I wasted no time here. At an easy going and relaxed pace, I had the chassis completely stripped down to its bare frame within 3 hours. I started tear down at 11pm and finished at 2am. I then spent an hour and re-arranged the shop to help facilitate the build process further. I took several leaves off the front spring. I believe I left 5 leaves attached and will go from there. I wanted to get this done quickly because I needed to come up with a list of some things I will need to get my hands on. Here's what I will need next and some of the things i've seen so far that need attention: - I need to get 2 large wrenches (larger than what I have on hand) for the removal of the torque tube from the banjo rear end. The two nuts are pretty chewed up. - Spring Spreader - I don't feel like using the double C-clamp and chain method on the rear leaf spring so I will be sourcing a spring spreader. I would rather have the tool for future projects. As an aircraft mechanic we practice MRM (Maintenance resource management) regularly. I really don't feel like dealing with flying leaf springs because of a mistake I made and damage my corvette, the bike I built, or injure myself in the process. People don't know how to properly install cotter pins, so I will be pulling every cotter pin on the driveline. I'll be re-installing them all up to aviation standards after checking everything for proper torque and tightness. I will not be able to use the Model A Chassis for the lakester's frame. It is roughly 1.5 feet too short in length to properly create the chassis I need. @26 T Ford RPU was right. It will be better to build my own at this point instead of re-purposing the Model A Chassis. I have no choice in the matter. I'll have to and that's okay. I'll be able to recouperate some cash as I plan on selling the chassis. This should make some people happy. Someone else can make good use out of this incredibly well cared for and restored frame. The left front wheel center cap is pretty loose so I need to figure out a way to secure that better. I am interested in getting the Mooneyes Aero wheel covers at some point.
I can't quite make it out on the pics: is there a number stamped on the upper face of the left frame rail a bit to the rear of the engine mount? It is sometimes very faint, and would have been the same as the original engine number. If there is no number you might have a Canadian frame.
Hey, Sl; I see you have most everything to use for suspension, esp early-style. But you asked for ideas, so in case you're still looking/considering; re: post 149 & the acvw components for transaxle &/or suspension comments: what could work out well, would be a "long"-bar torsion-bar instead of leaf or coilovers. Shouldn't take up much room, & I'd run them horizontally inside & alongside the hull-cut-line, & the swinging arms parallel w/the axletubes. Could end up being almost hidden. The reason I was thinking along the acvw-bars line is, because for the front, vw used a stack of small thin leaves, which could be added to, or subtracted from, depending on how the weights go vs the lengths of the torsion-bar "fingers". Vw also used conventionally shaped, but fairly short, round splined torsion bars for the rear, think they came in a few different diameters, but could be turned down as needed - after figuring spring rate(s) needed. Sort of a cheaper & easier-to-obtain-parts instead of circle-track suspensions. FWIW. Marcus...
No numbers that I can see. The frame is a a bit pitted from age but is solid. It was cleaned up and painted over. If there were any numbers they corroded away but it is impossible to tell.
Early this morning, the steel for the Lakester's frame arrived. I purchased two 24ft lengths of mild steel rectangular tubing. The dimensions are 3" x 2" x 0.125". I cut them both in half to give me four 12ft lengths.
I was out in the garage cloudy and early in the rain to receive the frame. It was raining very hard and didn't feel like going out in the rain so I took the time to tackle the rear leaf spring removal. I decided against purchasing a spring spreader and just used what I had on hand in the garage. I used the original spring shackles and a steel cable and ran the nuts down and backed them off slowly to control the release. After the shackles were ran all the way out, I had the steel cable wrapped around the spring to help control the release further and prevent the springs from flying away in a violent separation until all the pressure was gone. The rest of the spring came out no problem. Glad to have that out of the way. Progress!
