Quote:
Originally Posted by TeeJayHoward
Right now I'm leaning towards removing the other rear seat and doing a parcel shelf in its place. A nice, tall, square box. Something I can remove if I ever need to access the upper part of the transmission or the starter. Thinking it over this week.
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Realized I never did mention what I decided to do. Instead of a parcel shelf, I'm likely going to put a flat sheet over where the rear seats are. It won't be square, it'll be tilted. Why?
...so I can triangulate the torsion tube into the chassis in the event that something happens to it and a large chunk of the middle of it is chopped out. I hear tell that does occasionally happen, often when a bigger, newer transaxle happens to fall into that spot.
By putting some square tube across the uppermost edges of the rear seat, I can increase the "wall" by the feet, provide a place to weld some nuts in for the flat sheet/cover, increase the rigidity of the chassis, and hopefully prevent the suspension arms from ripping themselves free a few years from now.
But that's all just plans for the future. Last night I made use of my PCA discount at our host and picked up an item needed for my next major "chop up my car" plan:
I can already hear the, "Wha....?"
Why am I buying "pretty" things when the car's not yet ready for them? Well, two reasons. Firstly, my new pedal box is going to require a new fluid reservoir. That's gotta be mounted somewhere, and I don't want to have to undo my work because the end goal (CF frunk liner) doesn't work with my custom bracketry. Secondly, I intend to chop up a large amount of my frunk where the rusty bumper attachment points are, and I'd like to reinforce that area... In such a way that, should I so choose in the future, about 300 sq in of radiator space could occupy the frunk - WITHOUT removing any storage space. I think I've got it laid out correctly in my head to where the entire radiator can go underneath this liner. But I can't know until I actually get the liner.
What's that? Another, "Wha...?" A radiator? Don't you mean an oil cooler?
Yeah. See, I like the 3.0L engine. But it's got no balls and to bring it up to the kind of engine standards that the cheapest minivan has these days would cost a bazillion dollars. So I'm getting the car ready, 'cause if that engine pops, I ain't spending $20K+ to replace it. The rest of the car's being built to handle pretty much any engine. That EZ36 in the corner? The EJ25 in my shed? An LS from the junkyard? Doesn't matter. The wiring and cooling will be in place. Whatever engine I want, it'll just be a matter of a cradle, an exhaust, and a tranny adapter, and it'll snap right in. All I'm losing in return is my donut/spare (which can go on a roof rack) and the jack (which can also go on a roof rack, or where the rear seats were). In theory, I could probably add another 100sqin of rad core under each headlight if I replace the oil cooler at the same time as the engine.
Not that I don't intend to keep the 3.0L for a long time yet. I've still got that DBW setup to install, and I'd really like to start spending some money on a Safari suspension. So to that end, I've also got a 964/993 fan/oil cooler pack coming in. I'm going to investigate what it'd take to use that instead of my trombone cooler. I know all about the differences in the front end, the ducting, etc. I think I can make it work anyway, but won't know until I've got the physical item in my hand instead of a chopped up cardboard box held together with duct tape.