Donor car is MINE

Bought and took the possession of the MX5 today.

Cost update

Cost update time! Seeing as i went and bought more materials on Monday, i thought i'd keep on updating this one. As it's being built to the "Locost" ethos, i'm trying to keep things as cheap as i can, but keep the quality of the finished product as high as possible.

$1943 - from previously bought materials etc

$138 - Steel (25x25, 20x20 and 50x25mm RHS blue painted)
$39.80 - Material to make the build table extension.

Total so far for those who hate maths - $2120.80

So so so so freaking excited. Havent been this excited about a car since i originally bought the WRX. And that was 5 years ago. Maybe this project will be the re ignition of the passion for cars.

Day 4

Day 4 of the build and the final day of the 4 day building streak. Yet another productive day was had, and i'm stuffed. Will have to go back to work for a break. My back is sore from using the horizontal bandsaw as ours needs to have the speed of the cut controlled, otherwise the saw seizes.

So what was done today? Well i put the firewall cross member in as well as the entrance to the transmission tunnels. The front engine cross braces and the engine vertical brace went in as well. As per usual, every piece needs to be cut to the dimensions of the frame. While i'm 0.5 or 1mm out in some areas, it seems that if the pieces are cut exact to the book, it doesn't quite work.

Oh went to Metal Mates in Cessnock and bought extra material. Got another 3 lengths of 25x25mm. Then got a length of 50x25mm for the seat back rest, and 3 lengths of 20x20mm for the transmission tunnel and the rear of the car. A trip was also made to Bunnings to pick up some more MDF so i can extend the build table. Which needs another 800mm so i can build the rear differential carrier and suspension carrier.

This is how i ended the day. Looks awesome. Hopefully next weekend will lead me to have the transmission tunnel and seat back in place. I still havent gone for a 'drive' in it yet, i'll hold off till it's welded properly

The best looking bit of it at the moment. Well i think so as it was the hardest part.

Dodgy looking tack welds, but they hold and are pretty strong. Takes a hell of a lot of grinding to undo them. That's a good thing!!

Build continues

Well its the end of day three of the build and im feeling really excited about the whole thing. More so now i have the semblance of a chassis.

Saturday and Sunday i built and tacked together the bottom frame. I even got a photo with me holding the completed bottom frame, which i'll put up when my dad emails me the picture.

Today i tackled the front frame. Which is a nightmare of a thing to build. Compound angle cuts, notching and bending tubing, making a jig and then crossing fingers when it all comes together. Guess what?? It worked. I would say first time around, but that would be a lie. I stuffed about 2 meters of material getting the compound angles etc correct. And trial and error on making jigs.

I also got motivated and went back after dinner this evening and it's now in the third dimension with the uprights and the top rails going on. Its amazing to see that being accurate pays dividends. With the top rails, they get fixed to the front frame and then rest along the top of one upright and but against the other upright. With these three points, there was only one upright which was out, and that was only by 1mm.

And as always, the trusty work dog is helping out.

Bottom rails before tacking. Also made a mistake on this, but it's now fixed. Was an easy fix too, sort of. At the front of the frame are the two parrallel members with the really sharp angle. I took the wrong dimension and had to remake these as i had cut them too short. It involved another hour and a half working at the milling machine to get those angles perfect.

Here you can see the blocks holding everthing in place. The two members i mentioned before are worng. If you look at the next picture the two new ones extend past the horizontal cross piece.

Ah the dreaded front frame. Looks simple from this angle, but it's bloody hard. I now know what not to do when it comes to fabricating one of these.

Front frame again. The two silver bits of metal clamped to the frame are there to ensure that it wasvertical and at the same height the whole way across. And it is!!

Building the thing finally. WOO!!

 Start of the frame. Wooden blocks are attatched to the build table to hold the frame in place. This has worked extremely well. I've had the frame off the board once already and it went straight back on.

Where the seats will be mounted.



Motorsport and frame welding

Ideally the car will be used for driving on the road, but a great passion of mine is to be able to go racing. The idea behind the WRX which went so horribly pear shaped, was to get it on the track and join in for some hillclimbing and supersprints. I've got queries about putting a rollcage on the car. It would be an intelligent move to incorperate a roll cage when i am building the frame, before the bodywork is put on.

So looking at putting a half cage in. According to the CAMS Manual of Motorsport, a half cage is the minimum required for open wheeler in "Speed" events like supersprints and hillclimbs. It will need to be made of chromoly, circular section dold drawn tube. The main hoop needs to be 44.45mm outside diameter and 2.5mm wall thickness. All other components will need to be 38mm outside diameter and 2.5mm wall thickness. The supporting pads of the cage will be welded to the main chassis and the rear support bars will be welded to an extra rear structure which will need to be designed into the chassis as it is being built. The pads themselves have a specification to comply with. Each mounting foot of the front, main and lateral roll bars must include a reinforcement plate, of a thickness of at least 3mm which must not be less than that of the tube onto which it is welded. Each mounting foot must be attached by at least three bolts on a steel reinforcement plate at least 3mm thick and of at least 12,000mm2 area which is welded to the bodyshell. Examples are shown in drawings 253-18 to 253-24. (For drawings 253-18 and 253-20, the reinforcement plate does not necessarily have to be welded to the bodyshell.)

Having a chat to a fella from work, i have been advised it would be advisable to tack weld the frame and cage using MIG but with 0.9 309 stainless steel wire. This will help with the final welding of the frame and the cage, as i would like to get the frame TIG welded by a ticketed structural welder.

Update on build board and frame

I was going through the old posts and thought i'd do an update on what is happning with the frame and build board. Well the board currently looks like this -

and to add a note of proudness - that's my Dad's 1918 Model T Ford under the cover. He's done the most amazing job. Rebuilt it from ground up apart from the main body. It was originally a utility (pick up) which i rebuilt the tray as my HSC major work. He decided to go with the tourer a few years after this, the upholstery he did himself, and learned it all from scratch. I'm very impressed!

Back to the board. I found some white house paint left over from somewhere, and gave it a few coats so that the lines to be marked on it stick out a bit better. I will be drilling and mounting small blocks of timber on the board on either side of each metal tube to keep the chassis from twisting as it is welded, and prevent it from being bumped inadvertantly out of alignment.

Update on frame - fingers crossed the new plans from Voodou motorsport in the UK will be relesaed in the next week. I'm dead keen to get everything underway this coming weeekend.