Time for another set of updates. I have been extremely busy with life outside the garage and have had some big life changes. I won't get into details on that front because this isn't the place to vent and quite frankly, i'm sure none of you guys care anyway! Due to these life circumstances and further time constraints I will be making some changes regarding how I will be putting the lakester together. The largest and most major update being: - No rear suspension will be installed, atleast for now. Rear suspension may be addressed at a later date, however I doubt it due to lack of space in the rear end of this super slim tank. This will also affect how often I will drive the lakester in the future after completion. Most lakesters never had rear suspension anyways, so it is further keeping in tradition with the typical post-WW2 lakester of that time frame. I also don't have the time to come up with a rear suspension system and fabricate it, nor do I feel like spending the money on rear suspension at this time. This car has to be ready for a huge car show and get displayed inside a convention center in just over 2 and a half months. The clock is ticking FAST. Time to lay out the progress i've made over the course of the past couple of weeks. It was time to start getting the driveline laid out and put together and to assist with that process I decided to make a large cardboard template to assist in taking measurements and placement of the individual parts of the drivetrain. This was a great decision overall. I went to Walmart and picked up a couple of large moving boxes. I simply laid the boxes over the frame, took a sharpie to the bottom of the box next to the tank and drew the shape of the tank. After I had the outside of the tank drawn I flipped the box over and positioned it where it needed to go. The tank shape is identical so it didn't matter that the left side markings were now on the right side and vice-versa after flipping the box over. Space is extremely limited with this tank, so utilizing the cardboard template here would help fabricate the frame-rails with tight clearances to the side of the tank which is exactly what needs to happen. I used my laser level to help me find exact center of the tank once more for my template, and then from there I was able to take measurements from the centerline to the frame rails to help make sure that measurements and positioning would end up even.
Making that template was a big positive and really helped keep me on track with the completion of the frame rails. They fit inside the confines of the tank just perfectly. I did fairly well with these and very happy with the outcome. The two rails are almost identical. After taking some measurements I decided to make 5 degree pie cuts in the frame rails. I didn't quite need 5 degrees of bend, but I wanted a little extra wiggle room to be able to bend the frame rails to where I needed them to be. No special tools used here, just a protracter, a scribe to make marks in the frame rails, and a hand held cutting wheel to make the cuts. You may notice that the frame rails aren't sitting perfectly even once sitting on the tank. That's because when I chopped the tank in half, I wasn't able to cut two perfect halves. The halves are just a little bit off. In one of the next updates you'll see I was able to get the 2 frame rails sitting pretty even by recessing the flanges of the tank where I needed them to go.
Starting to look like a lakester! This is one of my favorite updates so far! I get my first visual of what it will look like when it is on wheels. Now that the frame rails are shaped, it's time to get the lakester off the lift and start working the driveline into place. I decided to recess the rear end into the rear tail cone a bit to conserve a bit more space up front. It worked out because it's pretty much exactly where I wanted the rear end to go and it is visually appealing at the same time. I think there is a good amount of tank sticking out past the rear end of the tires, and the location where the axle comes out through the tank is in a great position also. Now that the rear axle is locked into its location, I was able to take the frame rails and figure out where I needed to recess the flanges of the tank to allow the frame rails to get situated inside the tank. If you recall from last post, the frame rails were sitting uneven because the tank wasn't cut perfectly in half. I will be able to fix this unevenness when I recess these flanges. My frame rails are 3 x 2 x .125 (1/8" thick). I decided to drop the frame rails 2 inches into the tank and leave 1 inch on top. This will place the rails at the widest point in the tank and help me to fit inside best I can and allow the most room for things like the engine to fit ( I hope lol). The two inch drop lines the frame rails up with the rear end pretty well.
Frame rails are recessed. I spent a good deal of time getting this part right because I needed to get the frame rails sitting evenly and level with the other due to the unevenness of my cut when I chopped the tank in half. I managed to get them pretty much exactly where I wanted them to be. I was able to cut and grind down the flanges to give the frame a 2" drop inside the tank leaving 1" on top. I also took the time to cut some length off the front part of the frame rails to allow room for the front end and steering rod. Had to move everything over in the shop to get my Tesla in the garage due to the potential for incoming golf ball sized hail so I had to "dismantle" the tank and shove it off to the side where I could fit everything. Of course, no hail.
