OT plastic kit car

[Ulu]

I have been back to work on the Volkswagen chassis every day, and I have been stripping off all the dirt, grease, and old paint that’s on top of all the grease and dirt.

 

There is more than I hoped for. I am trying hard to get the weird chassis and suspension ready for paint, but I am only 3/4 there. I took a couple breaks from this to do welding on my security doors and other household things.

 

Also temperatures have been above 100° every afternoon so I am only outdoors until about 1 PM. Which is what it is now. See you soon.

 

 

[Plymouthy Adams]

we have high temp and higher humidity.....am wet sanding the roof of a project car today, found I just need to wring out my t-shirt for water.....lol  Of course I am not but could be done!  Many folks sitting about doing nothing.  Like you, taking advantage of morning and evening hours....today with the huge storm that came through, temps are moderate for the minute...will not be this way tomorrow.

[Dan Hiebert]

My VW's gas tank sprung a leak last month, now that the G-kids are headed back home we'll have some discretionary money available to install a replacement, but as it always means with me, it'll be time to scrape some crud off the car that I couldn't get to before.  Our "heat wave" broke yesterday, (we've had high humidity and mid-80's for a month ?), high was 75 yesterday, it's 52 out right now, and not supposed to get over 72 today with clear skies.  It'll be tough to get up the gumption, but I think I'll be working outdoors today...

Edited July 30, 2023 by Dan Hiebert

[Dave72dt]

it looks like the prep on the axle is going well.  Seems the hotter it is the more tedious and never ending it feels.  I was looking forward to a break in the temps this week, still in the upper 80's, but we've been getting rain at night and bright cloudless sunshine for the most part in the day so humidity is high.  Repairing rusty door bottoms and welding patch panels, indoor garage temps up to 104, I could wring my shirts out too.   Not to complain though, in another 6 months i could be looking at a 100 degree flip in temps

[Ulu]

Temperatures have moderated from the 110°F range down to about 100°F. It only gets that hot for a time, and it hasn’t been as long as in previous years so the concrete is not staying as hot.  I twisted my knee so I’ve been cramping around quite a bit but I still managed to get some more cleaning done on the car.

The rear suspension is getting much cleaner and I have started cleaning up the transmission housing. I burnished the rear brake drums, then I burnished the clutch cable bracket & lug bolts and painted them.

 

I had hoped to have this whole business painted last week but there were too many interruptions and on-the-job injuries.

I picked up a few new wire brushes yesterday and today the burnishing continues. This collection is getting well used.

 

I would’ve taken the rear suspension arms completely off for this business, and had them sandblasted, if they were not almost impossible to remove. You cannot get an air impact wrench in the necessary place to remove the pivot. That must be done with a 17 mm hex driver and a long breaker bar. If they are rusty internally, the only thing you can do is disassemble all the rubber parts from that area of the car and hit it with a torch. There is no access to drill those bolts out.

 

Fortunately the pivot arm rubbers are low mileage and still in great condition.

 

Edited December 6, 2023 by Ulu

[Ulu]

I got the transmission cleaned up pretty good so it was time to take it out of the chassis  To finish cleaning and repaint.

 

I built this rollover trunnion for the back end of the car. This was just built from random junk including an old trailer hitch & a piece of a tractor clutch.

 

The front end I just suspended with a chain from the engine hoist as I rolled it.

 

This is going to save me a lot of work not having to work overhead.

 

Here it is inverted. It seems like this day has been a long time coming!

[Ulu]

Hurricane Hillary has hit Clovis, shutting down all progress for the immediate future. Normally in mid to late August we expect day after day of 100° temperatures.

 

but the rain started with a cloud burst yesterday afternoon, continued on and off during the night, and started pouring about 5 AM.

 

Fortunately I had not bothered to degrease anything as I wire brushed the chassis, and so nothing rusted from the humidity.

 

But when this started up I went out there and covered every bit of shiny steel with a fog of anticorrosion oil.

 

I have a jug of swimming pool cleaner, which is a heavy detergent mixed with water and phosphoric acid. When I decide it’s time to paint, I will hit it with that first, degreasing and converting all the rust. Right before I paint it I will degrease with gumout, then acetone.

 

Finally I’m going to use a rust converting black paint on the bottom.

 

I expect to do quite a bit of welding before any of that happens. Although it may currently be too wet to paint, I’m pretty sure I can TIG weld in this humidity without electrocuting myself.

 

But I actually have quite a bit of grinding to do before that can start, plus I have to buy some more metal. I am not satisfied with my current collection.

[Ulu]

We got swatted by hurricane Hillary four times in three days but everything is dry now and I am back on the case.
 

I’m glad I fogged down all that shiny metal with oil, because the  spots that I missed started to develop surface rust. Any rusty spots that I did not fog are now slightly rustier.

 

Maybe I will be able to get some paint on this by next week.

[Plymouthy Adams]

you getting there......good that you have some jigs to position the pan on and do your work.  

[Ulu]

With these sturdy shock absorber supports, each suspension arm is practically its own jackstand.

I also made a steel “horse” to support the nose. I did not want it just hanging from a chain.

Essentially it’s standing on nine legs, plus I still have the chain on for safety.

 

Edited August 23, 2023 by Ulu

[Ulu]

Still no paint except for a few small parts involved in the transmission mounts. I’ve been scrubbing on the transaxle itself for about three days. It’s starting to look pretty good.

 

[Plymouthy Adams]

stick with it, it will prove worth it in the long run...I am getting down to the task that hopefully don't draw out days and weeks now per item.  

