Ready for the Lid
It's been a couple weeks since we posted our activity. The lapse in time is partly due to only incremental changes and the start of football practice for Brandon.
As you can see in the picture below, the entire chassis with wheels are ready to go. The wheels came in a week or two ago and I had the tires mounted to complete the setup. The tire are 225/50 - 17 which should maximize the contact area on the road to bring some needed performance to this vehicle. I'm kind of glad I didn't go straight to the 480-525 HP create engine in case the transfer of power to the road is minimal.
Here you can see we completed the exhaust from the headers to the side pipes which was a added twist to this project. We took the plunge and bought a TIG welder (sprung for the AC/DC unit to do most any metal). This wasn't a planned portion of the project but you can read the bottom section of this post to see what prompted adding this trade to our skill set. We purchased some mandrel bent 409 stainless steel to do the routing from the headers to the side pipes. I'm going to hold off on the final weld, of the side pipes, until the body is positioned to ensure the placement is correct to the body. There are two main reasons our project has additional complications. First, we are doing an LS engine conversion so none of the factory style pipes will fit. Secondly, we are adding side pipes to a '64 model which doesn't have the slots in the frame to receive the rear pipe mounts.
Here are a few other changes with the overall setup. I added an inline fuel pressure gauge to make sure I'm keeping the engine feed sufficiently. I did monitor the gauge while it was running which was well into the 60 PSI area of the gauge.
Here is a shot of the caliper mounted to the front spindle. The calipers surfaced another issue that consumed a day of my time to resolve. I used a "re-certified" caliper mount on one of the rear spindle assembly (the other was new). Anyway, upon mounting the spindle and torquing the bolts, it was clear the threads were not going to hold. I removed the lock washer and the threads further in the hole did hold but brakes are one thing you don't want to second guess. So, this prompted the ordering of a "New" brake mount, removing the half shaft and pressing out the spindle. This is not my favorite way to spend a day when I have other activity needed to complete the car.
This last photo is what started a new element to the project not previously conceived. This is the header collector flange I took to the local muffler shop to install the O2 bung which I did initially to test fire the engine. I wasn't planning on using these in the final installation since these necked down from 2.5" to 2". Regardless, there are two things wrong with this installation that really bothered me. One, the bung was installed backwards. That is the reason there's a smaller diameter section to center in the pipe during installation (ensure the pipe isn't blocking the hole while placing and welding). The second thing that really bothered me was the quality of the weld and the fact they positioned it so close to the pipe end that if I had wanted to use this pipe, it would be a mangled mess.
As you can see in the picture below, the entire chassis with wheels are ready to go. The wheels came in a week or two ago and I had the tires mounted to complete the setup. The tire are 225/50 - 17 which should maximize the contact area on the road to bring some needed performance to this vehicle. I'm kind of glad I didn't go straight to the 480-525 HP create engine in case the transfer of power to the road is minimal.
Here you can see we completed the exhaust from the headers to the side pipes which was a added twist to this project. We took the plunge and bought a TIG welder (sprung for the AC/DC unit to do most any metal). This wasn't a planned portion of the project but you can read the bottom section of this post to see what prompted adding this trade to our skill set. We purchased some mandrel bent 409 stainless steel to do the routing from the headers to the side pipes. I'm going to hold off on the final weld, of the side pipes, until the body is positioned to ensure the placement is correct to the body. There are two main reasons our project has additional complications. First, we are doing an LS engine conversion so none of the factory style pipes will fit. Secondly, we are adding side pipes to a '64 model which doesn't have the slots in the frame to receive the rear pipe mounts.
Here are a few other changes with the overall setup. I added an inline fuel pressure gauge to make sure I'm keeping the engine feed sufficiently. I did monitor the gauge while it was running which was well into the 60 PSI area of the gauge.
Here is a shot of the caliper mounted to the front spindle. The calipers surfaced another issue that consumed a day of my time to resolve. I used a "re-certified" caliper mount on one of the rear spindle assembly (the other was new). Anyway, upon mounting the spindle and torquing the bolts, it was clear the threads were not going to hold. I removed the lock washer and the threads further in the hole did hold but brakes are one thing you don't want to second guess. So, this prompted the ordering of a "New" brake mount, removing the half shaft and pressing out the spindle. This is not my favorite way to spend a day when I have other activity needed to complete the car.
This last photo is what started a new element to the project not previously conceived. This is the header collector flange I took to the local muffler shop to install the O2 bung which I did initially to test fire the engine. I wasn't planning on using these in the final installation since these necked down from 2.5" to 2". Regardless, there are two things wrong with this installation that really bothered me. One, the bung was installed backwards. That is the reason there's a smaller diameter section to center in the pipe during installation (ensure the pipe isn't blocking the hole while placing and welding). The second thing that really bothered me was the quality of the weld and the fact they positioned it so close to the pipe end that if I had wanted to use this pipe, it would be a mangled mess.
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