SS100 “replica” Project Car

[CaddmannQ]

I initially had a very difficult time getting all the bumpers and fenders to line up right on this car, so that it looked straight. When I got it, everything was misaligned, and head-on from a distance the whole car looked crooked.

Well the truth is that the frame was and still is crooked. I am just now approaching the real work to correct the frame.

I spent a lot of time cleaning up my work area yesterday, after all the sanding and grinding. Then I decided to do some more sanding, and pulled out the front and rear bumper brackets. They had some blobs of weld remaining from the original turn signal brackets which I had to cut loose.

I was getting ready to grind those blobs off, and half convinced to just drop these brackets off at the powder coaters & have them blasted & painted. Then I noticed the front brackets do not match.

Someone stuck one (or both) in the brake at the wrong angle. They don’t match in either direction of course.

That was causing the bumper to push out and tip down just slightly on the driver side.

Someone really missed the mark when he stuck this in the press. I’m afraid the difference was too much to just heat this up and hammer them without a forge handy.

I cut the left one in that photos, from both sides, along the bend. I left a tab in the appropriate place, and bent the leg into position with a crescent wrench.

I want them to come out the same so I set them both up in the vice with a steel pipe to represent the bumper. You can see there’s a fair gap to repair. I will have to fill from both directions and then grind everything to the proper profile.

[CaddmannQ]

So here I am welding up the inside & outside corners. I actually finished these up and ground them all down, but I couldn’t get a good profile. I need to add some more filler & regrind. At the fattest part of the gap there’s a solid quarter inch of weld on 1/8” thick plates.

I’m trying to figure out the welding symbol for what I did, but I’m afraid it would have to rely on notes at the tail, because I don’t think there’s any symbol for a bead that tapers from one end to the other.

Also, when I cut this flange I lay the blade flat along one flange and cut halfway along. Then I turned it 90° flat to the other flange and cut back almost halfway to create my tab.

To get the brackets to match, I had to twist the flange in three directions. That resulted in the strangely shaped beads you see on the front.

[digr]

Looks good and better then having to twist the frame

[CaddmannQ]

Oh, she had lots of twist ;-)

I finally got these brackets all straightened up and painted. They’ve been drying overnight in my garage.

[CaddmannQ]

I managed to get my fake Sawzall into the tunnel and chop out some final bits of rust thru.

This will get some more cleanup before I patch it. Then I have some small bits of scrap to cut out in the tunnel. Then I can flip the chassis again and touch up the bottom welds.

I should be ready to start welding on the crossframe soon.

[CaddmannQ]

This is the crossframe, which supports the running boards and reinforces the floor under the seats. I welded up almost all of the holes, because only a few of them are necessary for setup, then it will get welded to the chassis forever.

I already painted this, and it’s been curing in the dog kennel for about two weeks.

[CaddmannQ]

I ordered these channels pressed to make the new side rails for the frame.

Each of these will be cut into two unequal pieces, and it will make a box which laps to the pressed tractor frame channel.

These were made from 0.0104” mild steel, 3 1/2 inches outside with 1 inch legs. For two 8’ pieces I paid about $256 including tax. If my calculations are correct I should have left over two pieces, each 11 inches, for the gussets.

[arizonian]

Originally Posted by CaddmannQ

I ordered these channels pressed to make the new side rails for the frame.

Each of these will be cut into two unequal pieces, and it will make a box which laps to the pressed tractor frame channel.

These were made from 0.0104” mild steel, 3 1/2 inches outside with 1 inch legs. For two 8’ pieces I paid about $256 including tax. If my calculations are correct I should have left over two pieces, each 11 inches, for the gussets.

12ga (.105) should be strong enough, way beefier than the stock pan.

[CaddmannQ]

So I’m going to make a crossmember out of this steel box by cutting it down and doubling it up. This is 0.050” steel.

I had to take a section out of the middle but basically I split this both directions and struck it down from 6”x20” to 3”x9”

I used my harbor freight nibbler and it worked fantastically well. Much quicker than cutting with a cut off wheel. Straighter cutting than a sawzall.

It does make a kerf three times as wide as a sawzall though.

This box wants a whole bunch of spot welds and I was twing with the idea of setting up a spot welder but it would need about 17 inches of reach. I’ll probably just drill 50 little holes in it and spot weld it with the TIG welder.

I drew a sort of arch on there with a pencil, which indicates where the tunnel of the frame will penetrate the crossmember.

[CaddmannQ]

So I reached a major milestone today, when I finally cut the frame in half.

I eventually built a welded jig for the full frame, so I could get it straight, and maintain (correct!) the wheelbase.

This jig is all constructed from salvaged steel, and is certainly not suitable for production. I will eventually scrap it all out.

I used a sawzall to split the frame 95%, then finished it with the cutoff wheel. Then just 4 bolts and it’s split forever.

Now I must connect ‘this & that’, as they say.