Still following - could you have bent your headers up with the new machine? Will it do the tight bends you need for those? If not, what are you planning to do with it? Roll bar?
Those are some tortured looking front control arms!
Who do you buy your header bends from? I'm going to need some 3" bends for the exhaust system on my Mini hotrod build.
MiniDave said:Still following - could you have bent your headers up with the new machine? Will it do the tight bends you need for those? If not, what are you planning to do with it? Roll bar?
Those are some tortured looking front control arms!
Who do you buy your header bends from? I'm going to need some 3" bends for the exhaust system on my Mini hotrod build.
I could have bent tubing, but not mandrel bent, there is a mandrel attachment for my machine, but its big money, much easier to just buy bends.
My plans for the bender are to build new structure that will tie into the frame, strut tower, then become the tunnel. Eventually if I want to do a full cage, I'll have the capability, but immediate use was to build the tunnel out of round tube, then start taking on site projects to make cages when I have more space.
Those are e9x OEM control arms, crazy for sure!
All these bends came from JMD Tubes (https://www.jmdtubes.com/) quality is second to none and made in USA! everyone still loves vibrant, but it all comes from overseas now and the price hasnt changed to reflect that move, just paying for a name and fancy packaging now
Found some garage time this weekend, mostly getting this picked up, organized before I leave for a work trip, but was able to put in a little time on the v8 car. Yanked the engine out so I could start remaking the one header runner on the passengers side that I didnt like....I was going to create a weird spot in the firewall, so I wanted to give it a new route
The runner that drops down below is the one being remade, it just kinda bothered me
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Old runner removed and broken apart
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Not the best photo, but you can see the green tape, that is the new runner in the making, its going to drop down in that gap and snake back up from under runner #2
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Also picked up some "treasure" a couple weeks ago, found a guy on marketplace that was selling off some 4.2 engine parts, in this photo you see the upper and lower oil pans, then the galley cover for the top of the engine, this part was a great find specifically so I can now start planning how to adapt for an remote oil filter and oil cooler sandwich plate, the last part is just an alternator bracket, I've already modified mine, so an extra was a good pick up for $10
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As mentioned leaving next week for a two week trip to asia for work, hopefully when I get back I can get back on this car and start making some progress.
Its the bosses busy time at work, so while she was working late last night I was able to sneak down to the garage and work on my headers a little....after a little adult lego/jenga, I think I found the combo that works
Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
Overall, I think I am happy with this layout/setup, going to leave them while I am away on my trip. When I come back, if I am still happy with it, I will then go and start tacking up all the runners in more spots (most just have 2 tacks), then go back to fit them again to make sure nothing moved, if that is all good, it will be time to start welding them out
Yesterday after some house project work I decided to crack a cold beer and play in the garage for the first time since before I went to China back in July....CRAZY how fast time goes and how busy life has been. First order of business was to assembly my new tubing sander. I've wanted one of these for a while, I picked up this one relatively cheap, I figured it was a good test/proof of concept, then a couple weeks ago HF has these Bauer grinders on sale, so picked one up to be a dedicated tool
Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
Quick test piece, works as advertised!
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Once that was finished I decided to pull the Cayman out so I could bring the widebody car down and put some time into it. I picked up this HF porta power a while back, it was an intentional purchase to help resolve an issue where it seems the heavy V-8 has "pulled" the frame rails together a bit, the crash bar and core support don't fit like they should...hopefully i can get this under control, thinking about making a lower tube to keep the rails at the distance they are supposed to....Also hoping it doesnt mess with my subframe and engine mounts...TBD
New tool test day
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Here you can see the hole misalignment
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Putting in work
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Back from a trip to Europe with the wife, visited 5 countries in 5 days, only to arrive back to the aftermath of Hurricane Helene. first week home was sick as hell, spent the weekend cleaning up around the house/yard, not we are close to back to normal.
Good news, left the porta power on the rails while away, the rails seem to be holding in a good spot, test fit the core support and bumper bash bar, lines up like it should. Now to get the engine back in to build a lower front brace to prevent that from happening again. While the engine is still out I took some time to finish trimming up where the OEM firewall attached to the strut towers and the inner fender area. Next steps will be to work on laying out and bending an upper tube that will connect the back of the strut towers that will also act as the top of the fire wall.
All trimmed up
Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
So much room for activies LOL
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Going to take a page from @nocones book at start trying to spend a minimum of 30mins a day in the shop to make some amount of progress. Hoping to do this for the next couple weeks, then I have to fly to the Philippines for a week for work, once back home from that and recovered from the jet lag, I am going to try and get back on that cadence again until a week long work trip in November before thanksgiving. After that work travel "should be done" for the year, at which point the time will be changed and I hope to start making some substantial progress on this thing
Keeping on track, actually spent a little more than 30min on the car last night.
Got the tubing bender out and dies changed over for the 1.75" tubing for the strut brace, got one length of tube cleaned up, then spent a little more timing cleaning up the back of the strut towers. Then started sketching out what I think I want the strut bar to look like, thinking of a couple vertical supports as well to tie back into the frame rails. I think this approach will help with building the firewall structure as well.
Crude drawing of my thoughts, as always, open to any/all feedback
Day#3 - I have to admit, this is not only rewarding, but motivating....
That being said, I had intended to play with the tubing bender a bit and make up a couple template bends with the 1-3/4 tubing, but when I got out there and started looking and thinking about what my plans are for the tubing and the new firewall, I knew that the remnant seam sealer and undercoating that was previously in the rain tray area was going to be a problem future me did not want to deal with or have concerns of weld contamination.
All that being said, another hour'ish of wire-wheeling were spend un-doing some of my 20-something year old self sins!
Now I feel like I have clean slate to start working with, I plan to patch those holes that were previously in the rain tray (triangle shaped) as well as that one round hole that was previously used for harness routing/hiding during show car life
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Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
Its crazy how much of a mess that stuff makes....but after it was all swept up, I am guessing it was 2-3lbs of weight
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Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
Unfortunately fell off of my 30min a day last week, but it was for good cause, lots of house chores friday and saturday, but more than made up for it yesterday, spent good bit of time in the garage and made some decent progress.
Started on the strut brace...reminder, the evolution chop saw is a great tool!
Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
by fouckhest, on Flickr
Got myself back up to speed on tube bending
by fouckhest, on Flickr
by fouckhest, on Flickr
Left the legs long to start
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Trimed up, seems like it will fit nicely
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Cut some 3"x3", 1/8" plates for the tubes to land
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Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
Picked these up to help with finding the correct angle for landing the tubes
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Quick test, they work pretty well...now just need to bit the bullet and make the cuts on the real bar and get it tacked into place....did the test without the plates knowing it would be a more difficult shape, so should make doing them on the plates a breeze
Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
Untitled by fouckhest, on Flickr
Found a little time in the garage last night, unfortunately my bar is a little on the short side, so it is going to have to be remade....womp womp....but, I am going to chock it up to a learning experience for the bender and I've been thinking I might down size the tube to 1.5" and go with a DOM rather than this is a seamed tube anyways, so might as well make it out of something higher quality
Not going to have any shop time tonight, anniversary dinner with the wifey, hopefully get back out there tomorrow night to see if i can bend another tube up and get my dimensions right, at least that way when I get the more expensive material, I will be confident in the process.
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