Got a fair amount done this weekend. Got the battery cables buttoned down. E brake assembly in as well.
It's good to have helpers. That is a big beast going into a small space.
it's in...... sort of. we realized quickly that the slave cylinder and clutch fork needed some mods to get the monster into it's home.
As it sat while we modified the clutch fork and slave cylinder bracket.
and finally it's in. For good? who knows?
another shot
another
another
I like this angle the best.
sanding the underside of the tub for Herculiner application this Saturday.
Hey Slithern,
Looks great and a lot of fun. I have a few questions for you. What motor and transmission did you put in the car? And when you got the IRS from Hurricane was it rusty like that? I am about to order my car hopefully very soon and I
Looks great. You're really haulin' azz on your build. May I make one suggestion? You may want to consider putting some convoluted tubing around the positive battery cable just for extra protection. You can get it at Home Depot for a couple of bucks.
Jim
P.S. That sway bar looks kinda familiar. ;)
Josh,
Anything you need to know regarding the kit, you can ask. I would be happy to answer anything i can as i'm sure everyone here would. My engine is a 426 FE stroker from Southern Automotive(basically their 406 with a 428 crank). Trans. is a 4 speed toploader also from Southern. I can't think of anything right now that i would order if i had it to do over again. I agonized over brakes for some time, but i ended up going with the standard. I figured that i could upgrade later if i absolutely had to. I went with wipers because i wan't sure if i would have to have them for registration purposes, but otherwise i'm pretty happy so far.
As for everything else, here is the good and the bad as i see it.
The packing of the kit was mostly good. Seats and carpet came in plastic garbage bags. I think that could have been better.
The Vinyl seats look pretty good. They are softer then leather and may be less slippery too. I was debating going with leather and possibly sending them back if i didn't like them, but i'm keeping them.
The upgraded carpet is just OK IMHO. I may ultimately opt to have a pro install really high quality carpet.
Windshield arms fit pretty marginally but we are working on a solution for that.
The rear end does have some rust, but that is pretty easily fixed.
Hurricane has been tremendous to deal with so far. And for me this is hugely important.
Jim,
I will be putting some added protection on battery and brake cables. I do that stuff while i'm thinking and staring at some of the harder stuff.
Jim, your car looks great and I see that you are using a Southern Automotive engine...same as mine. So far my motor runs perfectly after some small routine problems (pan leaks) fixed by tightening up the bolts. I too had to mod. the slave cylinder mount so the push cylinder would work.
I guess I was just too stupid or confused I couldn't get the 3-wire alternator to work properly and blew up the voltage regulator..so I just ordered a nice new chrome one wire alternator from Jegs and solved that problem.
Anyway your doing a great job and making the Hurricane name proud. ;D
Best Regards, Bill
The cockpit tub and trunk tub Herculinered.
Cutting the footbox using the standard mod that everyone uses. JWD came up with it i think. Apologies if it was someone else. It really helps to have a friend who knows how to weld.
Welding in the replacement steel. I would not be able to do this stuff without my buddy John helping me. He handled this himself and did a great job. Once painted it looks factory fresh.
I have the Vintage wheels and i realized early on that the lugs were too long for the pins to work. Got the trusty cutting wheel out and went to town. Careful how much you cut here as the lengths seemed to change front to back.
The footbox after welding but before paint.
another of the footbox.
Test fitting the headers and pipes. Everything seems to fit fine, although i have to put a bit of elbow grease to get the pipes to be parallel to the frame. Is that what i'm going for?
another. Next, it's on to the transmission rods. The toploader does not really fit in the tunnel. We are going to make and bend all new rods to gain some clearance and see if we can get it to fit. That will be this weekend hopefully, maybe brush some aluminum, get the remote oil filter block plate to actually work, replace the fuel pump, temp fit the drive shaft safety loop (if i can do that without the shaft). I better get to work.
Bill
More pics on the way. I had a problem getting the oil relocation plate to work with the Hurricane frame. you can see the fitting was resting on the frame. I know some people built a new plate, some were able to use 45 degree fittings, but i checked with Hurricane and decided to create a recess in the frame.
