Yet another buggy build, here goes...........

[joescoolcustoms]

Making good progress. Keep at it.

Here is the one I made for David's Lithia in 2011. Buggy was sold in 2015 and has not popped back up again.

_________________
Bad News Racing 2018 NORRA 1000 3rd in Class
Best Day Ever Racing 2022 NORRA 1000 2nd in Class and first All Female team to complete the race

Everyone is gifted. Some just do not open the package.

Looks like it was painted with a live chicken,polished with a brick and buffed with a pine cone

[jakerot]

There she is..........

That looks great. Thanks Joe!

[jakerot]

Another pix.

Got the front hoop tacked.

Tacked it to the flat bars and added these kickers

[jakerot]

Well it was summertime so you know what that means unfortunately........too much other stuff to do, so not much progress on buggy....

Had to get into some more medieval type sh*t with this fiberglass body to get it to sit right.

Got these plates bolted to front hoop and body. Tack welded them.

Got these plates on the other sides. I want to run a piece of tubesteel under the lip of the body, and connect it to these plates.

Well I tried doing it right side up and it turned into a PITA. So I am going to address this later when I have the FG body off and I can turn it upside down.

So instead I turned my attention to the front bumper and banged this puppy out this past weekend

Had to trim one of the clamps for the front beam.

It's progress im happy of the results so far.

[joescoolcustoms]

Good looking work.
_________________
Bad News Racing 2018 NORRA 1000 3rd in Class
Best Day Ever Racing 2022 NORRA 1000 2nd in Class and first All Female team to complete the race

Everyone is gifted. Some just do not open the package.

Looks like it was painted with a live chicken,polished with a brick and buffed with a pine cone

[jakerot]

Thanks Joe.

Got some more time on buggy. Not much accomplished. But what needs to be done has become a bit clearer.

Decided to bend some 1" tube for some side bars. Got 1 for each side but didn't tack them in yet.



I had an unneeded piece of flexible gas line laying around. I think it's stainless steel. removed the outer yellow plastic, and now using it to figure out how the side bars will look.

Realized I am going to have a clearance issue with the front tire hitting the body where I previously cut / reglassed it. Don't have the full steering range as it is now. More work, but clearer.

So I decided to focus on the front hood and steering column assembly. Decided life would be much simpler if I could install / remove the hood without having to do anything to the steering column assembly I plan on building. So I cut a slit in the dashboard. I have a plan on how to finish this area of the dashboard.

Removed windshield, attached this hanger to hold the steering column where I want it. Remove hood and get the hoop for the steering column support figured out.

[joescoolcustoms]

Every buggy build I set them up with a independent steering column support so the hood/dash can be pulled without taking the column out. To trim the slot in the dash, I use pinch welting for a more finished touch.

_________________
Bad News Racing 2018 NORRA 1000 3rd in Class
Best Day Ever Racing 2022 NORRA 1000 2nd in Class and first All Female team to complete the race

Everyone is gifted. Some just do not open the package.

Looks like it was painted with a live chicken,polished with a brick and buffed with a pine cone

[jakerot]

Very nice Joe.

I'm aiming to build a hoop like the one you have on the orange buggy pix.

Internet search is great. Pinch welding. Learned something new. Going to look into that possibility

Thank you

Steve

[jakerot]

Got The steering wheel column mounted.

[jakerot]

Decided I didn't like the shorter steering column and went with this longer one.

Don't think I am going to use this mounting bracket. Using a fixed bracket from an older style column I believe.

Going to try to make the horn on the steering wheel work. Column tube is grounded however because of the way I mounted it. I have a few ideas I'll try to make it work.

Cut the dash some more to account for the longer column. However now part of the mounting slots will be visible. Thinking on putting some jb weld or bondo in there to close the exposed slots.

Got a front hoop mocked up too. Ended up putting a splice in it. Ran out of longer 1" tube so now I just got scraps and boo-boos. All the rest of the 1" I think will need i can get this way and I didn't want to just order 1 more piece. Let's see how this works out......

[Rick qc]

I followed and read your whole build, very detailed and interesting !

You gave me some good tips on raising the body wich i intend to do on mine since i am rather tall and my vision while i am sitting in gets right at the top of the windshield frame and when the top is on it is even more of a pain..

I also intend on lenghtening the steering column to bring the steering wheel closer as i have the seat as far back as i can.

Good job and keep 'er going !

[jakerot]

Thanks Rick.

Well I got the steering column mounting finalized.

Is it overkill? Probably. That’s how it ended up.

Made a second column mounting bracket.

Kinda got side tracked on another project the last few months. Now back on buggy.

[jakerot]

Turned my attention to the rear bumper. Wanted a fixed lower attachment to the forks. Didn’t want to rely on the fork bolts. Planning on adding receiver tube to the bumper as seen on Samba.

Made cross member. Knotched for forks, through drilled 1-5/8” holes for the starter tubes.

I have couplers to make the rear bumper removable but forgot to take a pix at this time.

Never mind, here are pix of the couplers. They look well made. Fit is nice and snug.

[jakerot]

Removed engine. Now you can see the cross members and diagonals I added previously. So many months ago............. jeeezzz

Note: The diagonals are not attached to the forks. They are bolted to the tranny cradle as seen in the second picture below

[jakerot]

Bent the hoops for rear bumper. First one went great. For the second one, well let’s just say I had a problem determining when the bender angle dial was at true 0. Bent a few past 90 and wasn’t successful getting it to bend back to 90 so onto the scrap pile they went. Eventually was successful to an extent.

