If it's not oil based it'll end up that way before long!
If it's not oil based it'll end up that way before long!
Worked on the front cross member today. The idea is to leave the front edge of the original in place and weld all that to the new one and leave some of the original to help transfer stress. It should be clear what's going down from these in-progress pictures. The new member is done. It's not the very best fit but there are no gaps I can't fill. I just have to cut out the back of the original beam now. The top cuts are easy but I'm not so sure about the bottom of the beam.
The car is looking a bit different up front after today. I really wish I was better at welding... I had it dialed in a few times but keeping it dialed in was just not happening apparently. Fortunately, I just got one of those bad dog lifetime cutting/grinding wheels. Pretty decent investment. The best part is you don't have hot pieces of composite flying back at you. Just some rather low temp sparks. It's quite pleasant to use. 
I reached the most exciting milestone of the project so far today. I tacked together the first lower control arm and was able to mount it up for a partial mock up of the new front suspension. I've been dreading doing the lowers for a long time expecting that they wouldn't go well. So far so good though. Lessons learned doing the uppers are serving me well here. 
Well shoot. I had it nicely tacked a couple days ago and fitting just right. I thought it was tacked thoroughly enough to be ready to weld up fully but I finished up the final welds today and the ends came in about 1/16th. So now the next step is to try to fix that...
Little update after a break due to getting frustrated and discouraged and also getting married.
Along with spending plenty of hours grinding out and filling body cracks, I mocked up the engine and transmission in the engine bay. It really does fit like this frame was designed for it. It's not so easy to weave it in there but once the oil pan clears the lower cross member it really looks great. A couple problems came to light once it was in there but none too difficult to fix. The manifolds I got won't work. I need to find some manifolds with the outlet pointing down so I can raise the engine from where it's sitting in this picture. These manifolds fit under the upper frame tube but don't allow the engine to come up enough for the oil pan to clear and not be sticking out below the front cross member. The shifter is roughly 6" back but that's easy to fix with the t5. The transmission mounting plates on the frame are about 6" behind the main mount for the t5. So I'll have to look at whether I want to move those mounting points on the frame or build an adapter to stretch the gap. Moving the mounting points sounds stronger. It also looks like a full size starter won't fit too nicely but that's easy to fix by throwing money at it. Very exciting milestone and new chapter in the project though. I feel a whole new energy for this project.
Very nice!
Glad to see progress again, keep it going!
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