First, we bent a plate that we thought would work so the fitting would clear.
Then, cut the frame to match.
Dropped the plate in, a pretty good fit actually.
Weld it in place.
The finished weld. Lots of grinding and sanding, priming and painting.
The finished product. It came out pretty good i must say. A bit hard to tell in the pictures. The engine went in with the fittings on and it clears by a solid 3/8" now.
I'm trying to get the fuel delivery buttoned up. Had to put in a fuel filter.
Drive shaft and safety loop. i had no idea the shaft goes that far inside the toploader. I thought for sure i mismeasured when i got the driveshaft.
I had a friend of a friend weld the AC pedals to the wilwood assembly.
Primed and ready for the gloss topcoat.
Multiple glossy topcoats
The finished product? I think it looks pretty cool, and actually looks better in person then on the close up pics.
Another angle.
Started brushing my aluminum with my homemade scotchbright block. More to come.
Nice job on the frame mod. That's the fun part. Making it work the way you think it should be. Yes, I'm the one that came up with the footbox mod. Thanks for the credit. Keep up the good work. Your build is looking great.
Jim
This is the clearance i got from doing the modifcation to the frame. I'm really pleased with the result. no way it will hit now.
The Hurricane tub is too narrow for the standard linkages to fit on the toploader. We mulled this over for awhile and finally decided not to cut the tub, but to bend the linkages to fit. We actually did have to cut the tub a bit for the shift mechanism to work, but it was a minimal hack job. A lot of bending, welding and swearing, and we finally got it done. Now we have full clearance in all gears. We added an additional sleeve for rigidity where we thought it was necessary. They still need to be cleaned up and painted but you get the idea.
Back to the oil relocation plate. I would suggest to replace the 90* fitting with a straight fitting. Then put on a 90 with a swivel on the side going onto the 90. you may think that the 90 you have on now is tight enough, but the relocation plate is aluminum, and once you run the motor to temp, you will most likely need to tighten it more. Do you have enough clearance to replace that 90 the way it is now, or get another complete revolution on it, let's say once the car is finished, and it's leaking?
Here is what I ended up with because of that. I will change this out this winter sometime,.... by lifting the motor enough to spin the 90 off and do it right.
Brad
(http://www.clubcobra.com/photopost/data/500/medium/remote_oil_adapter_004_Large_.jpg)
Been working on the car a fair amount and am getting some stuff done. All the firewall aluminum is in. I brushed it and had it clear anodized. The master cylinders are in. I still am planning on having a custom spacer made so they ride level. For now, they point down. I bled the brakes and clutch and had a leak at all four wheels. Another quarter turn and no leaks. These things need to be TIGHT.
Another. You can see the black thermal sleeving i put on the brake lines. I'll be adding a shield as well. I think the aluminum came out pretty good. A B+ in my opinion. I think Hurricane could do a better job on their aluminum when i see my buddies factory five. Just an opinion based on mine vs. his.
The pedals hanging where the will live from now on. (knock on wood) The still need some adjustment but pedal feels good so far on clutch and brakes. I added some of the high dollar heat shielding on the inside of the footbox. I figure every little bit helps. It's aluminum side out, but what the hell.
another of the footbox
Another of the thermal sleeve. I added some heat shrink to the end to hopefully keep the fraying to a minimum.
These showed up at 10PM last night. :o They look huge and wide, but Roger Kraus Racing say they will fit the vintage wheels i have.
another
Looks great. One concern I would have is the fluid resevoirs attached to the masters instead of using the remote ones. How will you fill them when the body is on, especially the 2 towards the outside of the car?
Keep the pics coming
Dan
The reservoirs is a temp thing. I'll be replacing them with the remote girling reservoirs.
filling the resivors is no problem there is plenty of room
Great job on your build. I was planning to us the AC pedals on my build. Do you happen to have a shot of how the AC pedals were welded to the Wildwood arms? If I can't find somebody to weld them on, I may have to find another way to mount them. Thanks
Sam
HM1076
Sorry, Sam i don't and now that everything is painted and mounted i'm not sure you would see much. My buddy knew a guy that did it. We just cut off the wilwood pedals and followed the arc that they had. They are adjustable to a degree and i think they will work pretty good. They feel pretty good on my feet so far.
