Got Bumpers a.k.a. Gilligan's Island episode 39

My lovely wife now grocks the Gilligan Island references on the car. The rear bumpers are stock - the rear fenders are not - they have a slight bulge flaring out to clear the 275/40R17 tires. Fitting the bumpers consistend of elongating the mounting holes, test fitting, and repeating the process until they fit. It also required making a shim for the outer mount to kick the bumper out far enough from the side of the fender, and a shim under the side mount. I had some rigid plastic known affectionately as Dam Rubber, not damn rubber, due to it's past use as air dam material. In a previous life the stuff was anti-static work bench mats. I made the shims out of that material. Once everything was fitting well, I was able to locate the hole for the side bumper mount and carefully drill through the pretty paint, hoping I got the location right.



After doing all this work, I cleaned and waxed the back of the car, then started mounting the bumpers, discovering I needed a bit more shim - one hardened washer on the upper outer hole between the plastic shim and the bumper, and needed to elongate the side hole to line it up. I also had some cross-threading on the outer right mount, so it was a couple hours of tedious work to get the right bumper on, then a much quicker 20 minutes on the left bumper. I am happy to report that no paint was damaged in the process.

Since May, I've knocked a good dozen entries off the to do list, but the list seems to keep holding at three to four dozen major tasks to go. Then there's the little mistakes like putting the tumbler in 180 degrees out on the glovebox - it drops in, but doesn't turn and doesn't come out without carefully drilling a hole in the lock housing to release it. There's also the sequencing mistakes - like mounting the rear license plate and chrome surround, then realizing that the license plate lamp housing goes in first. With all these time sinks, I've decided final interior assembly will be farmed out - looking at what other stuff I can trade money for time to finish this car and enjoy some road time this summer.
 

Air & PCM

The cold air intake system was finished before the fourth of July. On the left is the new right turn that goes through the radiator support and into the engine bay. I ended up fiberglassing together the aluminum pieces. It could have been welded, but I had the materials and skill to do it with fiberglass.  Several hours of work to save three quarters of a pound, but more importantly, it makes a clean transition along the radiator support. A silicon coupler joins to the MAF/MAP sensor, then the 90 degree aluminum bend brings it into the throttle body. Not pictured, but on the other side of the radiator support, a 45 degree silicon elbow brings it under the hood down to a 90" bend and down to the air filter.

 

The PCM mount was another three hour tour - probably one of those to be continued episodes. The pins on the right side go into firewall insulation hold-down grommets, and the left side bolts to the under dash birdcage. Hopefully not too much lost footroom for the passenger, and clear of the kick panel and speaker.

 

Early Father's day treat

Today spent time fitting up padding and carpet, and putting seat belts and seats in the car. Still need a little final fit on the carpet and to glue it down, and bolt in the seats, but it's beginning to look like a car. After getting the interior semi-functional, I took the car around the block for the first time. Susan was a good cheerleader and camerawoman. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3WVfdkkgos

Still kinks to work out, starting with figuring out what's up with the power steering or lack thereof, but it was nice to make a loop around the block.

This past week I was working on an airbox to make the transition through the firewall. Version 1 met an untimely death on the chop saw along with a saw blade, but no bodily harm. Version 2 took about a quarter the time to get to this stage of prep. Now just need to have a friend weld it up.

 

On the road again

This was the second consecutive weekend of working on the car again after the long bathroom remodel hiatus. There were a number of Gilligan's Island three hour tours, finishing up reinstalling the radiator, replacing the power steering reservoir with one that the hood can close over, securing the 5.3L truck fuel rails on the LS1 intake, and even replacing the battery - new optima has a different top than the old one.

One successful modification was rev 2.0 of the transmission shift linkage arm. This has been done for months, but the dead battery restricted testing. Mutt successfully traversed from the lift to the driveway, engaged park for a well needed interior vacuum, and moved back to the lift under it's own power.

The power steering reservoir was a rev 3.0 - the original bracket for the old LT1 reservoir that ended up not fitting, then rev 2.0 and 2.5 for the new one prior to installing hoses, and a final rev 3.0 with the hosed installed. Fortunately, it's a simple bracket from a piece of .090 gauge aluminum with four holes and a couple mild bends.

