2 MONTHS! It can't be 2 months. 2 months ago, it was cold, snowy, and ended February with ice.... Yeah, you don't like the weather in Virginia, just hold your breath, exhale and count to 15. It'll change....
So, I've been busy, but not with the car. Lockdown, restrictions, virus-related whatchamacallit, it all adds up to more hours in the shop at work, and less at the garage. Busy with customers means more hours at work, a little extra for the build project fund, but no time to work on it. Oh well, on with the show!
Knowing that the car wouldn't go very fast on the track without an engine, and, said engine needed to have better attachments than baler twine and coat hangers (I thought about it for a second), I fabbed up an engine mount from something I thought looked right from the interwebs.. and got this.
Attachment:
2021 03 14 motor mount 2mp.jpeg
Engine is in, tranny has a temporary mount. Not 100% pleased with the driver's side motor mount, and having forgotten to take pictures of it, it'll have to wait for the next update. Still not satisfied with the end results and may end up changing it as well. Again.
On to: Suspension!
I was chatting with an old friend the other day, and he suggested I change the rocker ratio on the front suspension because of something called 'mechanical advantage.' I thought 'mechanical advantage' was the benefit of having a garage and not paying for tire rotations or oil changes.
So I did. Front end is MUCH stiffer now.
Attachment:
2021 03 07 rocker bracket ver 2.0 2mp.jpg
It has a 2:3 ratio, which
should work. Old ratio was a 2:1, favoring the LCA. Now the LCA doesn't budge when I lift it up, unlike before....
After this, came the front uprights/spindles. But I hit a lag, because, well, uninsulated building, bitter cold (For us. Perry and the gang can keep that stuff up there in the frozen north) and yeah, just wasn't motivated to go to the unheated playhouse. Burned a lot of wood in the basement of the house, and kept the wife happy.
Then the weather got a little better, so I had a consultion with the Reverend Elijah Craig, and figured out that if I could do those suspension parts, I'd better keep going. Wasn't going to build itself, the car was. A quick trip to the local metal fabricator, and he turned some home-designed adapters to fit into the trimmed uprights, reamed them with a borrowed 7 degree reamer, then a bolt here, brace there, add in a upper control arm from Speedway and, BOOM!
Attachment:
2021 03 07 front end view 2mp.jpg
All done before the next consultation session. Weld, fabricate, etc.
before, de-brief/consult
after.
And, after that progress, I wanted to see what it'd look like with the wheels on it. So, yeah... it looks like an erector set drove into a stack of tires...
Attachment:
2021 03 14 side three-quarters 2mp.jpg
All I have to do now, is get the driveshaft shortened, balanced, install new guibo disc up front, new u-joints in the back end of it, get that installed, and only a few hundred other tasks, and I might get it done before... before... well, before I can't get my stiff-jointed backside into the non-existent drivers seat. BUT, I should have the seat soon, so pedals hung after that, then the steering wheel, shaft, steering joints.... Yeah, ya'll know better than me.
Thanks for reading this far! Come back another week (not next week, inventory at the shop. Yuck) for more thrills, chills and spills (gotta get a spill kit on the wall, I'm telling ya).
_________________
"If it's broke, fix it. You can't make it more broke"
BMW 2002 donor, M10 motor, 4 spd trans, IRS, tube chassis.
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