Rod's build thread - new title - TSCi
Turbo Mini Forums

I'll bet your family are really pleased that you are slowly dismantling your house to find things to hold your car together....

They don't look man enough to me. My experience of UPVC windows is that they have lots of things built in to locate them in the window/door shut as the hinged section moves about a lot.

What does a standard bonnet open to (degrees)? I can never find enough room for me under one...

But as it moves forward a fair chunk, will it not impair access to the rear of the engine bay?
As I imagine it the rear edge of the bonnet would be around 50mm forward of the scuttle and upright(ish) from there.

Edited by graemec on 28th Aug, 2009.

Standard bonnet about 45 degrees, but no forwards travel, actually slightly backwards.

Yes, about 50-80mm forwards so my proposal will inhibit access to the back of the bay slightly but will lift 85 degrees seriously improving access to the front.
The weight of the GRP front is less than the windows these hinges were designed to support once I have doubled them up...

Progress is never achieved without experimentation..... (as I'm sure Spock would have said if he'd had a decent scriptwriter.. :)

I'll try it out tomorrow. :)

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

Also though Rod, I assume you'll use gas lift struts to hold it up anyway? Thus the hinges won't need to take all the weight.

First,

Thanks Andy for the Audi 80 photos, the angle backwards they achieve is perfect.

I would probably struggle with the (horizontal) length of the bottom half but I'll keep an eye out next time I'm down the scrappy (not that there are many in rural Suffolk to look for Audis....)

In the meantime I've fab'd up some brackets that take my window hinges and would probably take the Audi ones as well if I find any...

Abuse of bandsaw
Nice new bimetal blade on it now so I can cut anything without it being clamped too well...
Trial fit
clamped in place
maximium lift nowhere near as good as the A80 ones but better than the standard bonnet even taking into account the greater height (depth) of the flip front.

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

Interesting idea Andy, so I tried the "windows" hinges upside down....

I really wasn't sure what would happen until I tried it but, no good...


Back of hinge is buried.

The Audi ones may be slightly different but I think the principle is the same...

Sometimes these things are very hard to visualise unless you mock them up with cardboard, plastic, sticky tape and every thing else "Blue Peter" and even then it's not allways obvious....

Edited by Rod S on 29th Aug, 2009.

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

The big difference between the car hinges and the window hinges are that the "window" ones have a slide on the bottom edge (black platic bit in the lower rail, in the first pics). The audi ones pivot on 2 fixed points, so either way up the action and end result is the same.

It also looks like the first few mm of movement on the rear of the window hinge is either down or near verticle, so the back of the bonnet may well catch the lip on the gutter...

I think some of my neighbours now think I have a strange obsession with my car boot....

Interesting, I'll have to visit a scrappy then....

The window ones are very clever, the very first bit of movement actually lifts (in my case) the whole assembly about 20mm before any rotation occurs - presumably the equivilant of pushing the window out of its seals before it swings up.

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

Go for the Audi 80 hinges like I did:

http://www.ferrenzo.nl/dagboek/p1070086.jpg

Remember, you need very strong hinges. These are OEM, made for the job.

Or check the following pages. Comments in Dutc:

http://www.ferrenzo.nl/dagboek/21-10-2004.php

http://projects.ferrenzo.nl/

Well, after a break for a few other projects, back on this one as there is a deadline 4 weeks away......

I decided against the window hinges as, although they are strong enough paired up, they only got o 80 degrees.

The Audi 80 idea is fine except without a pair in my hands, and none of my local scrappies had any, I couldn't really decide how they would fit.

So I spent a while looking at the photos Andy had emailed me and figured out why a simple two link system will do the Audi way over 90 degrees but would only do 80 degrees on my kitchen cupboard......

Easy really when you put the links either side of the mounting plate instead of on the same side.....

So a bit of practice with meccano (amazing what's in my loft) and some fabrication...



And assembled








And I've got all the repair section for the front spot welded in, just got the back to do, then seam weld it all next week.

