Lemons 2020, The Dirtsons strike again?

dculberson said:

volvoclearinghouse said:

In reply to Toyman01 :

I hear ya.  I'd like to do one as you say, for the experience.  Unfortunately we've been whittled down to only 4 drivers, ony 3 of whom (myself included) I could possibly convince to run a 24.  I think we'd need a minimum of 5 drivers, and probably 1 dedicated pit boss, to have a chance at completing a 24 with all team body parts in tact.  

I could probably find you a pit boss. And at least one more driver.

I don't think we'll be able to make the 24 @ CMP, but I'll keep this in mind for the future.  As I said, we're down to a "core" group of basically 4 guys; any fewer and we really won't be able to race anymore.  I'd really like to bring some new folks on board.  

Hmmm. That's going to be a tight fit...

There might be some plasma cutter involved in this install. 

In reply to Toyman01 :

It is just a matter of forced perspective.  The farther away it is, the more distant it looks.

In reply to noddaz :

I wish that was the case. The new engine is 12" longer than the old from the shifter to the front pulley. 

It's going to be a matter of forcing it to fit. 

Just push harder.  That's always a crowd pleaser. 

If I had friends like you I would no longer have a wife. What a good time!

Sonic said:

Just push harder.  That's always a crowd pleaser. 

Tomorrow afternoon at some point, I'm going to cut the nose off the car to give me some room to work. Then I'll slide the engine in and see what hits. If it's not important, I'll remove it. If it is important, I'll probably still remove it. It'll be fine. 

The only real concerns are the clearance from the intake and starter to the steering gear. Everything else is just metal that can be moved. 

Olemiss540 said:

If I had friends like you I would no longer have a wife. What a good time!

My wife is one of the team drivers so I get a good bit of leeway when it comes to working on Lemons Cars. 

This might fit better than I was afraid it would. Looks like I can cut out the front cross member, turn it around and weld it back in to miss the oil pan, build a couple of motor mounts and a transmission mount and be golden. The radiator will have to move forward 4" and the shifter will move back 6".  The engine will probably end up farther forward than ideal, but it will be Lemons worthy. 

So, last weekend, after a trial fit of the engine, I cut the front cross member out of the car, turned it around and welded it back in for oil sump clearance. 

This weekend was mostly taken up by the G35 but I did make the time to set the engine and block it in place. 

This is fairly close to the final resting place and as close as I could get it working by myself. 

I need to do a little more slicing on the transmission tunnel to level things up and get the drive shaft close to alignment.

I did not want to build a transmission tunnel, but with the lack of oil sump clearance to the steering linkage, I can't drop the engine anymore. Drive shaft hoops are going to be a requirement. 

More to come. 

So, the engine mounts are built and the engine is sitting on them. They are pretty ugly, but this is Lemons quality.

The transmission mount is being a pain. There is a bracket missing that holds the transmission mount. GM has discontinued it and I can't fine one anywhere. Polaris also used this transmission in the Slingshot. They have the bracket for $82 but I'll probably build my own for that price. 

I moved on to the fuel system. The pump is mounted back by the tank. Chevy used a fuel filter in the Corvette that had a built in regulator, so I mounted one of those on the firewall. I'm using the plastic fuel lines for supply and return, so I ran a piece of 1" steel pipe under the car to keep the lines from getting damaged. 

I didn't shoot any decent pictures so you will have to get by with words for now. I'll shoot some tomorrow and post them. 

Those fender mounted mirrors are friggin genius. 

officially approved by some dude. 

Uhm.... one stint? The only reason I did not drive two last year was the 5 hour drive to get parts so we could keep going!!  I absolutely want to be in the car more.

And yes, the key to not having the wife get upset is to have her be a part of the team. I started out as chief decorator for whatever crazy theme they came up with. Driving is more fun!!

Engine and transmission mounts are done. I made no effort to make them elegant, so they are super ugly but will keep the engine where it belongs. 

This little bracket was MIA. GM no longer makes it. Polaris wants $90 for it. This took 30 minutes to build and will get the job done. 

Coolant system is 90% done. I could not believe how well the hoses worked. The hoses that came with the engine are almost a perfect fit. The new radiator support is built out of a old bed frame. I have most of a sheet of brake metal at the office that I will use to block off everything except the radiator. 

