nest of wiring currently and I don't have the computer modules there yet. Eventually this will all have to be cleaned and tidied up. Visually when we are finished we want as clean of an engine bay as possible.....much work to be done for that!!!

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I lowered the chassis roughly down to it's parked height (when all the air would be out of the suspension)

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Getting the body ready to lift up and set over the engine onto the chassis.

It's amazing to see in pictures really how small this vehicle is! It doesn't really feel like it as I'm working on it, but when I step back or see it referenced to something or someone I notice it.

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The first fit! Very roughly just set into position on spacer blocks to locate it sort of in the right spot. Again, this would be the parked height (the bottom of the rockers are currently just a bit above the bottom of the frame rails. Not sure where I'll dial that in eventually.....I'll play with it and decide exactly as I do some more planning and fitting.

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The engine appears to fit in the engine bay pretty well. There will be a lot more to fill up this space eventually.

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View from above looking down. I appear to have pretty good space from the front grille area to the front of the engine. Though there will be plenty of stuff to tuck into this small area: Radiator, A/C condenser, supercharger cooler, cooling fans, trans cooler, radiator support, etc.

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This side view even with the back of the engine shows I have good clearance for the future firewall / cowl. I wanted to get the engine as far forward as I could being it's a small car and didn't want to loose a lot of interior and foot space, yet too far forward would take away from needed space for radiators and such.

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This view sighting across the fenders shows how the supercharger just peek's above the fenders. This is a little deceiving as the center of the hood has crown and is higher (kind of) as the fenders also dip down towards the edge of the hood. However, compare the height of the cowl lip in the center. Right now the hood almost shuts, but is interfering with the front edge of the supercharger. We have multiple ideas how to deal with this and I'll discuss those when the time comes.

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Looking from the rear

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A side shot showing the rocker panel clearance currently (this is parked height) this also may change up or down a bit as I plan and fit a bit more.

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We will not be using the stock large bumpers, but instead fabricating and modifying some custom bumpers. In time, I'll re-design and fabricate a new front end with a lower roll pan to lower the ground clearance similar to the rear of the fenders / rocker panels.

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The same plan goes for the rear bumper and rear body panel / roll pan.
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  #65  
Old 05-08-2018, 07:28 PM
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Steve Hamilton Steve Hamilton is offline
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WOWWWWWWW! I really like what I see

You are Killin it Dane.

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  #66  
Old 05-09-2018, 06:01 AM
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Always look forward to seeing the updates on this.
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  #67  
Old 05-09-2018, 09:01 AM
cliffrod cliffrod is offline
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Very cool stuff, Dane. Great to see how well things fit at this point.
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  #68  
Old 05-09-2018, 09:13 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Steve Hamilton View Post
WOWWWWWWW! I really like what I see

You are Killin it Dane.

Steve
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gojeep View Post
Always look forward to seeing the updates on this.
Quote:
Originally Posted by cliffrod View Post
Very cool stuff, Dane. Great to see how well things fit at this point.
Thanks guys! Setting the body on yesterday (the first of dozens of times) was exciting to see how wells my initial pre planning, figuring and measuring worked out. So far I’m very pleased with it!
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  #69  
Old 05-10-2018, 11:33 PM
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I'll just say upfront that this post update is about as far away from any metal shaping as I could get. However, since it's directly dealing with the previous design and fabrication of the roof rail and quarter window I'll glad to share it!

Before I dove right into matching all the work on the driver's side roof rail and quarter I wanted to verify my work on the passenger side by cutting out a curved quarter glass from the windshield I previously decided to use that had the correct curve that I wanted for the side glass.

Though I had taken templates, made profiles, and a buck I was still a bit curious inside how it would all work out with the actual piece of glass in place.......so today I had my father give me a hand cutting the windshield down to size (he's had much more experience cutting glass than I have)

Going into it we were obviously hopeful that we'd get a perfectly useable piece of glass, but were fine and probably expecting we wouldn't get it problem free on the first try (and we didn't) However, I'll use this piece (and more that we make) during the building process that I don't necessarily have to worry about grinding, welding, etc. around.

Here is a link to a video with a quick clip of one of the first initial cuts after scoring. In the video we put a little thinner in the score line (after it's been broken free) and my father lit it on fire to soften the inner laminate to help soften and stretch it so the glass layers separate a bit in order to slice the laminate layer with a razor blade.

https://youtu.be/baLYX-b4WBg

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Here I've located the ply pattern on the windshield and traced around it. I'm also extending all the cut lines straight out and to the edges of the glass. We do the main bulk cuts straight and slowly work your way up to the rounds. Eventually all the edges are smoothed and brought to final shape / size on the glass grinder.

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The pile of scrap cut offs!! Technically we could almost get a left and right quarter glass out of one windshield, however the back 3-4 inches are in a slightly different "curve" so it was decided to do one glass per windshield eventually.

The windshields are very inexpensive ($65ish) each, so it's not a big cost to go through several pieces of glass for this process.

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The first "test" piece of glass. Here it's been ground smooth (nearly to template size....slightly more to go here, but close enough for some fitting purposes)

I didn't mean to but my hand was covering some edge "chipping" when we got a bit careless on an inside curve. If this was the final glass we'd be using it wouldn't be acceptable, but again for fitting it's no problem at all.

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Looking down the length of the glass front to back you can see the curve.

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Quarter glass slid into position. Fit perfect both in profile and curvature to quarter panel belt line channel and most importantly the roof rail channel! Phew!!

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View straight from the side. It's a bit difficult trying to take pictures of clear glass!ha

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This is a close up of the rear bottom corner of the glass looking forward. Again as I did with the plywood buck I'm testing the fit of the glass channel as well as the rubber sweep that I'll be using. Fit really nice along the glass edge.

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Looking from inside the glass fits into the glass weather strip channel with no mis-alignment and fits the edge of the roof rail inner structure perfectly.

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This picture shows how the quarter glass will slide in and out forward through the door jamb.

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And a small crack It happened on the second to the last cut on the glass!ugh Oh well, it doesn't affect using it as a fitting / build piece at all.
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Last edited by pplace; 05-10-2018 at 11:39 PM.
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  #70  
Old 05-11-2018, 03:47 AM
Oldnek Oldnek is offline
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Love your work, Dane!
Very Interesting to see your using laminated on the side windows. In Oz we have to use Zone toughened.
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