SV reX said:In reply to sleepyhead the buffalo :
I'm thinking that a car with the top hacked off and it's rollover protection exposed may have a lot of flow disruption.
all the more reason to go bigger span. also why I think I made a comment about tonneau covering the area from the seats back to... whatevers left of the hatch
although, the presence of the wing can sometimes help the flow to 'sort itself out'
In reply to nocones :
Thanks for the vote of confidence on the tie-in. I appreciate the sketching comment too. I tend to just doodle nonsense and have been enjoying drawing an actual thing for the first time in a while.
In reply to Mr_Asa :
Yes, that's exactly the plan. The c-channel will be cut into some complicated shape to mesh nicely with the cap, B-pillar, main hoop and likely the door bar as well.
In reply to bumpsteer:
Great idea, thanks!
In reply to sleepyhead the buffalo:
Consider yourself Head Aerodynamicist (?) of Team Guac! I think I followed most of what you said which leads me to feel like I should abandon the semi-truck wing I was chasing. It's only about 4ft wide.
To SV reX's point, I suppose the height of the wing will be important also to find clean air. I should be aiming for the top of the main hoop or higher, right?
Ok allow me to indulge you with a terrible sketch of my own..
One of my favorite concept cars growing up was the Ford Indigo.
Obviously Guacamole is different then that but when you posted the picture without the headlights and given your mangled hood and missing bumper.. .
I had an idea..
It seems like you could cut away your hood, remove the plastic liner and any structure not related to holding the radiator, paint the strut mount black, mount some foglights under the hood notch attached to the strut tower and install an annoyingly large indigo/Ferrari 312T3 looking front wing at the top of the bumper support and send it.
As a bonus you would have a bench to sit on during the concourse.
Ignore it, use it, laugh at it, whatever you want.
I forgot about the Indigo! That's bringing back some memories from Need for Speed 2 SE.
AxeHealey said:In reply to sleepyhead the buffalo:
Consider yourself Head Aerodynamicist (?) of Team Guac! I think I followed most of what you said which leads me to feel like I should abandon the semi-truck wing I was chasing. It's only about 4ft wide.
Dunno what your budget is looking like. You might check out the 9LivesRacing site. they've got a couple of blemish wings up for auction. also, you could piece together a ~70" wing from "mini" offcuts:
https://9livesracing.com/collections/all/products/mini-wangs-are-back?variant=32036790239309
or you could follow nocones' example, and just bend sheet aluminum around an aluminum tube and make your own foil.
and yeah, getting up above the roll bar would be good. or, you could contour some foam on the back side of the upper roll bar to help the flow stay attached as it goes by.
In reply to nocones :
Oh, you are indulged. That is such a cool idea. I really wanted it to still appear to be a Mini in the end but I like a lot of things about this...
In reply to sleepyhead the buffalo :
I've checked their auction site a number of times for the Miata but I always seem to miss the live ones. Never noticed the mini wangs. Yet another cool idea with the foam on the bar.
Ok.. Because I can't stop and there was a REALLY detailed R53 MINI on Sketchup..
In Green
So yeah.. that doesn't look bad.. that has promise. Sorry It's impossibly low in the back. And your probably going to run pokier wheels.
In reply to nocones :
That's much better than not bad...
Progress.
Seeing the pics blown up shows me a few places that need attention that didn't stand out in the garage. Not easy welding (for me). The outer layer of sheet metal is extremely thin and of course the plate is much thicker. It seems I got good penetration in most cases though.
I also did some poking around re: turning Guac into a Mindigo. It's certainly not ruled out but the placement of the shock towers may make the final look difficult to achieve. We'll see.
Preschool Prom (yeah...) knocked everyone out except Dad so I got some time in the garage tonight.
CAD
Transfer
Refine many, many times and fit!
I'd rather the speed hole be a bit smaller but the smaller one I have literally just burned itself up trying to get through the piece. Extra speed.
Use plenty of cutting fluid!
Those look proper. I like how you drilled the holes in the top plates to bond them to the existing inner structure. I'm especially impressed that you didn't have any holes that didn't line up with metal.. which is what I likely would of had.
In reply to jfryjfry :
I used a bunch of WD40. That's as close as I've got!
In reply to nocones :
Thanks! I had intended on cutting slits in line with the structure and welding it that way but I have to give credit to bumpsteer for the hole suggestion. Much simpler.
