The Start, January 2000
| Well the first stage was to get that Chevy thing out. Nothing wrong with Chevies, but I'm more familiar with Fords and call me strange ( geez many have ), but I believe in Fords in Fords and Chevs in Chevs, but a Hemi can go where it damn likes. Since I can't afford a Hemi, then a good 351 Cleveland will reside in the hole. I later sold the Chev and T400 to a mate. He got the engine dynoed and it put out 430bhp and 460 Lb of torque. Rather impressive. The engine will see life in a 52 Hudson....now that's different. |
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| I was curious to see what was under the paint. So after grinding out a lot of bog, I discovered the guards were brazed to the body. So how do you get a one piece car apart?....draw dotted lines and rip into it with an angle grinder. I discovered they made cutting disks that are only 1mm thick and fit onto a normal 4" angle grinder. You need a thick spacer with a larger enough hole for the collar to fit into. I used a mag wheel washer. I also bought a box of disks. They do last a long time, not like those Dremel disks that grind into smoke as soon as you start.. With a bit of practice and patience, you can cut curves as well. |
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| Hey, I will be the first to admit I'm untidy. I will not clean up until I've finished the particular section I'm working on. Tools will just be left there and I just turn out the lights. This garage is for function, not show.:-) I do eventually clean up when I keep tripping over things. That's generally by the end of the day when my legs are tired and I don't pick my feet up enough. |
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| Here is how I had to remove the running boards. With an angle grinder. The floor was part of it!. I had to make certain where I cut the running boards off the quarter panel. I will bypass the rest of the cut up...it wasn't pretty. It ended up in three sections. The cowl, doors and rear sections. I then put the body under wraps to concentrate on the chassis. I didn't take pictures of the Cleveland block and C4, but take it for granted I did have it in there before I took the cowl away. The Chev engine mounts were originally bolted in to the top of the rail with a flimsy strap going down to the bottom rail.. I just repositioned them to the lower section, welded a gusset to give it a bit of strength. Now its a Cleveland mount |
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| Here is another picture showing both mounts in. Also before I removed the original cross member, I welded in a made up spreader bar. This will also act as a radiator support and has nuts welded in at each end so I can bolt the bumper brackets to it. Even though I intend to use some kind of nerf bar or custom set up. The next picture shows the boxing plate being welded in. It had to be cut around the mounts and spreader bar. Not clearly shown in the picture is the crush tubes that I welded in before the boxing plate went on. |
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| While I had the welder going, I began to weld up un necessary holes...believe me, there were plenty. You can see the radiator mounts in place now. You may notice the temporary 1" tube braces I welded to the "X" member to help support it. I had to take a huge twist out before I welded them in. The second picture shows the modified L300 IFS. A lot will cringe when they see the notch I made to clear the Cleveland sump. I had a verbal OK from an engineer that it will be strong enough. There's more metal in there now than standard. Sadly, the engineer that gave the OK has since died. I hope the next engineer is as obliging. |
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| Here is one rail completely boxed from tip to stern. I even stepped it in to accommodate the original fuel tank. Second picture shows a bit more of the modified L300 IFS. More on the L300 IFS later. |
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Well that's about it for 2000....see I did finally clean the garage up.
| Wanna see next year? Click here for 2001 |