Time to fabricate the rear end mounting brackets. I took a decent amount of time and leveled out the tank for a couple of purposes: - Fabrication of the rear end mounting brackets - Deciding ground clearance. I placed all the components inside the tank up to my current progress. I leveled everything to 0 degrees both longitudinally and laterally and i'm coming up with 5 inches of ground clearance with everything in place which is right where I wanted to be. This will help with driving on the street due to the long wheelbase. Everything is straight and true. Now that everything is sitting even, it will help me accurately fabricate the rear end mounting brackets. In post #188 I stated that I was no longer going to be pursuing a rear end suspension system. I am running out of time to get this tank rolling on wheels and to get ready to be a display car / feature car inside the convention center for the big car show in the first week of October. I also don't feel like spending the extra money to design and purchase the required items needed to fabricate the rear end suspension system. I am ok with this. I may not drive the car as often on the street, but i'll manage for the purpose of car shows and events. You can also see that with the rear end in place, there is almost NO room for movement. I still need to fabricate a part of the frame to extend behind the differential and exit the rear of the tank for a push bar. Room is severely limited and will be even more limited with the required space needed for the push bar. The push bar will also double as a rear end jacking point in the future. For these mounting brackets I decided to start with some cardboard. It worked out so well for the frame frails that I decided I would use it again as a template for the brackets. I went to Lowes and sourced two 1/4" thick rectangular steel plates. These are hefty! The last two left! I also sourced the required bolts and hardware. On each side I will be using 5 large bolts and nylon locknuts, along with 2 washers ( one under the nut and one under the bolt head) and bolt the frame to these brackets. The shanks of the bolts are 2 1/4" in length to account for the 2 inch thick frame rail, and 1/4" plate thickness. As with your typical lakester, the plates will be welded into the axles and then those plates will be bolted into the frame to allow for removal of the rear end assembly for servicing. The brackets took a decent amount of time to cut and grind down to where I wanted them to be but they came out great and are identical. They fit the axles perfectly. Here's what's next for the immediate future. These steps will hopefully be done by the end of the coming week: - Drill 5 holes into each frame rail and each bracket for the mounting hardware. I'll be creating another template for these holes to ensure I get this right. - Cut a couple slots into the front end of the tank to get the front end into place. -Fabricate the front leaf spring tower and come up with a mounting solution. I'll need to source a couple new U-bolts. It turns out that my 2x3 frame rails are the perfect housing solution for the front leaf spring so I may go that route or I may go another route altogether. I'll probably put together the mounting solution and then build the tower up to where it needs to go afterwards. If I can get these tasks done, the lakester should be on wheels by the end of next week! Having a great time with this build so far. It's coming along quick and the lakester will become a car rapidly from here. I work fast. On another note, I have a Montana LLC. I contacted them with regard to start the titling and registration process for the lakester and sent them a couple of pictures. They will be considering the lakester a kit car for the purpose of registration and I'll be able to get a state-issued VIN number. The car will need to be completed before starting this process and will need to be inspected. I should have no problems getting plates for the car when it's all said and done. Not sure how long this process will take as of right now.
That welder looks like it's struggling. Doesn't look like those welds are really burning in there. Gasless?
Yes Gasless MIG. I didn't really take good pictures of the welds but those are just small tac welds currently. I ran some test welds on another piece of frame steel I chopped off while making the frame rails to dial in voltage and amperage numbers. I'm getting plenty of penetration.
All very impressive, as for the mounting of the front end may i suggest making the spring mount adjustable. If you finalize it now (or soon) it will change as you add components. JW
Thanks for that. I'll look into an adjustable solution when I get there! It's something I haven't thought to consider.
This is a great example of why CAD/CAM is traditional. (Cardboard Assisted Drafting/Cardboard Assisted Manufacturing) Love the way this project is heading. Life sends us all some bumps along the way - glad to see you are still making this dream come to life. Cheers, Harv
Thanks Harv. Having a great time with the build so far. This kinda stuff comes easy to me and it's therapy with everything going on. It's all falling into place and will be done before we know it.
Keep up the GREAT work ! *This vehicle qualifies for any Future T.R.O.G. events, especially those in WILDWOOD, NJ ! !
Thank you! The only questionable items on the car are the white wall tires, but I don't see why T.R.O.G wouldn't approve the lakester how it will sit. Everything else should be good to go! Wildwood, NJ isn't that far away at all from me. I'll be making every attempt to make it to those events in the future.
