At Last!. I have started on my car ;-) PART 2

Sounds marvellous OG, I believe bright colours are still in this year and don't forget those floral chintz curtains; axminster carpets have made a comeback and lino has been banished, Ikea are doing a deal on wall coverings and camouflage paint for the bathroom is the main choice of designers this season; don't forget those all important colour coordinated his and her onesies :lol:
 
Sister-in-law has just shipped titanium bolts so a delay until I can start on the suspension assembly :-(

Had a result on eBay this afternoon. I was bidding on a new sintered clutch plate for the Elan (as a spare) and was the first bidder at £25. The seller has two (which I need) and said they would sell second one for the price of the first.

I won it at £25 - not a lot of call for these plates, so I have obtained a spare set of plates for £50 plus shipping. These are over £100 each, result! :)

 
Day 280 -Did some machining work on second front caliper bracket to reduce weight by 100gms and match the first one. Got it to within 2gms..

Also trimmed brake pad pins and back face of pads.

 
Day 281 -282 - Nothing
Day 283 - I now have all my titanium ducks in a row for the front suspension and rear driveshafts so I can't put off assembly any longer :)

Total weight of bolts is 908 grams thereby saving approx 685 grams, most of which is rotational.

 
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Day 284 - Spare clutch plates arrived today. I don't need them at the moment but, at £25 each, it would have been rude not to bid on them. Over £100 each retail.

Bought 2 as there are 2 in the clutch assembly, just in case you were wondering :)

 
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Update on Motorhome.

When we told our son about John offernig to revamp the van, he said he thought he was still going to do it and had been thinking about what to do with it for months!

Dilemma.

Spoke to John and he is happy to back off. He was only going to tidy and freshen up the exisitng, Alex wants to gut and start again!

So we are going to try a father/son project, something we haven't done before. May bring us closer together, may be a disaster waiting to happen :)

Anything should look better than at present:



 
Day 286 - Nothing
Day 287 - I needed to extend thread on the titanium bolts holding the front wheel sensors. I didn't know if this would be a problem but I gave it a go. Plenty of cutting compound and taking my time and they came out OK.

Left is original steel bolt, middle is titanium bolt untouched and right is finished article:



 
Day 289-292 - Nothing. Deliveing parcels and was so knackered when finished I was hardly able to lift my wine glass.

Day 293 - Woke up at 4am and couldn't get back to sleep. Lying in bed with my mind wandering I had a Eureka moment.

I have been looking for M10 x 110mm titanium bolts. My preferred supplier (who I have managed to extract a 5% discount from - not much but he is the cheapest around already) isn't doing this size yet. Pro-Bolt wants £23.50 each for these - way too much.

However, as these bolts are for the top damper mount and are in double shear, I suddenly realised I could make them out of 10mm bar by threading each end. Looked on eBay this morning and a guy was selling a 300mm length of 10mm and 2 approx 200mm lengths of 5mm as a lot. I won them for £7.50 plus £3 P&P.

Result :)



Looking to do the same with the bottom mount, but this is 1/2". Can only find 12.7mm but this is imperial converted to metric so should be OK. Seller wants £25 for 250mm. I have offered £17.50 and am awaiting response.

I celebrated by removing 15gms from 4 bolts before taking the dog for a walk and cooking dinner. I know, 15gms is bu**er all, but if I did this every day for a year I would remove nearly 5.5kg :)

I have been watching videos of people machining titanium on small CNC mills without any problems...........Hmmmmmmmmm :)
 
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A little bit of experimentation and persistance allowed me to drill out the centre of a titanium bolt:


However, the effort and time involved wasn't worth it for a 2 gram saving, even for me :)
 
Yes, but one letter at a time :)

I'm too old for tents :) You need room to chill out with chums when it's raining, somewhere to prepare lunch, a comfortable bed if it's a weekend meet, a loo and a shower.

No brainer, really :)
 
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What things cost is relative and what the item is colours your buying decisions.

For example, I have been looking for a comprehensive socket set to take racing. Halfords do a pretty impressive set for £124.99. I looked at it today, liked it, but decided not to buy one at the moment. When I got home these were waiting for me, £186 worth of titanium bolts. Now where is the financial logic here? :)

 
I suppose I should be used to it by now, but nothing is simple.

