SS100 "replica" Kit Kar

[Ulu]

Mocking up the crossmember with filler plates.

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SS100 kit kar
1600cc DP

[Ulu]

The paint stripping took a few hours. I didn’t want any paint chemistry issues here, so I took it all off.

The red powder paint was a pain.
These filler plates were cut with my fake chinese sawzall, from the bottom of an old harbor freight welding cart.

Now they’re stripped & it’s all ready to weld up.

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SS100 kit kar
1600cc DP

[Ulu]

When you think you are done cleaning, you need to look again. I wasn’t yet finished with the paint.

I also had to make a sleeve and these two shims.

These tubes have to be spliced, & I clamped them with some angles for alignment.

I put a sleeve inside for backup. I drilled thru the sleeve & used a little wire clip to keep it centered until welding.

There wasn’t enough clearance to install the crossmember, so I also had to modify my jig a little.

I spent some time preparing for impending rain, so no actual welding was accomplished
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SS100 kit kar
1600cc DP

[Ulu]

The rains dried up and I finally started welding again. I worked on this until I ran out of argon.

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SS100 kit kar
1600cc DP

[Ulu]

A 300amp bronze ground clamp and #2 cable rrplace my cheap stamped clamp and short #4 cable.

I got the rest of the crossmember welded.

Just hanging there…

I had some seam splitting on the electro-seam-welded tubes. I TIG’d them out.
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SS100 kit kar
1600cc DP

[Ulu]

I needed to straighten out the floor pan before I welded to the crossmember and it was rather curled up from all the mishandling.

In order to straighten it out I made this set of fluting pliers, from some harbor freight welding clamp and random pieces of old steel.

Roughing out the dies

Welded to the clamp

I did a lot of grinding, filing, and sanding to get this profile smooth. It raises the panel a bit more than stock, if you clamp it all the way. If you crank the knob in until the clamp won’t latch, the process is totally controlable.

They straightened up the pan edge a lot. I’ll do the fine touches as I tack it to the frame.

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SS100 kit kar
1600cc DP

[Ulu]

Fitting up the new frame rails.

I must now square it up a bit and tack it all together. There will be other closures and gussets.
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SS100 kit kar
1600cc DP