[Ulu]

Plymouthy, the most wonderful thing about this project is that I don’t have a deadline for it to be finished.

 

I have other projects waiting, but if this one takes the rest of my life it’s not a problem.

 

I have run out of photo space again, so until I delete some old photos all you get is the fuzzy little stuff.

Edited August 29, 2023 by Ulu

[Ulu]

After two days with too much wind and humidity, it finally dried up and calmed down today, and I got my transmission painted.


I had to do the last little bit of cleanup on the bench and then I put it on the hoist.

I washed the whole thing down with acetone, and blew it off.

There it is with several coats of self etching black paint.

Edited December 6, 2023 by Ulu

[Ulu]

I’m slowly cleaning all the corners in the rear suspension.

 

This flame-cut block is the outer spindle bearing block.

It’s MIG welded to the stamped suspension arm and there’s about 30 dingleberries remaining, even after stiff mechanized burnishing.

 

I have been knocking dozens of these dingles off the chassis wherever I find them, because they prevent me from doing a good cleaning job, and just look messy.

 

After knocking off most of the dingles with a small hammer and a nailset, it looks cleaner.

 

I started out with a cold chisel, but that leaves marks, and isn’t necessary 99% of the time.

 

It’s nearly ready, but I still need more solvent to degrease it all.

Edited October 23, 2023 by Ulu

[DonaldSmith]

Plastic Kit Car 

some assembly required

[Ulu]

This is going to be at least its third assembly. ?

 

Maybe more, because there’s 30 years of its history I don’t know about.

 

Anyhow, it’s like any other custom car.

Once you get it all together and running, you will decide you need to change something.

 

In this case half the frame, LOL

 

Who knows, maybe the whole frame. I’m not close to done yet.

[Ulu]

I have been spending some time on little projects for my wife, but I did get the rest of the burnishing done on that suspension. At least that which I can get to with power tools.

 

I am down to the little corners that you can only get with a little scraper. There’s a few more hours of that before I can degrease and paint, but it’s looking pretty good.

[Ulu]

After many side projects and other delays I finally did finish cleaning up the suspension on the back of the Volkswagen.

 

I degreased it and acid etched it and flipped it over so I could paint both sides.

I painted everything that I had stripped to bare metal but I did not paint anything that I need to weld on yet.

 

When this is dry I will cover it all up so the welding can continue.

[Ulu]

This is the frame which under-girdles the floorboards and connects them to the running boards, fender tips, seatbelts, and seat frame risers.

 

I decided I should weld up all the unnecessary holes in this thing before I weld it up under the chassis. At least a dozen holes got relocated and there were about 30 holes in this that needed welding. There are a lot of corresponding holes in the floor boards that need to be welded up as well.

 

I did this, again, by first clamping an aluminum chiller block underneath the work and then flipping it over to weld the backside. I find it if I leave the aluminum chiller on until the weld cools considerably, I don’t have any corrosion problem on the back of the weld, and they come out clean.

 

I got about 3/4 through before I ran out of Argon and had to head for the welding shop. I will finish this up tomorrow and sand it and put some paint on it. Then I will put it away until it’s time to fit it on the chassis.

 

 

[Ulu]

I got that cross frame all finished up and painted and put it away to cure while I work on the bumper brackets.

 

I figured out why I could never get the front bumper to look really straight with the fenders. One of the front bumper brackets was put in the brake crooked, and it doesn’t match the other one at all.

 

These things are 1/8” steel plate, and I am not going to bend them easily nor will I be able to heat up the bend and hammer it into the correct orientation, so I cut the offending flange nearly loose and bent it into the correct orientation so I could weld it.

Edited October 10, 2023 by Ulu

[Ulu]

Very little was accomplished on the car over the past two weeks. I did lots of household improvements that had come due.

 

I got back to my brackets, and finished welding up the unneeded holes. There was lots of shaping and filing, but it’s nearly ready to sand, strip and paint.

 

[Ulu]

I finally stripped the paint off of those bumper brackets today.

 

I would normally buy Jasco paint & epoxy remover or Zip Strip brand paint stripper, but this time I decided to try caustic soda in the form of generic barbecue spray cleaner. I have never tried this before.

 

I got the brackets as hot as I could in the sink with scalding water, but I think it would work better if I heated them up to about 400° in the oven first.

 

It ended up taking me three applications and some scrubbing with scotchbrite, but they’re looking just about ready to paint.

 

I do like the finish better than when using the zip strip.

 

Edited October 26, 2023 by Ulu

[kencombs]

I used to use lye, (or Drano as it is almost pure lye) as a stripper and cleaner.  But it has become really hard to buy locally in bulk.  Even hardware stores keep it locked up or hidden away.  Apparently it is a precursor chemical for some meth recipes.'

 

I have a restaurant quality two burner countertop electric range and a stainless pan that just fits both burners.   Makes a great mini-hot tank, when I can find the chemicals.    Grease, oil, paint,  it all comes off with time and 210 degrees in there.  A quick soak in vinegar, and even the rust is gone.

[Ulu]

50 years ago I worked in a shop where we had a big hot tank with caustic soda in it. It was nasty and stinky but it worked well. Probably completely illegal in California now.

 

Amazingly one of the senior mechanics thought he could put an aluminum porthole frame from his boat in there, and it completely disappeared overnight. LOL

 

I’m telling you, a little chemical knowledge can go a long way in this life.

Edited October 26, 2023 by Ulu