I think you should build some sort of jig to enable you to get the frame rails parallel and the cross members square, We used a 6X6 tube (light pole) with 2X2 tube cross members great taking care that the cross members were square and on center of the spine.The cross members were 2ft apart. This was mounted on rugged saw horses made of 2x6 lumber. the height of the saw horses was such that to work on the chassis you didn't have to bend over. Took time to build jig but made construction of the chassis so much easier. Gasless MIG is not the best for strong welds in my opinion. You don't pretty good penetration if there is any chance you could go over on your head at speed. Another thought that at Lorring Me. you can run 1 and 11/2 miles on paved surface. Check out LTA on internet.
Umm, looking at your test welds, your machine is too cold and you're moving too slow. Set up some practice plates the same thickness of your tube walls with the same gaps you've got on your cuts and practice on them before you start welding on your rails. Even with that light gauge steel, you're going to want a sealer pass before you put a cover on it. You're using inner shield, so spray some anti-spatter around the weld area, it'll make clean up a heck of a lot easier. Speaking from 50+ years and several hundred miles welding inner shield experience.
I bagged around 30 hours of garage time over the course of my weekend, all in 90-95+ degree heat. No air conditioning, no fans, no airflow. I may have sweat through all my clothes, but I managed to get out there and get it done. I have 3 day weekends every week which makes garage time easier to come by. 12 hours Monday, 8 hours Tuesday, and 10 hours on Wednesday. I accomplished a ton and made loads of forward progress. I appreciate the welding advice. I'm not a professional welder but I am getting better every time I do. I already know my welds are subpar okay!? Lol, One of the big reasons for building the lakester is to grow as a hobbyist and a mechanic in all aspects of building vehicles, welding included. I have been doing a bit of stick welding with 7018 electrodes but the majority of my time with welders is gasless MIG. Per your recommendation @alanp561 I did pick up some anti-spatter and it does help. The welds may not be the prettiest and I think it's a common fallacy that gasless MIG / flux core wire welding is weaker than other types. I believe it can be just as strong as any other type of welding. You may not have a shielding gas, but flux core uses compounds that produce a protective vapor during welding which accomplishes the same goal. I know grinding welds down typically makes them weaker in some but not all cases, however I did decide to grind and smooth down the welds on the frame rails for a couple of reasons: 1: Now being as I'm not a professional welder and weld infrequently I did weld a few of the seams twice. Since I was closing and bridging gaps in the pie cuts I wanted to ensure that there were no air pockets inside. If I found any, I welded those gaps a second time over. 2: One 3" side of the frame rail wasn't ever cut during the making of the pie cuts so I deemed the integrity of the frame rails to be enough to allow for these welds to be ground down. 3: I do plan on making at least 1 trip to the Utah salt flats in the future, and since I'm relatively close to Wildwood, NJ for T.R.O.G events, the car will be on the salty beach. I don't want salt and highly corrosive substances to find places to hide on the frame rails to start the process of corrosion and rusting of the frame.
On Monday, my focus was getting the rear end on wheels. In order to do that, I needed to finish fabricating the rear end mounting brackets and drill holes through the frame rails. Drilling through 1/4" thick steel plate is no joke. I went through around $60 worth of drill bits even with oiling the bits and the steel itself to help keep temps down and the bits lubricated. Got the job done though! They came out really good in my opinion for using a hand held battery drill. The holes themselves are 5/8". Rear end mounting hardware is all Grade 8. The washers were slightly large for the space I had to work with, so I did grind down one side for the bolts that were side-by-side. These essentially became lock-washers and are unable to spin if the bolts ever loosen up. For running the bolts through the rails, they will run from outboard to inboard side. This will be a safety in the event a bolt decides to loosen up. The wall of the tank itself will prevent them from backing out all the way. For tac-welding the brackets to the axles, I first ran all the bolts through the brackets and attached them to the rails. This was to ensure the rails and brackets were true to eachother. I then butted the brackets up to the axles and tac-welded them in place.
