Casey Family Build Thread (coupe)

[vnmsss]

just brought home the 40+ feet of 1-1/2 .120 dom tubing.

tubing.JPG

Awesome! Not sure if you're using your own door bar design, but we have a set of jigs which Hank fabbed up for the door bars on the new car. We kinda figured the jigs would be like the travelling pedal benders, and you're welcome to use them.

Karen

[QSL]

Awesome! Not sure if you're using your own door bar design, but we have a set of jigs which Hank fabbed up for the door bars on the new car. We kinda figured the jigs would be like the travelling pedal benders, and your welcome to use them.

Karen

that would be great! PM inbound

[MRSQSL]

Pop quiz. You are undoing the header bolts and you drop a thick e clip. Where does it fall? A) Straight to the ground where it rolls gently to rest right by your foot and you can easily bend down and retrieve it. B) Straight down under the exact center of the car, so you can't reach it from any angle. C) At an angle uncalculable by man which will lodge it firmly between the footbox aluminum and the frame with the bottom of the "E" under the aluminum so that it is impossible to pull up. The answer is C. Perhaps the coupe will not have this issue, but we spent the weekend working on the Cobra (don't ask why I'm updating this thread instead of that one). Mike had to take a screwdriver and a few yoga classes to get it unwedged. And so began week 2. Okay, that's a lie. Week 2 started on Saturday morning. We got up and headed off to the Temecula Rod Run with some friends. We did not drive Scoopy as the weather has been pretty bad (rain) and we didn't register as participants anyway. I guess this is an annual show where they block off a main street and park cars (1972 and older - I think) along the sides. Tons of people showed up. We saw two Cobras. I think both were Factory Fives, but I wouldn't swear to it. We also saw a GT40 which was a Superformance. The guy was entertaining serious offers only of $250,000 or higher!!!! Where's that shocked icon? I don't see it so we'll go with those two instead. The highlight of the show for me was a Chihuahua pulling a very small wagon. I snapped a picture on my camera, so I'll probably be responsible for posting since it isn't on the camera Mike uses.

After the show (where I didn't get any new dash or gauge ideas), we headed home. Karen came by to see our cars and let us pick her brain once more about building the coupe. I love her!!!!! We'll meet with her again in a week or two for the jigs to do the side impact door frame mod. I'm sure I'll have more dumb questions by then. As Mike and I were discussing later, Karen is extremely intelligent and I feel like she is telling me important, logical, well thought out things and I'm stumbling around saying things like "car is pretty" or "car goes vroom".

Saturday evening didn't go as planned. I was going to mark and photograph the footbox aluminum and then remove it. Unfortunately, I wasn't feeling great so I sat in the garage and watched Mike remove the sidepipes and header bolts (and throw e clips into positions you couldn't replicate if you tried 1000 times). It didn't bother me so much, but one of the sidepipes was sticking out too far and you could see the bolts (headers to pipes) through the body cut out. He decided to remove the headers, cut off the necessary amount, weld on new flanges and reattach. Fortunately, we know an amazing fabricator who came by Sunday morning to help.

Before I get to Sunday, let me point out something so incredibly stupid that I can't believe it took me until last week to realize. Because we are doing frame mods, the frame is not powder coated. Because the frame isn't powder coated, I can't go shoving suspenion parts or any other parts on. This made me sad. I wanted to build when I finished inventory. It'll be worth it, but how idiotic that I figured I'd do inventory and hop straight into building.

Okay, so Sunday Martin came over to help with the car. He is the one that made mini coupe in aluminum and also welded our roll bars. I have to say that if anyone in so cal needs any work done (especially hot rods or muscle cars), this is your guy. Okay, commercial over. The first thing they tried was using an old ban saw to cut the pipes. I'm not entirely certain what went wrong, but I believe it wasn't cutting at the desired angle (probably something to do with shims). Martin offered to take us to his shop where he had tools that he knew could get the job done. To make a long story short (instead of a short story long like I usually do), the three of us (mostly those two) spent the day putting the headers and pipes on and then taking them off and perfecting the millimeter or so that annoyed them (dang perfectionists) and then repeating. Up, down, up, down. I think I have massive leg muscles now. Okay, maybe not massive. In the end, Martin took the headers home so he could weld the flanges at his shop and will be returning them this evening. I spoke with him a tad more about the coupe dash. He showed me a picture of one he had fabricated for a truck. I believe my dash worries are over. Now back to the gauge confusion. Oh, so I was supposed to do the coupe panels Sunday while Mike and Martin were working, but there wasn't enough room in the garage or enough hands for two projects. Nothing accomplished for me.

Yesterday evening, Mike and I did yet another leak down test. I wasn't strong enough to get the stupid quick disconnect connected, so Aly had to come out. She couldn't do it either, so she ended up disconnecting and connecting the other end which worked well. Nothing more than 8% on any cylinder. The spark plugs look better than they did before Mike removed the PCV. It appears the valve cover gasket may have had a leak (I think that's the one he told me). It may still be that the intake gaskets are bad. I don't know. I'm sure we will be dismantling things for awhile until the problem is solved.

Alyssa is currently registering for classes for her senior year. She brought me the form to sign last night. I was delighted and extremely jealous to see that she is trying to get into a welding class. I've spent the day pondering ways to quickly learn extreme movie makeup so I can pass as a teen to take the class with her. Think I may need a fake ID as well. Maybe she will make me one of those pretty welded roses I saw on the other forum in the off topic section. I should show it to her and plant the seed now. Insert evil giggle.

[WIS89]

Karen-

Once again demonstrating that you ROCK!!

Great thinking on the jigs, and even better idea to share them. Your generosity is inspiring!!

Regards,

Steve

Awesome! Not sure if you're using your own door bar design, but we have a set of jigs which Hank fabbed up for the door bars on the new car. We kinda figured the jigs would be like the travelling pedal benders, and you're welcome to use them.

Karen