I wanted to replace bottom ball joint to wishbone bolts with titanium. Unfortunately imperial bolts this size are not available in the UK at a reasonable price so I decided to use M12 bolts instead. Drilling out to 12mm was pretty straightforward but the bolts were a tad short. I therefore had to skim 2mm off each wishbone. Not an issue as 3mm washers had been previously welded on.



 
Day 302 - Whilst fitting titanium bolts to water pump pully and alternator adjuster I took the opportunity to take a few grams out of the pulley, 28.44gms to be precise :)



Including bolts, that's 48.64gms of rotating mass removed :)
 
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Day 302 - part 2.

Made the first front damper top titanium stud/bolt. Quite pleased with it. However, it blunted my new tungsten die!





Weighs 46 grams including one nut in lieu of bolt head so less than half weight.
 
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Finally cracked the drilling titanium problem.

630rpm, firm pressure with regular withdrawal to clear swarf. Drilled around 20 bolts yesterday with one drill bit that is still sharp.

Added up what I have done and it comes to just over 1.9m of holes :) This equates to approx 85 grams. Was it worth it? On its own, no, but as part of an overall weight reduction strategy, yes.
 
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Bit of a hiatus on the car recently due to family stuff :-(

However, off to the Classic Car Show at the NEC (Birmingham, England) on Saturday and I am preparing my shopping list.

So far:

Aluminium rod ends:
10mm x10mm male 2 off
7/16 x 7/16 UNF male 2 off
1/2 x 1/2 UNF male 4 off

Structural adhesive

Aluminium nuts and bolts

Zircotec Zircoflex flexible heat shield

Look out for titanium bolt suppliers

Had a bit of a result yesterday. I had 1/2 x 1/2 UNF female rod ends on my list. I then remembered the 4 I got from America that were supposed to be left hand thread but were right handed. They sent me the correct ones and said keep the others. Just have 2 spare now :)
 
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Spent 9 hours walking around the Classic Car Show yesterday!

Good show but didn't manage to cross off anything from my list :-(

Zircotec were there but no show deals or any stock to buy.
 
Anyone know of a supplier of the structural adhesive used to stick cars together?

No I don't OG! But I was watching Beetle Crisis over the weekend were the lads from Coventry used that very same adhesive to stick the new body onto the reworked chassis. You might be able to track down the garage & telephone them.
Long shot but you never know ;)
 
I suppose you could try to speak to someone at Lotus, wasn't the Elese chassis glued and riveted.

EDIT: This seems to be the stuff you need:

Araldite #2014
 
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Thanks Claymore.

There seems to be more glue types then wallpapar patterns!

I spoke to Araldite and they recommended Araldite standard!

Spoke to my suspension guru and he guided me towards Loctite. Spoke to them today. They were very helpful and said their 9461 would do both jobs, so I have hardened up on this. This is similar to Araldite 2014 but I was not happy with their helpline.

My local tool shop has ordered a tube and applicator for me which shoul dbe here next week so I had better get on with designing and making the brackets!
 
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Day 325 - Aluminium rod ends for front suspension top wishbones arrived. These save a total of 213 grams. Aluminium rod end in on the left:



Day 326 - Ordered structural glue for rear suspension brackets.

Started design of brackets. Made cardboard mockup and used this to draw up first draft. I have cut this out so I can offer it up and make any necessary adjustments. The mockup and cutout are sitting on the bar stock I will be using:

 
Day 328 - First draft pattern almost fits. A few tweaks and some G-code and then we are off to the milling machine :)

 
Day 328, part 2.

Started to cut out a bracket blank but was stopped by dinner. I will continue tomorrow after parcel delivery duties:

 
Day 329 - Blank cut out and rough machined as it will need a bit of fettling due to many angles to be taken into account:





 
Thanks.

Shaping is ok but finish is rubbish. I need some new cutters as I am still using my original set which weren't the best to start with.

I also need to change the bearings on the spindle as the top one has a little play in it which can't help. The motor also needs some attention as it lacks power under load.

I think I will also treat myself to a quick change tool holder set up.
 

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