Bill
So< we've been wiring the past few weeks.
Another. We have all the ends on the wires and it should be just routing and hooking it up now.
Underneath where we put the starter solenoid. It is protected by the footbox, but not up on the firewall.
Another. You can make out how we grounded to the frame. We ran the other ground to the block from here.
The dash temp fitted. I have to cut the bracket on the speedo in order for it to be positioned correctly. The dash braces are a temp fit and will be final position after powder coating.
Another. I am going to have to pull the Tac back out and try and re-glue the vinyl. That's the only place where it looks to have bubbled up a bit. I should get my pipes back from coating, some cool flex radiator hoses and a battery cutoff switch all in this week. I think we might be getting close.
Bill, looks nice and tidy. I had clearance problems with my speedo bracket and the top of the dash support also. I ended up angling the top of the dash support 45* plus trimmed the bracket.
Good idea on the aux 12v outlet. I installed one as well for phone chargers, radar dectors, blenders, coolers ;D, etc.
Matt
I don't want to hijack but here's a pic. of a panel I built, covered in dash material, that has the controls for the seat heaters and an outlet for I-pods, cell phone, etc.
Jim
Looking real nice, I like the way you made the panel for the heated seats, I took have them but not sure where I am going to put the switches yet. Nice idea
Randy
Well, the day finally came. All the wiring roughed in. Time to add some gas and give it a go. AND...... nothing. There was one wire not hooked up correctly that was letting us get power when the key was in the on position, but not in the start position. After that was hooked up right, she came to life. I ran it through all the gear on the jack stand and itall seems to be working correctly. Some say they thought it would be louder, some say it's really loud, i say it's just right. Now to re-route all the wires to their final lengths and positions and the first go kart ride. I have to say, it was so amazing to hear it rumble to life for the first time. I also got the pipes back from jet hot and installed them. WOW that was easy. NOTTTTTT.
I have a go Kart. I drove it around a bit on Sunday, and it was quite a thrill, sweaty palms, giddy smiles ect. It drove good, nothing crazy happened. Engine seems to be missing a bit going into higher RPM's but we will figure that out. It's woth all the hard work. I have a video but don't know how to post it yet.
Bill
Great feeling, isn't it Bill. I remember my first go kart, what a thrill.
I posted mine to Youtube. Takes a little work to initially set up but after that it's easy. Then just copy the link from Youtube and paste it on here.
Dan
Congrats Bill! That's gotta be a great feeling! Would've liked to make up there, but was intent on racking up some build time of my own over the weekend. Will make a point of coming up soon.
Matt
1st Go Kart ride video Now Playing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dsyR2HMj6w
another from the copilot seat.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dsyR2HMj6w
I'm jealous, I don't have an onboard video of my go kart ride. :(
Looks great though and that Big Block rumbles very nicely. Good choice.
Dan
[size=12]Slithern,
VERY cool.
Here ya go-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PS6D5k47H7M
Spent last weekend mounting the body and all the lights. The headlights too a while. I went with the wipac buckets and they look a million times better. The drivers side is not perfectly centered, which I will have to fix, and the flat mounting spot is bigger on the drivers side, which i am hoping my painter can fix.
Another of the passenger side. It looks good, pretty well centered. I think the Lucas lights look pretty cool too.
Here is the drivers side. They actually look worse in the pics, then they do in person. I'll have to go really scrutinize them tonight. You can see the drivers side flat mounting point is larger then the passenger side.
One from the rear. I had to open up the hole more on top so the bulb would shine more into the tail light then the trunk. I am going to make the little aluminum housing to clean it up in the trunk. I tried some off the shelf LED's but the shoot straight up. I think the regular bulbs that i purchased are actually pretty bright.
Bill, I used the Wipac buckets as well and the fit was about the same. I sanded the flat edges to round/blend them into the fender and they look pretty good. I haven't painted yet, but I think they will be fine. I also did the same for the tail lights and they blend into the fender better as well.
