Bu-suzu

I decided to bob the back for weight savings.

Next up are fender flares...

That is just bad ass.

Thank you for your service. If we are ever anywhere close to each other, i want to buy you a drink.

In reply to Dusterbd13:

Thanks Duster, are you going to the challenge this year?

In reply to Catatafish:

Zombie lives!

In reply to crisd:

Yes. Bringing an amc imsa clone. You?

In reply to Recon1342:

Thanks Recon, and thanks for serving also!

In reply to Dusterbd13:

Your right down the road from me, your profile says Albemarle, NC. I'm in Fayetteville! And yes... as long as I don't get deployed during the competition.

Dude, youre stationed in Fayetteville? I get that way every few months. Ill have to look you up next time I am down there.

crisd wrote: In reply to Catatafish: Zombie lives!

And its awesome!

In reply to Catatafish:

Thanks bud

I hear dampers on cars are all the rage lately so I figured I'd add some. I used some of the square tube scrap to make the lower bracket and welded it on the lower A-arm.

I cut up the Explorer one, flipped it upside down and welded it up.

I wanted to see how my yard sale air dam was going to look under the truck so I bungeed it on to see...

I have a whopping 2.5" clearance!

That looks perfect! Has a syclone feel to it

I've had similar thoughts, I like how it is turning out.

I'm curious about what you are doing under the hood. Both in terms of utilizing the space and any front suspension changes to make up for the new weight distribution.

In reply to Brian:

Right now I'm just getting this thing put together using only the components and scrap I have from the Buick Riviera, the Isuzu truck, the Ford Explorer front suspension that was given to me from a solid axle conversion, and the bent Jag front suspension that was in the bed of the truck when I bought the truck. If what I have isn't optimal, I honestly don't have a clue to: a) determine what is optimal, b) measure what I do have to know where I need to go. And finally, I have no experience in setting up a suspension to work right. I'm welding this sucker together and running that. Of course, if any one has guidance or suggestions to offer... I'm a quick learner!

As far as any "engineering" that anyone might think I'm doing here... um... nope. I have a concept of what I want then put stuff where it fits. This truck is engineering itself by what is available and where what I have spacially fits. The location of the engine was determined by where it fell on the frame rails when I was using the OEM unitbody. Once I cut up the bed to fit that wheelbase, it stayed that way after I later ditched the unitbody. The height of the engine was determined by needing to keep the axle shafts in the cups which determined how close together I needed the frame rails to be, and the engine sat as low as I could given those hard points being in the way. (The location of the lower pick up points were determined by the length of the axle shafts needing to stay in the cups.) The upper A-arms were located by where they fit, and where one point didn't fit, it was cut and moved.

I did look at some examples in a few books on how the angles should look generally but my take away from those chapters was, there is no perfect suspension, it's all a mess of compromises so don't waste a hundred hours toiling over math and angles and just make the darn thing keeping within general guidlines. All your math is going to change anyway once the project is complete as the weight of the final product is unknowable until done and that weight will determine how low the vehicle will sit and that determines the angle of the A-arms. If they are not at a good angle when complete... I'll cut and move them. But... I have a little adjustability in the rear ride height from the torsion bars. The spring rate is what it is and not changing. The front suspension is what it is. I could make small adjustments in ride height left to right by putting spacers under one or the other spring but that is it. I have a sway bar in the front and rear, the only tuning I could do is unhooking one or the other or both. I suppose I could grind one thinner to make it slightly less strong. But I would only want to grind in tiny increments. I suppose I could do that to the front springs too. Of course I could always add lead weight to any corner to balance it. Adding weight doesn't excite me though.

Left side bed wheel arch being cut for fender flares. Damn battery went dead before I could finish.

Added brackets to hold the back of the bed up. The brackets are the old Explorer torsion bar key covers. I just flipped them up side down and used the existing holes to bolt it to the tailgate bolts. Like I said, this thing is engineering itself, lol. Re-attached the tailgate.

Awsome!!!

More on flares, please. That is something I have to start thinking about on my challenge car.

Dusterbd13 wrote: Awsome!!! More on flares, please. That is something I have to start thinking about on my challenge car.

I'll post pictures of the flares soon but a few notes on the flares. My original plan was to cut away the offending metal and toss it. Then fabricate metal flares from the Buick hood. But years later when getting back on the project, I pie cut the fenders and flared that metal out. Now I am at a crossroads with four choices. 1, cut pie shaped metal slices and weld them into the pie gaps for a solid metal flare. 2, use the metal flared out as attachment points to weld on a strip of metal for flares. 3, used the protruding metal as the base to lay fiberglass mat down for flares. 4... there is no four but then it wouldn't be a cross road with out 4... so... um... buy flares. No to 4. lol edit: once I got home and looked at splicing in pie cuts I decide that was too labor intensive to make a hundred DIFFERENT dimensioned pieces. So one is out. Four is not an option. So it's either two or three. I know nothing about fiberglass... seems easy enough no?

In reply to Dusterbd13:

On the left side the flares were cut from full panels so the flare sticks out way more. First, I traced the right side fender openings to the left side. Then drew lines down perpendicular to the arc. Then used a 4" cut off wheel on my angle grinder to cut the fender. Once cut I bent the metal 90° and bolted the fender back on.

Next

Next

Last, I used sheet metal screws to fasten the air dam to the grill.

OK... let's talk paint. I'm thinking of doing the $50 dollar Rustoleum paint job:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qPJTTRWttQ

And a paint scheme that looks like one of these...

This so totally rocks. After you get done in the back, toss a supercharged 3800 fwd drivetrain up front.

In reply to Robbie:

I would hate to think how much trouble trying to sync the two would be!

My first draft of the paint scheme. (The word TIRE is supposed to be white but when I erased the red it just looks pink). I'm tracking only General Tire and CRC are our sponsors... am I missing anyone?