More Wartburg progress

pres589 wrote: You're a magician or some kind of wizard. Very impressive!

Thank you for the kind words but guys here have done so much more than this I feel as though Im slacking.

Heck, Andy built a "Ford" dragster from a VW and a washing machine.

VERY nice! Too bad this car won't make CMP so we could see it in person.

Jensenman wrote: VERY nice! Too bad this car won't make CMP so we could see it in person.

I really wanted to do CMP. You guys know how to do things right, but the timing in relation to the Challenge was too close to fix anything if we hosed it on the track.

I may try to talk the guys into bringing our next one (MGB waiting in the wings) to CMP

JThw8 wrote: You guys know how to do things right

Wow. Somebody has YOU fooled.

Jensenman wrote:

JThw8 wrote: You guys know how to do things right

Wow. Somebody has YOU fooled.

Ok, mebbe I phrased that wrong. I hear CMP has the best parties :)

Okay, I'll roll with that.

Of course now I've hacked up the door so tonite I went and filled it back in. I was able to use the piece that was cut out behind the wheel to match the contour pretty close and require little reworking. The trailing edge was folded under so when its all cleaned and painted it will look like a factory door skin crimped in place.

For the final part of the evening I mounted the door and did a quick alignment so I could have a line to work with on the filler piece required at the front of the fender. Had to stop there for the night, needed to do some things around the house.

Shaweeeet!! .

Filled in the gap in the fender and did a quick mount. Need to play with panel gaps a bit but its close.

Clearance is tight, but its there. I'll hit this with a fender roller once its mounted solid and give it some breathing room.

We stretched the wheelbase at both ends so on to the front. Not alot of step by step here, same as the back, cut out the arch, mark it, cut away forward of the fender, weld it back in place. Just need to fill in the backside now.

Oh and so much for the fender roller, it wont fit a porsche bolt pattern, been hand forming the rear fender now and its getting there.

can't wait to see this thing in a few weeks, Jim. i won't be at Summit so i'll be dropping in to Rob's while the cage goes in.

Hoping Im ready for Rob :)

If not BABE is launching from Philly this year so come see us off at the Hilton Philly Airport on sunday or monday morning. Working on getting P&S to show up and cover it on the air.

Hey, what happened to the fiberglass fenders you were making on page 2?

Time and lack of need. There was just so much to do, and we didn't really NEED the glass fenders. We had to do whatever was the easiest way to get a fender on the car, and this was it, for now. We originally thought we were going to have to flare the crap out of the car to get the much wider wheels/tires to fit, but we were able to fit them under the stock bodywork, so we did.

We still have the glass fender, but that's a project for another time.

^ What he said. I can knock out a modified steel fender in a few hours, it takes alot longer to make the glass fenders and get them smooth and fitting correctly.

The trunk and hood are still going to be in glass for now. I'ts possible I'll have time to complete the glass fenders before GRM, now that the steel ones are modified that will mean the glass can be taken as an exact mold of the existing fenders rather than having to modify them after they come off as was the original plan.

JThw8 wrote: Hoping Im ready for Rob :) If not BABE is launching from Philly this year so come see us off at the Hilton Philly Airport on sunday or monday morning. Working on getting P&S to show up and cover it on the air.

sweet! if it's sunday i will be there. but on a monday, P&S coverage would be great! that's exactly the kind of thing they would get a kick out of.

Well we will be arriving Sunday, and launching monday. Yeah I've talked with P&S a few times about this. Their crap car car show they did last year (or 2 years ago) was actually a result of telling them about BABE so Im really hoping they'll come out since we're in Philly this year.

Really funny part is the car that won their crap car show was one I almost bought the year before for BABE. 60s Dodge Dart limo build for the vatican and used by a local convent so it was dubbed the Nun Runner. Dudes that did buy it kept all the "patina" (ie it was a rusty POS) but transplanted a corvette suspension and brakes with a Viper V10 under the hood.

Started modifying the other front fender tonite. To do so I had to put together most of the front end for measurements and just couldn't resist tossing the hood on to see how it looked. Looks a little more stubby or blunt in the front with the wheels forward but kinda interesting.

Got the passenger front fender 75% done as well. I'm finally ahead of schedule again and should have the major body work and cooling system done by the end of the weekend.

i remember the crap car show...i was wondering if we could enter one of our Lemons cars.

i think that any team that makes contact with the Wartburg should be punished severely.

We were going to enter our BABE cars but as is typical of BABE for me, Im so sick of spending time nursing the darn thing that by the time I get back from BABE its sold within 30 days.

How to you go from a 3" exhaust pipe to a 2 1/4 inch exhaust pipe....not simply it seems. After playing with all the adapters at the local parts stores and coming up dry I just bought a 3" connector tube and decided to see what we could make.

So we focused the mathematical powers of Jim squared and figured the circumference of the 3" was approximately 12.5 inches and the circumference of the 2 1/4 was about 7 inches so we divided the difference by 4 then ignored all that and marked out some approximate pie cuts in the adapter.

Then we cut them out and bent everything inward.

An end cut of the 2 1/4 and a little welding and it was all done.

Now why did we do this? Because we got a stainless steel Banks muffler for $20 and it had a 3" inlet.

When I closed of the center tunnel you may have noticed I had left the back part open. Our cooling and fuel lines still had to be run and they passed through this section so I wanted to wait until they were finished to close it in. Also since our brake junctions and shift coupler are under here I wanted this panel to be removable not fixed like the front tunnel. For now its held in with some sheet metal screws but when the time for "prettying up" comes I will switch to dzus fasteners or at least rivnuts in the floor with button head screws. The final difference is this piece was made from a heavier gauge steel than the front tunnel. Since we eliminated the trunk the back seat area is the only place we have for luggage, tools, etc on the BABE rally so it needed to be able to support some weight.

superman panel!

Oh, and in case I didnt mention it, its now tagged and registered :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M317lrWTIRM

Sittin on temp wheels while the others are out getting new rubber on them.