Regards, Sam
This is a shot of the outer fender wells. I had been putting this off for a long time because the brackets sent from Hurricane were not really usable. I needed a bit more space inside the engine compartment and had to make new brackets. I couldn't put it off any longer though as i wanted to drive the car with the body on and it slings rocks everywhere. I didn't want my pipes to get more chipped then they already are from the body going on. I think it came out pretty good.
The gas cap...... We didn't like the idea of screwing the cap through the body. My friend has a lathe and we decided to turn down the cap assembly a little bit and open up the hole in the car a tiny bit so it would drop down and rest farther down inside the hole, so the Lemans cap will close. We still may have to shorten the spacer on the Lemans cap but it is waaaaay closer then it was.
Another with the cap on.
The Trunk roughed in and the quick jacks on. I will be doing a lot more work in the coming weeks to get closer on the alignment of the doors, trunk and hood panels.
Windshield on. The hole lined up pretty good that we had drilled earlier, but it was quite the magic trick to get all the washers and nuts on with the body on.
Twin pusher fans mounted. They may be a little high, i'm not sure. We aren't exactly sure how much room the fittings and the oil cooler are going to take up. It may balance it out just fine, or we may have to drop the fans a pinch. I still think they look cool.
Backed out and pulled back in to try and check out the ride height.
And off we went.
Here's a link for an onboard video with the body on.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORxsM1-7SVc
Too cool video. Great job.
Wasn't that a thrill?
Dan
It really was amazing. I now have an actual car. It was way different then the go Kart. Faster, more real. I've actually got 50 miles on it now.
Congrats. on the major milestone. That sure brings back some memories of my first drive.
Jim
Congratulations Bill! You sure smoked me on the build. I remember when you came by to look at my build when you were checking out Hurricanes. Now you're nearly done and I haven't even fired mine up yet. Oh well, gotta say that I'm enjoying the build, even at my snail pace, and will be a little disappointed once it's done. But then again, are they ever really done?
On the pusher fans, I don't think they're too high. You'll see on originals that the axis of the fans was just a few inches below the upper edge of the grill area. Would love to see a pic from inside the wheel well to see how you mounted them, if you don't mind.
Matt
Matt,
I had an unfair disadvantage. My good friend whom you met when we checked your car out has been with me every step of the way. He's very good at this stuff and has been invaluable. We also have had 3 or 4 full days with another friend, so some days we had 3 guys working on it. Still a long way to go from here. I'll see what i can do this weekend regarding the pics of the pushers. We just used machine screws to mount it currently. Not completely sure if we will leave it that way permanently.
Bill
Bill, your car looks really great ;D , and your correct with the body on...it does feel more like a real car as compared to driving it as a go-kart.
Just wait until its painted and all done and you get a few hundred miles on it, when you get out of it after a long drive you'll say "Damm did I actually build this fine thing?" ::).
On a side note I like your gas cap installation, lowering it is a good idea. Something that I did on mine that has worked out well, is adding a 3/8" steel drain tube through the fuel well and attaching a hose that extends to the bottom of the car and out to the road. Two or three times I over filled my car and the gas ran down the tube preventing it from splashing over the fender.
Anyway, best of luck, Bill
It's been a while since i updated but the work continues on the cobra. Here is where she sits right now.
Here is one of the trunk prop on. I may go with a gas strut back here, but for now, this works pretty good.
I was getting a lot of heat up through the tunnel, so i figure it was time to actually put the plate and the boot on.
Need this to see if "the man" is behind me.
Need this to see if "the man" is beside me. Mirror placements subject to change still.
Lots of heat and road debris coming in from the sides, so i buttoned it up and it is alot better. Had to hit the easy button a few times installing these.
The roll bar finally went on with some sanding of the outside and inside of the tubes and a bit of grease. Unfortunately i will have to have it re-powder coated due to a misguided attempt at putting it on a few weeks ago. One of a couple of things i have screwed up along the way. But all in all, it has been relatively minor stuff.
Bill, lookin' good! Who are you using for paint and have you decided on a color yet?
Matt
I think i'll use Miller. I'm thinking a blue with white stripes for now.
Can I ask where you got the black thermal tubing for your brake lines?