The next fabrication is for the air intake. I've been struggling with that one - how to make the transition from one side of the radiator support to the other - with the larger track to the new LS MAF,  the tubing is too close to the radiator to use a nice manderal bend. The solution looks to be to make a nice box for the transition with a tubular inlet, a radiused corner across from the inlet, and a transition on the adjacent side to a tubular exit. I'll fab it up this week and get someone to weld it up for me to solve this dillema.

Bathroom 1, Corvette 0

Between a home bathroom remodel, a trip to China, and a ten day trip to the bay area, the Corvette was neglected for ten weeks. I'm happy to report that Susan and I are very pleased with the bath remodel, and the garage picked up a nice big subpanel and lost the washer and dryer. Can't complain about more power and more space to work, and Susan won't bump into the lift doing laundry anymore.

At this point it was time to start doing some time / money tradeoffs on unsuccessful fabrication efforts. The first was reuse of the 1993 Corvette LT1 dual fan setup. I had tried to make a new aluminum shroud to accomodate the fans and clear the larger 4" air intake for the LS motor. That project was doomed from the moment it put the first blemish in the new paint.


The fan is a 16" Spal with the Be-Cool rebranding mark-up for the included hardware kit. A set of universal brackets mount it to the radiator.

Universal brackets are, well, universal. In addition to trimming off the ears at the fan on all the brackets, this bracket required a notch to clear the mounting pin for the radiator.

The project was a success, with an inch of clearance around the air intake once I rotate the offending hose clamp.

Back at it

It seems like September, October and November got away from me with a couple trips to China, a family reunion, some ministry work, a kitchen peninsula range hood install, and a backyard landscaping project. Thanksgiving I took the week off, but with a couple visitors over that week, I only got a few hours in on the project. Christmas I took two weeks off work, with a goal of getting back to work on the car.

Back in August I was struggling with power steering routing, and had a few other things that seemed like giant conundrums. Every project seems to have some of those. With a few months away, and several days to work through things, managed to get back to making forward progress. Power steering is now plumbed, heater box is reinforced and back in the car, and a host of other small tasks knocked off the to do list. Of course, for every couple of steps forward, there's a step back.

Friday, January 6th, the car made it's first movement under it's own power, only to find that park wasn't fully engaging - looks like the shifter linkage lever I built needs revision. I should have figured that one out when the car wouldn't start in park. Of course, the ebrake wasn't installed yet, so it was a quick run up and down the driveway, just long enough to turn the car around to have proof it actually moved. Ebrake is now installed, but there's a few more things to knock off before the true maiden run of the car - then lots of little stuff including windows, interior, and exterior trim before it's done. God willing, it will see the road this spring.

4 hours

Some time ago I made a number of business trips to Japan, and it seemed every customer we visited, it took us three hours to get there, whether taking subway in Tokyo, taking the bullet train out to the customer, or driving with our local manufacturer's rep.

Lately, it seems like everything on the corvette is taking four hours. Gas pedal has an S-Bend right into the trans tunnel. Build a new arm out of 1/4" steel  for the pedal that bends to the left rather than the right - you've got it - four hours.

Arm for the shifter on the transmission is shorter than the one that I had with the 93 Corvette shifter I'm using, but the one from the 93 corvette hits the exhaust pipe. Time to make a new one out of some 3/16" steel. Needs a square hole on one end and an oval hole on the other. Don't know about you, but my drill bits only make round holes, and I don't have a mill.

New wiper transmissions for the new wiper system replacing the old cable system. Brackets rub against the windshield channel - some filing to make clearance. Well, I'm not four hours into it, but I'm hardly started on this one.

New location for the power steering reservoir - well that bracket was easier to fabricate, and I only got it wrong and had to redo half of it, so it was probably only 90 minutes.

New Aluminum master cylinder - fittings were different than the old iron master, so tried re-flaring in place, ended up fabricating two new lines to the first tee or junction. Probably only 2 hours all said and done.

So not everything is taking four hours, but it all takes time. Looked at my checklist from last weekend. Crossed two things off the list of 22 must do things before I pull the car into the driveway under it's own power, but put four more things on the list, so I've now got 24 things left to do.

Not depressed, just struggling to accept the reality of how many little details there are when building a car from the ground up.