Hi Everyone, I know I have been neglecting the thread. Part of it is that I am a little afraid of sharing too much good news.
In late July, I stopped by FlatSix and showed Aaron the pictures and discussed the car. Things seemed like a good fit and we decided to bring the car up from Milwaukee and give it a good look over.
- The torsion tube was twisted open (we expected this).
- Engine compression sucked
- All the suspension components were severely rusted and pitted.
- Everything rubber underneath the car was shot
- The braided steel brake lines my dad put in were a hack
But, the body was sound, so let's get cracking! Aaron was willing to take it on.
Aaron removed the engine and his body guy (Jason) cut the torsion tube out. Here is a neat picture.
This shows 3 torsion tubes. The top one is from a long wheel base car. The middle one is from this car, and the lower is an unsuitable donor from a short wheel base vehicle. You can see how the mounts on the failed tube are twisted out of alignment. Also note that the LWB mounts are in the wrong place.
And why did that happen, good old fashioned rust. Water got in and rusted out the bottom. See the next picture.
A LWB tube will not fit and, apparently, you can't get a complete SWB donor tube. Good luck. So now what?
This:
- Cut the mounts off the LWB tube
- Cut the mounts off a SWB tube
- Put the SWB mounts on the LWB tube
- Weld it all together
Next pic is the parts on a jig ready to be re-assembled.
Got to get to bed, but next time I'll show some pictures of the car on the jig and what was found when the frame was cut open to install the new tube.