AxeHealey said:In reply to jfryjfry :
I used a bunch of WD40. That's as close as I've got!
I read about this guy who did a project I was going to do. Required 8 3" hole saw cuts in stainless. He said he went through 4 hole saws using wd40. I made all 8 with one hole saw using a lot of cutting fluid and it's still as good as new.
maybe his technique was extra hard on the teeth but cutting fluid is awesome. Definitely worth getting a bottle of it.
In reply to jfryjfry :
Noted. I will buy some... next time. For now, I just got back from a week away and the show must go on.
I accidently grabbed my old welding helmet, was having trouble seeing and sorta bodged the first couple sections. I also struggled with settings for some reason.
Nocones' compliment on me hitting the inner structure with the holes in the plates was haunting me while I made the driver side but, alas, got it again!
Good fitment again.
Burned in.
It's hard to tell in the pictures but the main hoop is much closer to the B-pillar on the driver's side. I'm sure that's directly related to the fact that the drivers side appears to have been smashed pretty well during the wreck.
Last night I didn't feel like doing anything major so I started into the driver's door. It isn't pretty after the wreck. It hasn't opened or closed well in my ownership but after I cut the inside out, it was worse than ever.
Some hammering, muscling and adjusting at the hinges left me very satisfied.
There's still the huge kink by where the mirror used to be but we'll get there. Tonight was the seat. I figured I'd use the rails that we got for the Healey. I don't remember if they came with the seats or we purchased them separately but it looks like I can get essentially the same thing on Amazon for $36.
I wanted to use the stock mounting holes. Problem is, the lever wasn't wide enough.
Nothing the angle grinder, metal hot glue gun and some scrap bar can't fix. Not sure what the bar costs for budget, 25 cents? 50 cents?
The expensive bit is the Sparco brackets I'm using. They were given to me but I know that's not how this works. I see $73.50 new online right now but these are used and I'm going to keep my eye out for a lower number to claim.
The seat is what came in Hatchet when I bought it and I still have the (sort of) nice cover. I'm betting I could sell it for more but I personally wouldn't pay more than $50 for it. I see lots of similar seats on FB for that.
First order of business tonight was to get the wiper assembly out. It seems like, to do it the right way, you have to remove the cowl. I didn't do it that way.
Next was capping the A-pillars. It was at this time that I had an idea...
Pretty freaking cool lookin if you ask me. The bar wouldn't be long enough to reach from above the driver's head once fit into place but it would from the middle of the main hoop.
I think I've convinced myself not to do it so I started into making a cap out of Guac C-pillar.
Thoughts from the group on the bar from the hoop to the passenger A-pillar?
Regarding the seat rail that you got for free... if not used here it, could have sat in rhe shop corner until one day when you scraped it to get it out of your way.
Budget it by the pound.
I've seen similar bars from the middle of the hoop down the center to the cowl/trans tunnel on MGAs and Spridget type stuff, but I believe it's primarily due to the fact that they maybe don't want to cut holes in their trunks in order to run the down-bar toward the rear.
In this application it seems like that bar adds weight up high and doesn't really increase rollover protection. I would put something like a funny car halo in it if head protection is the goal, but hey if it looks cool then go for it. I don't think there's likely to be a significant detriment to the integrity of the roll hoop (kind of a funky angle could load that area in an odd way I guess), but it's not like I've run an FEA on the thing so who's to say.
In reply to John Welsh :
Good thinking, thanks.
In reply to bumpsteer :
I hope this isn't a famous-last-words situation but I'm not overly concerned with rollover protection. This bar would be there to a) look cool and b) provide some extra stiffness. Avoiding the extra weight and added budget is more important here, I think. I'm going to move forward with the simple caps.
Even if you ran the bar you'd probably still want to cap them. Unless you want to cut them flush and cap that gap.
I agree your rollover protection looks plenty adequate for the Challenge. That extra bar is often called a "Petty bar" and is used in place of rear stays for odd cars that can't fit them, such as the Lotus Elise. You have plenty of rear stabilizer, so the Petty bar isn't necessary.
In reply to jfryjfry :
Totally. I was jut going to cap the passenger pillar with plate rather than just sheet metal if I was going to run a bar there.
Vacuumed out the acorns and got it welded in over lunch.
Driver's side done.
I think I'll stay on theme and get the C-pillars capped off next.
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