that's going to be unique and those welds look great,, way to pass on the knowledge I like to run the 9'' Makita grinder I'll post some of latest pics of my hand and what not to do when changing spring hangers
Been a while since I posted and we have gotten quite a bit done. I will start with cool parts! The UPS man brought some post Christmas joy. The coil overs and upper control arms came, as I figured was going to happen I am going to have build all new shock mounts. I new the lower would need to be moved and beefed up but the spring is just a little to big to fit in the upper. Please excuse the washers and nuts to shim the upper control arms, I will build proper spacers. I plan to move the arm as far back as possible to gain caster. I wanted to use Corvette brakes but they are expensive and hard to get at the parts house. After some research I found 2000 Buick Park Avenue brakes are pretty cheap and available everywhere. 12 inch by 1.25 front rotors and 11 rear, they only have single piston calipers but the rear uses caliper mounted parking brakes which makes install easier. They should be plenty of brake for the car and they are for a Buick.
My buddy cut out fish plates for the frame on his CNC plasma cutter for me, super nice thanks Cory. I have plates for all four sides of each frame rail with plug weld holes. Cory is a welder by trade and said don't plug weld on the frame welds so you notice that the plug welds are at the rear and front on the untouched frame sections. I installed the outside on the left and outside and inside on the right, I will install the rest after I pull the body off. The ones on there will support the frame for now even on the wheels. The ones on the inside are a pain, lots of curves.
After welding the plates we started to mock up the engine, tight. The engine will sit 3 inches higher than in a normal Buick and is shifted 1 1/2 inches more to the right to clear the front diff. The driveline is very tight on the left and the stock Buick exhaust dumps right on top of the diff yoke, bummer. I will be building a header for the left and if you have never done that it is a lot work. I am going to relocate and build new shock mounts so I can make a stock shorty header fit on the right. On the plus side you will notice that the oil pan sump clears very nicely with lots of room. I plan to make a big sump to hold around 8 quarts of oil. I want the engine moved back for weight distribution but that's in the next post.
Since the engine is 3 inches higher the floor has to be cut to raise the tunnel for the trans and also major butchery for the transfer case. I want the engine back but not way back. We cut the right side of the firewall and are building it back in for motor clearance. The motor will sit 3 1/2 inches farther back that stock, doesn't sound like much but that is huge as far as weight distribution goes. I wanted to use factory motor mounts and adapt them, no go so I will be building motor mounts with poly bushings. I have never raised a tunnel or moved a firewall back and I an learning its kind of a pain. I don't know how body guys weld that 16 gauge, that's hard. I am a little concerned about fitting a seat with that t case, but I will figure something out.
As long as you are having to fabricate a tunnel, I would suggest Dzus fastening one in. It would make any transmission/transfer case swaps easier, if the need should happen.
I haven't posted for awhile but I have done some work. This is what we have completed in the last month or so. I have one part of the project totally done! The steering shaft, I cut a notch in the frame and used half a piece of pipe to fill it in. This was needed to clear the steering shaft with the new gear box and the original steering column. I used Borgeson u-joints and a collapsible shaft, turned out nice. Also I got my limited slip for the front diff, can you say say 4 wheel burnouts.
Here I have started to fab the motor mounts on the engine. I used 1/4 plate and 1 1/2 poly bushings. Also shown is where we had to cut out and plate a section of the frame to clear the oil filter.
These are pics of the frame mounts where the motor mounts will attach the engine to the car. I welded a 3/16 fish plate with a plug weld to the frame for added strength, then welded the 1/4 plate mounts to the frame.
Since I didn't want to use the torsion bars from the s10 suspension I had to come up with a new spring set up. I chose to go with QA1 adjustable coil overs and fab up mounts for them. It is a little tight but I think I have everything fitting. First step was to box in and reinforce the lower control arms to hold the down force of the spring with the weight of the car. First pic is the original control arm, then we welded a flat strip across the front and put a plate on top of the arm to the strip boxing in all in and plating the top of the original. We then welded tabs for shock mounts to the reinforced part of the arm.
Next we have to make upper mounts for the coil overs, I have tried several shapes and ideas. The cardboard mock ups in the pics are my favorite so far. The only down side is the long span for the bolt. A 1/2 inch grade 8 bolt is strong but I plan to weld tubes from the edges to the shock on both sides to hold and reinforce the bolt. We also plan to plate the arms across the back side to help strengthen them as well.
A early 60s special with a s10 and frame or 80s half ton frame already with disc brakes and 4wd bolted under a Electra and street/strip 455 like my 70 would make a sweet sleeper. Think off all that torque smoking all 4 tires in a full size land yaht! Epic display of Buick torque!
Wow, amazing work as always. I wonder if it would've been easier to just graft the Buick body onto the S10 frame. haha.
You all probably thought I quite on this project, well I did for awhile. Super busy, I have had the parts for the coilover mounts cut out and welded in since May. Then I made some engineering changes and had to modify more stuff. The pics below are the shock mounts, I will eventually plate the back side. Here I am still using the factory control arm mounts. You will notice that everything fits but it is very tight, control arms, axles, and springs.
After a lot of thought and consultation with my rock crawler buddies I decided to eliminate the factory control arm mounts and fab my own. They are very bulky and do look ugly. By changing them I can also optimize the angle of the arms and lower them a bit to improve the the camber curve when cornering. This has the same affect as a taller spindle or taller ball joint.