They need to be trimmed a bit to fit but this is as far as I’m going to go for now. Need to determine how far out the rear bumper tubes need to be in order to allow enough space for the exhaust / muffler I want to run. I don’t have the exhaust tip with muffler yet so I can’t use it for mock up.

So I have to buy muffler. Trying to find used one just for mock up. For final exhaust I will buy exhaust system with pipes and muffler. So now I gotta figure out which size headers. Leaning towards 1.5”. Thinking it will be fine. Engine will be 2007 or 2110. Mild cam. Haven’t decided on valve size yet. Prob aim for CR of 8-9:1

Thoughts?

I’m now going to focus on rest of roll cage until I figure out exhaust.
In other words, I’m gonna procrastinate.

[jakerot]

Well all right. Still plugging along.

Got the roll cage all tacked up. Almost done with the steel additions. Man what a grind. Figuratively and literally.

Added flat bar under the hood on each side for windshield mounting. No pix yet. Lots of stuff I am doing won’t be visible until I take the body off.

Started hacking up a fuel tank to make it fit under the hood

Don’t like the way the front bumper is lining up. Going to cut and reweld one side

Then I have to address the rear bumper. Prob gonna pull trigger on Tri-Mil bobcat with muffler.

Getting closer to the time when I will start to take it apart to finish up all the welds. I can see progress taking off again once this fab work is done and I can work on it at night. I am very limited now regarding times when I can cut grind weld, bend, etc. every time I need to weld or cut it’s a process to take everything out and then put it all away again. I swear 50% of my time invested in this buggy build so far is setting stuff up, putting it away, and moving stuff around the garage to make room for whatever is next on the list.

[jakerot]

Ok so one more item off the list. Hacked up a gas tank. Cut the front bump, and expanded the bottom.

I’m not sure if I got enough clearance for the passenger side tie rod. I do have a 1.5” body lift so this helps. I got about 4” vertical tie rod movement at the point where it connects to the spindle before it hits the bottom of the tank.

Only thing left is the filler neck then seal it up with some red cote, then paint.

Anyone have any suggestions as to when I have built enough and should start dis assembly and final welding? Trying to figure out sequencing and at what point I should turn around.

I’m thinking (hoping) I’m close to the point where I can start final welding.

[joescoolcustoms]

I have modified a lot of tanks and you are on the right track.

For tie rod clearance, the tie rod will be the closest on the P-Side bottom edge of your tank when the steering is turned for a right hand turn, (outer tie rod in as far as it will go) and in the fully compressed position. To check this, I remove the trailing arm grub screws and slightly slide out the upper and lower trailing arms just until they let go of the torsion spring pack, then use a floor jack to raise the suspension all the way up with the steering turned all the way to the right. I also allow for at least 3/4 inch clearance for those just-in-case moments.

Also, check the clearance for the steering damper. If either are going to hit the tank, I use exhaust tubing to make a "tunnel" for the tie rod to go up into the tank. It will be a tapered clearance so the fuel will still go around the "tunnel". The exhaust pipe is easy to split into a tapered section and weld in. I usually use 2 1/2 inch exhaust pipe that can be had at part stores in straight sections for cheap.

Keep at it, looking good.
_________________
Bad News Racing 2018 NORRA 1000 3rd in Class
Best Day Ever Racing 2022 NORRA 1000 2nd in Class and first All Female team to complete the race

Everyone is gifted. Some just do not open the package.

Looks like it was painted with a live chicken,polished with a brick and buffed with a pine cone

[jakerot]

All right got some more progress on the gas tank.

Cut out the passenger side tie rod clearance piece from the original gas tank. Spliced it into the tank

[jakerot]

Here is the progress so far on the filler neck. Have the tank and hood drilled. Added small plate to reinforce around the hole in tank.

Here is what I hope to have the neck and cap look like when done. Neck isn’t welded to the tank yet. I like the grommet. My challenge now is figuring out how to tack the filler neck to the tank while maintaining alignment. Don’t think my mig will fit in there. Thinking maybe jb weld a few small tacks just to hold it so I can get the hood off. Once the hood is off then I can tack weld the neck, grind off jb weld tacks, final weld.

Foil tape covering sending unit hole so stuff don’t fall in.

Big hole in hood is from previous owner / fuel filler location. Will get patched eventually. Got some old fiberglass seats from which I will obtain a donor fill piece.

My other challenge is the threaded stub the cap screws onto. The red grommet fits nicely around the neck, but no way it will fit over the threaded stub. My intent was to braze this stub to the neck but now have to make it removable.

The stub fits real snug on the neck as it is. I had to lightly hit it with the belt sander on the end of the neck to get it to fit inside the stub. It inserts maybe 1/4” with moderate tapping on piece of wood. I have to use a hammer, punch, and vice to get it to come off. A good 10 whacks it takes. It’s real snug. Possibly “pressed”. I’m thinking maybe just install the hood/grommet, then put the stub on the end and give it a few good whacks with rubber mallet, run a bead of some type of fuel rated sealant around the inside seam, and call it a day. Assuming I can get the pressed stub off again, this will allow me to remove the hood if I ever needed to without destroying the red filler neck grommet.

Or I could weld a nut to the inside of the filler neck and use a bolt to hold the threaded stub on. Will have to use a sealant on the threads. This is probably the route I will take. Will need to sand the OD of the neck some more. Or gotta find a lathe.

Gotta sleep on it for a month or 5.