Shop Life 2.0

[HipMF]

Oh yeah, I did some more stuff.

Made some spacers for under the strut inserts:

Even cut the correct shape to mate with the strut insert and bottom of the tube. Too bad the gland nuts that I got were the wrong gender.

These would work great for an early e21. Mine is post-facelift. I left the spacers long and the mini-lathe setup so i can cut them to the correct length once I get the correct nuts. The theme of this part of my project is getting as many things as possible half-done. On that note, here's the relocated battery:

The box part is complete except for the super ugly welds on the bottom (I absolutely suck at welding upside down. Should probably google that to see what I'm doing wrong...). Need to grind those down, make an actual tie-down for the battery, re-route cables, and make a cover.

The more work I do, the longer my to-do list seems to get... Fuel cell is backordered. Will allegedly ship today. Still soldiering on.

[Bassboy3313]

That battery location is super slick!!

[Jdesign]

I also dig the battery location. Do you have pictures of it from the underside?

[HipMF]

I was in a rush to get out of the shop, so I didn't. I'll take some this weekend.

[HipMF]

Battery box:

Wasn't really feelin it this weekend, so not a ton new progress. I got the fuel cell and pump mounting situation figured out, but my dumb self forgot that I needed to get the welding gas tank refilled, so everything is just tacked in place with flux-core for right now.

I should have the correct gland nuts next week, which would allow me to set the car down on it's new suspension for the first time. I think that would bring the motivation level back up. It's actually getting pretty close to being functional again....

[Jdesign]

Any progress is better than no progress. That battery box looks great. This might just be me not knowing that chassis very well, but that fuel cell looks really low to the ground.

[B C]

grounded to the ground

[HipMF]

Jdesign said:

... that fuel cell looks really low to the ground.

I'm slightly concerned as well... but it's only an inch or two lower that the spare tire well was (famous last words).

[HipMF]

Managed to get the front end back together Saturday. Did work stuff on Sunday (boooo!).

#shoplife

Front coil-over adjusters are as low as they can go and there's a little shy of 2 inches of travel left. Tires hit the front of the wheel opening when turning at ride height. Would probably hit all of the things at full compression. Rear coilover adjuster could go a half inch lower, but the wheel arch is pretty much resting on the tire already. Still has 3 inches of travel left. At this height there's no camber, so it really needs to go 1-1.5 inches lower in the rear just to make it handle right. Sooo..... pretty much what I was going for.

I'll give the fender roller a try, just for novelty's sake, but will probably have to do flares just to make it driveable. Much work left.

[HipMF]

I made this!

10 WIBimmers Prize Points for anyone who can tell me why it will never work for it's intended purpose.

[Jdesign]

HipMF said:

I made this!

10 WIBimmers Prize Points for anyone who can tell me why it will never work for it's intended purpose.

Not NPT threads?

[GunMetalGrey]

Kind of hard to tell but it looks like your threads are left hand.
I'm impressed you made that lol.

[jc43089]

Threads are backwards.  Only for use in the southern hemisphere.

[HipMF]

Yep, they're backwards. *facepalm*

[HipMF]

last test fit. time to weld some shit.

[B C]

That looks real good

[Bassboy3313]

Awesome!!!!!

Sent from my SM-G930R4 using Tapatalk

[HipMF]

Full compression achieved.

I got about two thirds of the way done welding it before realizing that I was warping the crap out the quarter panel. It's more or less a big flat sheet once you cut the wheel arch off, so it's pretty flimsy and it doesn't take much to mess it up. Cut out half the welding that I did and started again. Ended up with a huge gap to fill between the wheel arch and quarter panel. Realized what I was doing was stupid and cut the whole thing back off. It took a lot checking, wedging, clamping, re-checking, and cooling the panel down after every quarter inch of weld, but I managed to get it on there while keeping everything pretty straight. Turned out pretty well actually.

It needs a little rolling and/or trimming, but it should be a no-rub situation when it's done. Started working on reattaching the inner fenderwell to the outer, but haven't figured out how to stuff myself into the wheelwell so that I can actually see what I'm doing.

Enjoying a well-deserved beer. Almost halfway done!

[Daggerty]

Great job any thoughts on what youre going to paint the inside with?

[HipMF]

Daggerty said:

Great job any thoughts on what youre going to paint the inside with?

Inside the wheelwells? Probably just seam-seal the welds and spray bomb. It's a fair-weather machine, so I'm not too worried about it.

I'll probably get a quart of paint mixed up for the outside once everything is done. Since I've decided to put the turbo off another year, I'll be doing body work stuff this winter. Finishing the flares, deleting the side trim, marker lights, etc.

Need to figure out what to with the ugly rear valence too...