The factory rear axle in the B210 is rated for 120 lb-ft of torque. The engine is rated at 166 lb-ft. I was going to encourage the team to drive it fairly easy to keep from snapping it. One of the team members is a Datsun nut and is building a E-mod Datsun Roadster. The Roadster rear axle is rated at 280 lb-ft of torque so it will work perfectly for what we are doing to it. Now instead of trying to make a too wide axle fit, we will have to make a narrower axle work instead. I'll be building new spring mounts next weekend. I was amazed at the size of the Roadster axle compared to the B210. It's huge. As an added bonus, we get huge aluminum vented drums.

In reply to Toyman01 :

It is not so much that the roadster axle is huge, more like the B210 axle is miniature

A Lemons update video from Shellie's House of Speed. 

Some of this construction is pretty hokey. Quick and dirty at best. 

Toyman01 said:

Engine and transmission mounts are done. I made no effort to make them elegant, so they are super ugly but will keep the engine where it belongs. 

This little bracket was MIA. GM no longer makes it. Polaris wants $90 for it. This took 30 minutes to build and will get the job done. 

Coolant system is 90% done. I could not believe how well the hoses worked. The hoses that came with the engine are almost a perfect fit. The new radiator support is built out of a old bed frame. I have most of a sheet of brake metal at the office that I will use to block off everything except the radiator. 

The factory rear axle in the B210 is rated for 120 lb-ft of torque. The engine is rated at 166 lb-ft. I was going to encourage the team to drive it fairly easy to keep from snapping it. One of the team members is a Datsun nut and is building a E-mod Datsun Roadster. The Roadster rear axle is rated at 280 lb-ft of torque so it will work perfectly for what we are doing to it. Now instead of trying to make a too wide axle fit, we will have to make a narrower axle work instead. I'll be building new spring mounts next weekend. I was amazed at the size of the Roadster axle compared to the B210. It's huge. As an added bonus, we get huge aluminum vented drums.

Please check the axle alignment when you're finished welding the new brackets on.  All that welding on one side of an axle  will bend the axle. But all you need to do is weld on the opposite side to move it back.  
You can check for camber by clamping them on vertically. If the distance at the wheel is about what it is 3-4 feet up you're good. 
clamp two straight pieces ( of angle iron? Or something ) to both wheel rims. Measure horizontally at the front and back. Keep welding until they are the same. I like using my stick welder for this  because it's fast and can throw a lot of heat into the weld.  

Obviously I need to update this some.

Some of this is probably covered in the above video. I do better with words and pictures. 

Transmission mount is done. Not pretty, but it lets me use the factory mount locations on the transmission and the car. The engine and transmission mounts are both soft mounted using factory mounts. Hopefully that will help soften the blow when the drivers abuse it and keep them from breaking the mounts.

The new axle is mounted. Rather than moving everything on the axle, I moved everything on the car. Again, quick and dirty. Not race quality, but Lemons quality.

Front spring mounts. I cut the original mounts in half and built these. They use the existing mounts on the body to save me from building new mount locations. They are offset for the narrower spring locations on the axle. The Roadster springs are a little longer, so the new mounts are also offset forward about an inch to keep the tires close to where they should be. 

The rear shackles are done the same way. I cut apart the factory shackles and rebuilt them as necessary. They are pretty atrocious and they are going to cause some twist in the springs, but they should get the job done. Handeling should be...interesting. 

Close enough. It also lowered the car a fair amount.

Next up was the fuel system. The exhaust is moving from the drivers side to the passenger and I didn't want fuel lines run anywhere near it. That meant abandoning the existing hard lines.  I'm running Nylon EFI tube from the fuel cell to the engine bay for supply and return. Since I didn't want it susceptible to damage, I ran a piece of 1" EMT under the car on the drivers side as a raceway for the fuel lines. No pictures of that. 

GM was nice enough to design a fuel filter with a built in regulator and return port. Originally for a Corvette but it's apparently the hot ticket for running GM engines in non-GM bodies. The LS guys apparently use them a lot. All of that is tucked up nice and safe on the firewall and uses factory quick connectors. 