Now that the rear end is on wheels, the next step of the build is to get the front end on wheels. Tuesday's job was to find the front end its home. I only have one chance to do this right so I used a laser level throughout this process along with some careful measurements with calipers down to the thousandths of an inch to ensure the location is squared and true both longitudinally and laterally. The saying measure twice, cut once really came into play here, except I probably measured closer to 20 times. Can't be crooked here. I removed the steering linkage that runs from wheel to wheel to assist with locating the main support of the front end for those first cuts through the tank, and then I flipped that linkage from the rear of the front end assembly to the front. This saved a lot of room inside the tank and allowed for an easier time to fabricate the front mount for the leaf spring. The steering pivot point is no longer on the left wheel and is now on the right side due to flipping the linkage from the rear of the assembly to the front. I was a little bit worried that when I made the cuts for the steering linkage, there would be reduced strength for the cone of the tank but it doesn't really feel any weaker. Still feels strong. At this point I only have the basic cut for the linkage. I'll still need to open it up wider to allow for turning. You'll see at this point that the tank is obviously resting on the front end and isn't being truly supported which is why the cuts look a bit off. The cuts should be even when I actually get the car sitting on its front wheels after fabricating the mount for the leaf spring. The slots, especially for the main structure of the front end has a pretty tight clearance. After the leaf spring is supported on its mount, I'll possibly be further clearancing the two slots to allow for proper spacing and to prevent rubbing of the tank on the front end assembly. The need to do this will also be determined by the final resting place of the tank after mounting the tank with the radius rods. This is the first time seeing the tank on 4 wheels! Had to get some pictures with it. The vision is coming to fruition!
I didn't make as much progress as I had planned, but Wednesday's job was to start working on the front support structure for the leaf spring. I spent a few hours working on a mounting solution, but it ended in failure and I wasn't happy with the result so I scrapped it. Trial and error is par for the course for building a whole car from scratch with no directions. The leaf spring does fit inside the 2" side of the 2"x3" frame rail, but it's a tight squeeze and requires a slight bend in the 3" walls to allow it to fit. Wasn't happy with that outcome but I have a better solution I'll be working on next weekend. I finished welding the frame rail pie cuts, and welded the rear end mounting brackets to the axles. I also squared the front of the frame rails to allow for a flush mount of the cross brace / front leaf spring mount. In post #203 I detailed my Wednesday welding adventures in further detail. Here's the few pictures I managed to take to close out my 30 hour garage marathon over the weekend. Overall, I made some massive progress on the belly tank and couldn't be happier! Starting to look like a car!
I appreciate what you are doing here, I once was in a very similar situation as you are. You have a lot of determination and and a great work ethic that I hope will carry you through this whole deal. Having said, that I gotta say something about that rear end attachment. I know you put a lot into it, but this arrangement is going to have issues in time. Rectangular tubing is not rigid enough to use through bolts to attach an axle. It will compress over time and the attach plates will be loose and work around and start to come apart. It will hold for a while, maybe long enough for you to go back after its done, to incorporate a suspension of sorts (needed!). You could fix it by enlarging the holes in the tubing (more drilling!), then welding in some through strut tubes to support the bolt clamp loads. As far as $50 for drill bits, I assume you're getting bits from Home Depot. Might want to step up to quality bits sourced on line, and maybe you're killing them with too much bit speed. try drilling at a slower speed with more pressure, and the oil is a good thing. Keep plugging, it is a journey!
You see, this is exactly why I have started a build blog. It is really helping me fill in the blanks, and providing further insight beyond my own thought processes. Instead of drilling larger holes, I'll probably source some 3/4" diameter steel tubing to place inside the frame rail where the 5/8" diameter bolts can slide through. I'll weld from the inside. Excellent Idea! I haven't even thought of potential for compression and loosening over time which I can definitely see happening. This will be a quick and easy improvement.
In regard to moving the tie rod from the backside of the front axle to the front, may I suggest that you look at Wikipedia's description of "Ackerman steering geometry"? There is a very comprehensive explanation, with diagrams, of how it works. I admire your enthusiasm for this project but there are some basics that you can't ignore.
Something to ponder. When you do a lot of welding on one side of the rear axle housings, they will "pull in" from the welds shrinking and the outer bearing surfaces will most likely be out of alignment. You will likely have to heat/shrink the other sides of the bells to get them back into alignment. You may need to cut the ends back off the housings, put an alignment bar through the middle (that picks up the bearings surfaces of the carrier in the middle) and then re-align the ends and get things square again - before welding the ends back on. You'll probably be surprised on how much the bells will pull/bend towards the welds.
The Jalopy Journal
