D64:Frame Rear End

I had some time this afternoon out in the garage and the weather was beautiful. I decided to give the steering a break for a day and try to get the rear end finished. The CAD drawing is what I was going off to build the rear end of the frame. I've made some changes here from the book, as usual. Most of the changes are needed to incorporate the donor rear end without major mods.

I tried to mock up the wheels and fenders in the CAD to get an idea of what it'll look like assembled. We'll see how it looks when it actually comes together.

I've finished about half of the rear end so far. I still need to add a couple of pieces to the rear and then add the sides in as well. I'm hoping that all comes together pretty quickly.

One change from the book is using square tubing and a flat strip instead of a round tube on the top of the rear. I just didn't want to spend the extra cash buying round tube when I had plenty of square in the garage. I also didn't want to figure out bending the tube either for the corners. I think this solution might not be the prettiest in the end, but it'll work... and it's locost.

D63:Steering Linkage Stabalizer

With all the steering linkage put together, next up was the stabilizer to keep all the linkage in place. I used the 2 plastic bushings from the linkage of both donors. The challenge was figuring out how to integrate these into a new mount.

Below, is the top portion, that holds the plastic bushing to the mount. The next photo shows the mount with this top holder in place.

The mount with bushings installed along with the steering linkage that it'll hold. The left side has the top cap and the right does not.

The linkage and mount installed in the car.

... and finally my first attempt at a video in this blog. The entire steering system working together.

D62:Steering Linkage and Steering Column Mods

I got some today to work on the steering linkage that I need to complete the gap between the donor parts. The plan was to shorten all the parts that I bought yesterday at the junk yard to make a new piece of linkage.

The first step was shortening the outer sleeve to the extension shaft. I cut about 6 inches out of the middle.

The two ends where then welded together. My original plan was to incorporate one of the giubos (flex disc) into the new linkage. This plan required shortening both outer sleeves and then bolting them together using the giubo.

Step two was to cut and shorten the inner rod. I needed this end as short as possible since I still needed to fit the other half into a 12 inch space. I also needed a length of tube to mount a bushing to hold the linkage in place.

The two ends butted up together just before welding them together.

The final product of the first half. It's about as short as possible with as many pieces as I was trying to incorporate.

I haven't made a final decision, but after getting the first half of the new linkage together I was thinking it might be easier to simplify the solution by eliminating the giubo. Below is a pic of the second option. It is definitely a simpler solution. I need to do some research, but I'm assuming the only thing I'm losing by eliminating the giubo from the steering linkage is a little extra vibration in the wheel.

I plan on mounting a bushing to the control arm upright to fix the position of the new linkage. The entire linkage can be seen below from the rack to the steering column. It's not "straight" or pretty, but it'll get the job done.

Next up for the day was lengthening the steering column. Below you the steering column cut and the extra tube that will be added between. The extra tube is actually a piece of one of the outer sleeves from the extension above. It was a bit too big to fit inside the column, so a little grinding took just enough off for a snug fit. Glad I didn't have to go find a 6 inch piece of tube in some drop pile at a steel yard.

Below is the the new steering wheel placement with the extra 3 inches of column length added. This will give much more space for the indicator switch, ignition, etc. It also feels much more comfortable while sitting in the car with the wheel a little closer. The next step is adding the 3 inches to the outer column tube.

Steering Linkage Find

Yesterday I had a free morning and spent it at the junk yard trying to solve my missing steering linkage issue. This particular yard had 4 BMWs which wasn't very promising as 2 of them were e36 3 series. Since that's what the donor was I knew these weren't going to provide anything of great use. The other 2 were an '85 5 series and an '86 6 series. Both of these have extendible columns with independent u-joints. The only question was whether or not the splines would match up to those from my '92 donor.

After an hour at the first car with no luck getting the u-joint out I almost gave up and went home empty handed. Then a breakthrough. I ended up pulling the back end of the steering rack off and out of the car, then prying the u-joint free on the ground. This was much easier than trying to work a crowbar inside a packed hood. Then the moment of truth... were the splines going to match up? They did! On to #2. With this newly found trick of disassembling the rack, 15 minutes later and I had the second one out. At $15 each, I'd say this was both successful and locost. Oh, and icing on the cake was a $4 set of spark plug wires that I needed.

Christmas came early...

A little early Christmas present this year. I finally got a tank for my welder. 75% argon/25% CO2. I got it hooked up and tested it out and WOW! What a difference it makes over the flux cored wire.

D61:Seat Mounting 2 and Steering Column Disassembly

With the pedals in and working on the placement for the steering column I realized how high I sat in the frame with the seat mounted the way it was. I figured I could remount the seat to floor level dropping it almost an inch from where it was originally. An inch didn't seem like much until I was done and realized how different of a feel it was.

Below are the new brackets. The seat will mount directly to these brackets instead of sitting on a bolt on top of the crossbar. I still need to drill the holes for the mounting bolts, but the second pic gives a pretty good idea of how the seat frame will sit on these new mounts along with the original bolt mount.

Below is all four mounts installed in the frame.

Next up was disassembling the steering column. During the mounting of the column I realized it was a little short. My plan is to add about four inches to the length. I plan on cutting both the column and the outer tube to add in the additional length for each. The hard part will be getting all the right size tube stock to actually accomplish this.

The last picture is of the ignition housing removed from the column. BMW uses these bolts with no heads to attach the housing to the column for theft prevention. These required grinding a notch into each and then using a screwdriver and a pair of pliers to get it apart.

Nose Cone CAD

It's been freezing in Denver for the past week... and by freezing I mean barely in the double digits. So instead of working on the car I've been playing around with CAD mockups. Here is a rough idea of what I'm thinking for the nose cone. I'd like to keep the look of the BMW grill and work that into the nose cone.