The fuel pump is mounted to one of the tank straps. Hopefully I won't have a problem with the pump losing prime. I also had to add a 3rd port to the tank for the return line. 

I decided to use the factory Solstice coolant tank. They are cheap and fairly easy to mount. I'll probably have to drill a hole in the hood for the cap though. 

I needed an intake tube. The OEM stuff is too expensive, but a cheap Chinese CAI solved that problem and gave me a place to mount the mass air sensor. It will need some uglification before judging. Hopefully it won't rain too much.

Fan mount is built. I'm a little concerned about running a pusher fan. Hopefully it won't be a issue because there is zero room to mount one on the pull side. I have 1" of clearance between the crank pulley and the radiator. There is also some concern that the radiator is too small since we are using the original Datsun B210 radiator. We should have some time to get some testing done before the race though. 

And that's about where we stopped due to the COVID mess. They had posponed the race at that point which bought us some more time. The car is currently sitting on jack stands with the rear axle disassembled for bearings. 

There will be more to come, just not sure when. 

Modern engines don't waste as much heat as older mills.  That rad might be fine.  Have you had it cleaned out? Might be worthwhile. 

Might want to reinforce those spring mounts a little, maybe add some gusseting. 

In reply to volvoclearinghouse (Forum Supporter) :

The radiator was new last year. I think it will work fine. Some of the other team members are concerned. We'll see. 

Gussets might not be a bad idea. 

I must know about the cool green Turkey-Pi-weed T shirt I saw in the vid above.  What's the story? Can you imagine a turkey pot pie with weed in it?  Tryptophane and THC, the stoners delight weed and munchies in one delicious package.  No fighting around any Thanksgiving table where that is served, pure food coma babay!

Edit note.  So I posted this a few mins ago and when I looked, everything past the PI symbole was gone, so I re-wrote it with 'Pi' rather than the symbol.  Strange.

In reply to Adrian_Thompson (Forum Supporter) :

I like shirts that make people wonder. That one is one of my favorites. Chicken-Pot-Pi.

The Think Outside the Box is another favorite. Most of them come from 6dollarshirts.com. 

I have been super lax in updating threads around here. 

The car is getting close, which is good considering the race is in 3-4 weeks. Engine is in, rear axle is in, wiring harness and ecu are in, fuel system plumbed and tested. It hasn't been fired yet, that may happen this weekend. We ran into a problem with bearings and seals for the rear axle. They are some bastard size that is not available anymore except through specialty sources. It took almost a month for them to come in, but that is done and they were install last weekend. Brakes and such will be completed this weekend. 

I also ran into a problem with the driveshaft. The Datsun axle flange is a bastard size. The Datsun driveshaft tube, which has a flange, is also a bastard size. The local driveshaft shop basically said they couldn't build it if it didn't use standard parts. I found a place that built a shaft I could have used if I built an adapter for the axle, but it was $600. After a bunch of research and measuring and parts hunting, I'm building the damn thing myself. I bought two used Solstice driveshafts from ebay for the CV joints and splined stub ends. I've cut the stubs out of the shafts and will be welding them into a new piece of driveshaft tubing. And I'm building an adapter to bolt the Solstice CV to the Datsun flange at the axle. So the shaft will have Solstice CV joints on both ends. One will bolt directly to the transmission, the other will bolt to an adapter that is bolted to the axle flange. Here's hoping it works and stays together for 24 hours. 

There is an adapter in there somewhere. I just needed to go find it. 

Note to self, do NOT buy a bigger piece of metal than you need for your part. Doing so increases machining time a lot and makes a hell of a mess. 

It does look like the adapter is going to work though. 

I also have started cutting the ends to weld into the new driveshaft tubing. 

While I'm reasonably certain this will stay together, it's going to be getting some fairly stout driveshaft hoops just incase.

I'll try to update this over the next couple of weeks as things come together. 

Oh, and the exhaust is done. 

And one other thing. The plan was to use the Datsun clutch master cylinder with the GM slave. Unfortunately those two lines were nothing alike. The GM line was a o-ring quick connect, the Datsun line was a NPT. So I made a manifold block. The GM line plugs into one side. The Datsun line screws into the other. It's a pretty neat little piece that I apparently didn't take any pictures of. If I remember I'll take some this weekend while the car is up in the air.