Project Blue Book

[chief]

Thanks fellas, it's good to be back!
So today has been fun if not a little messy!

Time to get cracking on getting this underseal off. Not the most fun of jobs





So run out of steam now and thought i'd knock off early!
Here are a few pictures of bits that have been going on in the background.


I've powdercoated the tank from black to the grey to match the filler (ish)
Next is what i'm pretty pleased with. After spending some time figuring out the suspension and finding someone to make it....
I first uprated the bushings in the top mounts. Then powdercoated them along with anodising the hardware.

The rears.

Then the front struts. Converted to coil over with longer top hats, helper springs and lower bearings to help stearing.




Then the rears.


I am adding to this set up both front and rear anti roll bars which will require some body mods and a fare bit of welding. Hopefully it should all work
So off for a early bath and a curry!

[Green Ernie]

Nice.

[defianty]

Nice work Chief. Coming along good.

[LMR]

Good to see you remembered where the garage is. I thought I was going to have to draw you a map!

[chief]

Thanks fellas!
Phil,
I cudda done with a map!
Two and a half months away has been painful

[chief]

Okay, sooo i've pretty much landed on the spec for the engine. This list that follows will be pretty scary to some and kinda 'meh' to those that are not familiar with the effort invloved with aircooled engineering. I'm pleased with it...
Align bore mains
Bore case for 103mm cylinders
machine for Porsche 5 blade fan
Drill, tap, clean and plug oil galleries
Reface flywheel
Polish and balance new crank and assembly
JE 103mm Piston Kit with Eurorace Barrels
Light weight 'H' beam con rods with AP bolts
Light weight flywheel bolts
Web 494 Cam including cam wheel and followers
Shadek Oil Pump
Alloy cut to length pushrods
New casting 3 stud heads with 44mm and 36mm stainless valves
Heads bored for 103mm pistons
Heads ported
Decked
Uprated valve springs and CrMo retainers
Porsche swivel adjusters
Jenvey throttle bodies
BAS7 inlet manifolds
Fuel injectors and ecu by Omex (600 series)

This will give me as close as a knats nacker a 2.4 ltr :bandit:

It will look a bit like this. There will be some serious mods, one of which will be a modified Porsche fan shroud. The idea is to duct the back and fit the oil cooler with twin electric fans under the air box. The idea behind this it to make the engine appear vintage, however it will have modern turn key reliability and tuned for muchus torque. Lots of black crackle finish paint should add to this.

Today has been several hours of scraping the bottom of Project Blue Book'. Still an awful lot to do, but you can see progress





That about it for today. There's only so much scraping you can do before your wrists and back scream enough!
Keep well everyone!
Chief

[defianty]

Now that's a 4-pot! Great spec.

At least you have a rotisserie for that scraping! I wish I made one now but I've coped well enough without it. Would have made life easier though.

[chief]

Update as I have been away from this thread for a while....
I managed to get a few hours Saturday afternoon and this morning. So more of that scraping and drilling out spot welds (On this subject, I think the chap who spot welded most of this body shell had 'Ark eye'). I have managed to get some new rear jacking points and a towing eye as all of these has seen better days. Restoration Design Europe are the fellas for these.


Both were a bit ropey so time to get the spot weld drills out.

So after drilling out the spot welds I could start to leaver of the piece.



So i'm left with a rusty panel to celan down, but still ive remarkably good condition considering it's age.

The towing eye has had a hard life. It looks like it's driven over it's self!


The floor has taken a bit of a pounding too!
I guess this is down to the car being lowered....A LOT!

Next I started to identify where the floor had had a beating and cleaned off the paint.

I identified each with some tape so I didn't loose track. I shall use a spot weld tool to attached pegs too. Then attach a slide hammer and start to pull the little blighters back into shape.
I moved onto removing the exhaust heat shield which had 18 spot weld on! Man alive that was fun.But removing this let's me get the the rear floor which is red rusty and in need of some TLC. More on this next week.
All the best,
Chief

[LMR]

The tape reminds me of my Dad in the 70's after he had shaved!!

[defianty]

Tidy work Cheif.

[chief]

Managed to steal away some time in the garage yesterday and an hour today...This is going to take some considerable time at this rate

So, here goes....

More spot welds to be removed.This is the plate that held on the manifold pressure sensor. This will be redundant on my build and I want the engine bay to be as clean and neat as possible.

To this end I then removed the tags that hold on the sound deadening blanket to the fire wall.

Hopefull all these little thing will add up to a lot in the end.

Next I drilled out all the spot welds for the rear exhaust heat shield. I could see that there was a lot of red rust under there. There must have been 35 of the little blighters!



A far bit of cleaning off with the angle grinder and a lot of elbow grease to get all the years of stray oil off!
So looking cleaner already...


This one is an ongoing process. I am hammer and dollying all these seams straight. They are as wrinkly as a pie crust from the factory due the all the high amp spot welding. I appreciate as PeterS has commented today that you won't see these once the car is back on it's feet, but I just can't leave them as they are!


So after listening to a couple of albums on the ipod I kinda ran out of steam grinding the hell out of the floor pan!!! I'm just removing where the coating has been damaged and rust is showing.


After a cuppa I decided to look at some fit up of parts. I have had the side cills and front and rear aprons shot blasted to have a nice clean base to start welding from. The process of blasting and just age meant that they no longer fit all that well


A little percussion adjustment and hey presto!


As you can see from this one, i've got my work cut out the flare the rear valance into the arch. I also need to remove where the exhaust comes out. I will be having a twin center exit exhaust (In keeping with The Red Baron).
So that's all for now. Hopefully I shall be doing some stud welding next week to start on pulling the various dents out of the floor pan!
All the best chaps,
Chief

[LMR]

Nice to see progress - it was a poor excuse for not venturing to the NEC though!!

The manifold pressure sensor bracket highlights something I found on my car. No matter how much rust removal you do, there can be trapped rust around spot welds. I did the same as you with that bracket.

[chief]

I know our Phil, but I've got to try and catch you up!!

[defianty]

Good to see an update Chief, even little and often will get you over the finish line.

I keep looking at my MPS bracket and wondering whether to remove it or not, I'm not sure if I could mount my fuel pressure regulator there. I'll have to give it more thought.

[chief]

Stephen,
It's a difficult one. Where do you stop, but the 'Whilst you're in there' devil is sat on my shoulder!!!
I'm giving myself plenty of time to consider, then re-consider, then re-re-consider.....
Stud welding gun has just arrived, so next weekend should be a hoot!