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

Good progress Rod.

Do you really think you can meet the RR day?

I've given up with the Miglia. It was giving me too much stress. Best take my time and be ready for Avon 2010.

I'll still do the RR day with the 998 EFi Turbo.

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

Looking good.

At least you've started your pre RR day project!

Boring stuff but at least progress.....

Rear subframe finished yesterday (apart from rigid brake pipes)


I'm a bit concerned over the flexibles, genuine Goodrich stuuf, seems the bend is a bit too tight to me ???


And the front stuff...


This took ages....
The ball joints - three kits, and however I swapped the parts around the best I could get for the shims was (in thou) +10, +3. zero and -3, ie, I had to grind 3thou off the locktab plate on the worst one.
I've never had this before, usually there aren't enough shims to get the clearances right......

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

was it genuine balljoints?
as i also had to remove some metal off mine to get them anywhere near night

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

Well, after a total loss of motivation last weekend after my exploding tyre incident, I got back to work mid week.

Rear section - I had allways intended to be bumperless but I added a few bits of angle to (a) make welding easier and (b) to replace some of the strength/impact absorbtion of the original flange/bumper.







Not quite finished, but with the only other welding now required being the sills, probably two days if my argoshield doesn't run out.

Oct 17th was possible until the tyre failure and me not doing anything for three days - everything else is ready to just bolt in, subframes both assembled, engine, engine management wiring etc. all ready to be fitted but - as it now won't be finished in time, I'm tempted to spend a couple of extra days and de-seam it completely......

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

Well, after little to show having had the failed tyres issue (outcome still awaited although Gavin is on the case so to speak) and missing the RR day, I did slow down a bit.....

Anyway, the last part of structural welding was the sills.





Loads of zinc in there first....

But whilst doing the tack welds on the sill, this happened


The first I knew was the welder cut out (and the lights in the garage). so I took my shield off and saw the fire....

So I calmly walked ouside to pick up the hose pipe (which I always have on hand when welding) to find some random woman had been walking past the end of my drive when this happened and was now screaming "it's on fire, it's on fire...."

Now the next problem was that when I picked up the hose pipe and turned it on at my end..... nothing happened.
I had forgotten to turn the tap on at the other end earlier....

Random women obiously noticed the failure in my plan and started screaming even louder....

So for about 2 seconds I did consider wasting a perfectly good 1kg dry powder extinguisher (I have two of them in the garage) or go and turn the hose on.

Random woman was sceaming even louder when I came back from the other side of the house (where the tap is) but it was out in 3secs once I had water....

I'm glad she didn't have a mobile phone otherewise otherwise the whole of Suffolk's retained Fire Brigade would have decended on me an houir later....

Debris from the next day


I think my lead light cable needs a bit of PVC tape....

Strangely it was the MCB in the house (32A) that tripped, not the fuse in the lead light plug (3A) so I could have carried on oblivious otherwise.

Anyway, random woman seems to have gone away now....

So, welded from outside,


One sided spot welding, I've always been sceptical until now but here's the result from inside....



Lower ones in the photo are the tack weld on the edges of the sill, too much penetration, but on the spot welded positions, penetration is perfect and saves the hassle of trying to hold the real spot welder at all sorts of strange angles....

And now ready to roll over to do the other side.

Edited by Rod S on 11th Nov, 2009.

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

Bloody Hell!

What caused the fire, welding spatter on the blankett or a trapped wire for the light??

What do you mean by spot welds on the sills? Pool welds? I have similar repairs to do soon...

hey at least you caught it in time :) work looks top

nice shelf too ..

Yes i moved to the darkside

Instagram @jdm_brett

The truth of the matter is that Rod was having a post-coital fag after servicing some random woman when the quilt caught fire

So he quickly sends her out the front to raise the alarm whilst he goes for the hose.

Good excuses there Rod.

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

Interesting. I think I shall be upgrading my welder at some point...