We will be meeting at the space at noon, Saturday, Dec 6th to move the car from storage to the workshop, and will work on evaluating its condition, getting it running, and seeing what we need to do to prep it for parking it outside.
We will be using [email protected] email group for notifications and organizing events, I think anyone can request to join just by going to the google group page. I will try to post updates and statuses to this thread in kind of a blog format.
Picked up some vehicle dollies to use while car is in workshop (so it can be rolled out of the way if needed)
Lets go by the the coin-op car wash on the way to the space. The car is probably pretty grungy from all the ice last year.
Just curious, when will the shop get a lift?
Will try to place the order for a lift before the end of the year.
Got the car to the space, it turned over but didn’t start, probably due to bad gas. We pumped out the remaining gas and removed the bad battery, so it will be a bit before we get it started again. (Want to rewire fuel pump which is currently hard wired to battery)
Right now the whiteboard by the car will track what we need to do, will look into setting up trello
Its on casters so it can be moved around, but it takes 2 or 3 people to move, mainly because the slippery floor limits shoe traction
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Also turns out that I didn’t put enough coats of plastidip on last year, so it won’t just pull off. There is a dip dissolver product(similar to to goo gone) available but need to let that sit and then use pressure washer, which we cant have at DMS due to lack of any water hose outlets
Lots of progress lately on the fuel system, we now have a working fuel gauge and found a leak to patch in the fuel tank. We plan on pulling the engine for some preventative maintenance on Jan 10th/11th.
We also decided on a Mario Kart based theme this year, so we will need help building some props to mount on the car (turtle shells, mushrooms, Yoshi head, anything) and coming up with a design
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Ok, so we welded the crack in the fuel tank. It looks good to me. We put three gallons of water in the tank and it does not appear to be leaking, so we are going to leave it standing outside for a couple hours so make sure there are no leaks.
Side benefit is that we are rinsing out the tank, so it won’t rattle anymore.
Next we are going to work on the redundent spare back-up second emergency-use-only fuel pump.
All of the AC related parts have been removed(saving lots of weight and freeing up space) and now starting to figure out how to fabricate seat mount.
Also I was thinking of starting a DMS Racing build night every Wednesday 7-10pm, with pizza, would anyone be interested?
Wed. is the only weeknight where my availability is spotty personally. Obviously no day is going to work for everyone so whatever works for the group as a whole is fine, but just thought I would post my availability. Either way, I have been able to help Chuck, Stan, and others with various stuff for it during the day though so its not like it would prevent me from being involved.
I’m for Wed nights, I’ll totally help out (with some adult supervision).
@Brandon_Green What are the requirements to become a driver, where would I rent a suit and what would I have to buy? How much would the entrance fee be? I am interested in driving and helping pit.
Had a good turn out for our first Wednesday build night. Chuck has a new kill switch mount fabricated, we got the fuel tank and rear suspension back on the car (so its on dollies and pushable again), and also mocked up the new seat location. By using custom sliders and modifying the floor pan we will have 10 inches of easy lever actuated seat travel while also increasing head room. The previous seat mount used 4 bolts to change between 3 different positions. Taking 5 minutes to change drivers is not good in an endurance race where the amount of time you are on track determines the winner.
There probably wont be much organized work on the car over the holidays, but there are lots of simple things that need work, such as removing the tint from the rear window or removing the old plastidip and vinyl stickers.
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I have been reading this “racing lemons” thread not quite understanding why this would be a subject of interest for so many Makers.
This morning I read an article in the NY Times which explains it a little more for me and I offer it to those who may have the same questions about “racing lemons” that I had.
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Using the plasma cutter I made room for what I think is a good idea for one side of the seat mount(which is 2" x 1/8" steel with a 1" square tube welded to the bottom side[still need to drill holes and be sure can get a socket / nut inside the square tube]), but it created a new problem, closing up the floor pan is going to be harder than I thought at first, will likely need to get some sheet metal, the area of the floor pan that was hammered in seems too messy / irregular to simply weld to it
Also, we need someone experienced at welding to recommend the best setting to use to weld the seat rail mount to the car, I tested on some scrap and am afraid of just melting through the sheet metal
You can use the Hobart for this. It’s full of flux core. Run it low. You’ll have to clean the metal really well. There’s some 1/16" electrodes for the stick welder if you’d rather go that route that would weld dirty metal but takes more control on that sheet metal without blow through. Any thick to thin weld can be a PITA. I suggest practicing with a scrap piece of sheet till you get the settings right. If you’re worried about burning through, weld an inch or so at a time, giving the metal a chance to cool between arc strikes.
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Turns out the air chisel is the ideal tool for removing sound deadening material from the floor pan.
And I made the hole even bigger, it’s much easier to cut a straight line with the angle grinder than the plasma cutter.
The seat sliders will have a recline of about 10-12 degrees and we will have more leg room and an inch more head room than the previous seat mount. Next need to fabricate the box that will hold the left seat slider before starting to weld it to the car.
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We got officially accepted to the race! (There are a limited number of slots, so you have to apply and be approved)
We got lots of prep work done on our build night last night for getting ready to pull the engine this saturday. Anyone who wants to help or just check out an engine getting partially torn down should come by starting around noon. We got in the rebuild kits, so replacing the timing chain / tensioners, water pump, oil pump will be on the todo before we put the engine back in the car. Thanks to @bgangwere for bringing an awesome engine hoist and stand that we will be able to use.
We also got another 1/3 of the seat mount done, it looks like this approach will work, but we want to finish fabricating all the pieces to do a dry fit before welding anything into the car. Thanks to @Kentamanos for helping teaching us how to use the bridgeport to drill the mounting holes precisly 11 inches apart (+/- 1/2000 of an inch or whatever the resolution is on the bridgeport read out)
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The engine is now out of car after we had lots of people meet up at noon to work on the car. Also a big thanks to @BenjaminGroves for bringing in pizza and restocking the kitchen.
We got all accessories and everything except the timing chain off. The only existing problems we have found so far are a missing exhaust manifold stud that was causing an exhaust leak and a leaky oil pan.
We will continue pulling the head off on our next wednesday night build at 7pm. Then we will replace the timing chain, tensioners, all gaskets, oil and water pump and then start putting the engine back together and get the car running again.
One outstanding question is if it’s worth the effort to remove the EGR, or if it would be easier to just leave it.
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