LocostUSA.com

The scuttle of my build has part of the original donor mgb scuttle/firewall in it. The firewall side and the curved edges are 16 guage mild steel.
Would it be best welded to the chassis or made removable?
Dale

I'm thinking along the same lines at the moment (although my scuttle is the normal, Locost-type). I'm trying to decide if there's an advantage to having the scuttle removable. The downside of that is that there's an awful lot of stuff attached to the scuttle, so it would have to be attached ONLY to the scuttle, and not to the frame. That might be a bit of a chore, and would certainly complicate the build.

On the other hand, being able to remove the scuttle would allow access to all that stuff for maintenance/repairs/modifications. Hmmm. Still thinking on that one.

I doubt that a scuttle, if it's along the lines of the Locost basic design, contributes anything to chassis rigidity.

At this point I'm proceeding with the assumption that I'm going to bolt the sucker on...

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Scratch building, at continental-drift speed, a custom McSoreley-design framed, dual-Weber 45DCOE carburated, Zetec-engined, ridiculously fast money pit.

http://zetec7.webs.com/

If the scuttle includes tubular hoops that are tied into the transmission tunnel and the side rails, then it will contribute to torsional stiffness of the frame by adding transverse structure.

Open top boxes have much less torsional stiffness than close-topped boxes (I draw on a ship structures analogy here, where tankers are much stiffer torsionally than container ships, which have very large hatch openings). An affective bulkhead at the front of the cockpit (which a structurally-integrated scuttle might approximate) should improve chassis torsional stiffness.

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Warren
Isuzu Pickup/SR20DE, +401 COLD frame
Build Log: viewtopic.php?f=35&t=11601

Hi-
The MGB is a unibody car. I've never removed the firewall/scuttle from one to test this theory, but I'd bet ya the firewall unit is stamped steel and is part of the unibody structure and therefore is rather stiff. Having it in the Locost frame, tied in to the rails, would most likely increase the stiffness. As to welding vs bolting, I'd say that would depend on how many items potentially requiring servicing are underneath the scuttle.
JDK

I was originally going to make it removable to make working on the dash simpler and also wipers ect. But now thinking it might be easier to make the dash hinged or easily unbolted with enough cable to make it workable.
I want to make my windshield frame able to give some roll over support, so have been thinking of making it from 1x2 x.125 with the narrow side forward and a 45 degree rake and preferably a 1/4 side vent window (maybe incorporate the vent windows from the mgb which are sitting in the shed. Pic below shows what I mean, the back is a targa style to hide the roll bar and the top piece would hopefully be a combo of fiberglass and tinted lexan that would fit on the underside of the trunk lid.
Dale

made mine removable ..purely so i can access electrics, pedals, steering ,etc

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I USE TO HAVE AN OPEN MIND ..BUT MY BRAINS KEPT FALLING OUT

I made my scuttle removable as well as my dash. The dash is easy to remove and gives me access to everthing I need.
The scuttle is much more complicated to remove and in hindsight short of rebuilding the car from some serious incident, I have since thought, where would I ever need to remove the scuttle to gain access to anything the dash removel doesn't already give me.
If I was doing it again I would weld the scuttle and make it part of the frame structure.

Al

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Super Seven 3.4

I thought of that, too. My primary reason for making the scuttle removable was for ease of skinning the car with aluminum...I don't want a lot of visible seams, and it would be extraordinarily difficult to skin the sides & scuttle all in one piece. This way, the scuttle is skinned as a separate piece, so the only seam is along the top of the frame....

I'll post a pic of my scuttle framing soon...it's a VERY difficult piece to build (the pics will explain that). If it weren't for the fact that my frame is a bit of a one-off (roughly a +4 width, tapering to a book nose, so the taper angle in the sides of the car are a bit steeper than, say, a standard +4) I would have gone with one of Jacks (Kinetic's) scuttles, and saved myself a ton of work. By the way, that would be my advice to other builders...unless you have to build it yourself, like I did, consider saving yourself days of work , and give Jack a call...

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Scratch building, at continental-drift speed, a custom McSoreley-design framed, dual-Weber 45DCOE carburated, Zetec-engined, ridiculously fast money pit.

http://zetec7.webs.com/

Myself I found building the scuttle fairly easy, I welded up the frame and skinned it with aluminum.
If I was going to weld it I would have welded it from inside the dash, to the frame, on the other hand it would have been very difficult to replace the aluminum if the whole scuttle was welded to the frame as I had folded the ends of the aluminum under my scuttle's framework.
At least with it bolted on one has an option to be able to replace the aluminum skin if need be, maybe something to consider.

Al

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Super Seven 3.4

I know this thread is old but the other reason i made my scuttle removable was so i could fit
a single seater type scuttle /body like the mallocks have,... that way i can choose which body to use

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I USE TO HAVE AN OPEN MIND ..BUT MY BRAINS KEPT FALLING OUT

I welded my frame work in but made the sheet metal removable by removing about a hundred very small screws. It's a pain in the ass but I can get to all the wiring that way, and I have had to do just that several times now. I thought that making the dash removable would be enough, but because some of the wires are so heavy I can only move it a little bit, not enough to really work in there. For the same reason I made the body side panels in the engine ares removable too, using screws. I can get to my master cylinders with removing the intake manifold, but I riveted the foot well panels and it is a real bitch getting to the pedals themselves. One of the rods came unscrewed once and I had to remove the steering wheel to get all the way down there to get that re threaded and tightened up. Theses thing are something to think about while you build.
Wayne. Texaslocost.com

Exactly, elewayne!

One thing I've done at every stage of my build is to imagine how I'd be able to remove adjacent parts every time I weld something on. Kind of like chess - got to think several steps ahead. Since Murphy is my co-pilot, I have to assume that I'll need to remove just about every single part, at some time or another, for repairs/replacement.

And, the aforementioned Murphy being as active as he is, the more complex & awkward a part is, and the more inaccessible it is, the more likely it is to need removal, and the more frequently this will occur.

Since the guts of the scuttle are seriously complex, I'm figuring on probably weekly removal...thus the removable scuttle

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Scratch building, at continental-drift speed, a custom McSoreley-design framed, dual-Weber 45DCOE carburated, Zetec-engined, ridiculously fast money pit.

http://zetec7.webs.com/

This is a very old thread, but I don't see why I would start a new one.
If you skin your scuttle, how you are "mounting" the aluminum sheet to the scuttle frame?
At the bottom sides would be dzus fasteners, but how about the rest(top, sides)?

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Tibor


'20 Alfa Romeo Stelvio daily
Locost/442E in progress

I welded my scuttle, but made the dash removeable. This worked out fine for me.
cheers

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book 4AGE build, Supra W58 transmission, Corolla GTS live axle

I mean the aluminum sheet, how it is mounted to the scuttle's tube frame.

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Tibor


'20 Alfa Romeo Stelvio daily
Locost/442E in progress