Nocones $2020 challenge build thread

In reply to Rigante :

Your last sentence made me laugh.....because you're right !

In reply to Robbie (Forum Supporter) :

We should see.  I hadn't really thought about that but it makes sense.  I don't have a tow vehicle big enough to pull that off though.  That would be a trailer load of awesome if we managed that.   I'll measure the length of this.   It's not as short as you would think, it's going to be a bit longer then the MG but I think it's only ~11'.   They would probably fit in/on a 22' trailer.  Weight won't be an issue as combined they are going to be like 3300lbs.

Or if we could find a super awesome ramp truck.  One on the truck one on a trailer. .  

At a minimum we should plan to meet at in Indy for the most rediculous 3 car caravan ever assembled since we both will drive right through on our way.  

In reply to DeadSkunk (Warren) :

OMG yes the price of steel makes this very hard.  I wanted to try to do it with "new steel" to see if it could be done and because I didn't want to compromise on tube thickness anywhere (I did on the MG and the chassis is 50lbs fatter then it needs to be and I hate it).  I'm going to be ~$650 into steel for the chassis/suspension with another $250 or so in sheet materials.  Almost half my build budget is metal.  And apparently I bought at the right time as prices have gone up 20-25% or more on most sizes since I bought.  For a regular car $1000-1500 worth of steel/aluminum to build a 1 off tube frame chassis is no big deal.  The raw materials are still even at today's prices cheap relative to the total.   But for a challenge car it's a daunting expense.  

I look at those Ferrari chassis and think..  wow I overbuild things.  

I mean obviously they look inadequate when compared to the tube frame full race cars and trophy truck type things we are used to drooling over.  But they clearly are sufficient for the need based on thousands of Ferrari cars each doing dozens of miles a year with about 1% of those cars ever seeing track use.  The issue is I don't have FEA (Nor would I put as much faith in DIY FEA as a bunch of people on the Locost forum do) and I don't have the luxury of a long development cycle and years of historic chassis failures to build off of.  Ferrari evolved their steel chassis over time to arrive at that being ok.  Instead of that evolution I make everything a triangle, and put extra tubes everywhere.  

I've been enjoying the Stanceworks Kswap 308 build for this reason of seeing how much a real 308 is like a car I could build in my garage.  I'd actually think a reasonable argument could be formulated that a Fiero Mera (308 "factory" kit) overall has less in comon with a kit car than a real 308 other then the Whole being a fake 308 thing.

In reply to nocones :

I've got about $120 in my chassis. The only virgin steel in it is the square and rectangular tubes, and they were purchased from a private seller who was picking up 11 foot lengths as "drops" someplace. I tried to get him to reveal his source, but he didn't bite. I bought it for $0.50-$1.00 per foot and he was making money on it. All the cage tubing and sheet metal is recycled....there's some hammock frame in there...... a pair of nice beech wood grained steel closet doors for the floor......a couple of roadside file cabinets....all free and all thicker than necessary.

nocones said:

In reply to Robbie (Forum Supporter) :

At a minimum we should plan to meet at in Indy for the most rediculous 3 car caravan ever assembled since we both will drive right through on our way.  

Bad Decisions Triangle! Bad Decisions Triangle! Bad Decisions Triangle!

gumby (Forum Supporter) said:

nocones said:

In reply to Robbie (Forum Supporter) :

At a minimum we should plan to meet at in Indy for the most rediculous 3 car caravan ever assembled since we both will drive right through on our way.  

Bad Decisions Triangle! Bad Decisions Triangle! Bad Decisions Triangle!

Looks like we got ourselves a Convoy. 

We need CBs and Handles.  This is important.

If the engine is not being used as a structural member the elimination of rubber mounts is foolish on a long term use case. For the challenge OK, but for serious track days you will be constantly chasing loose hardware everywhere in the car. Install rubber mounts and 99% of self loosening stops. Or you need at least a 6 cylinder engine to stop the vibrations that loosen things.

In reply to TurnerX19 :

I'm looking at cheap options.  But the stock mounts are hilariously large/heavy/expensive and were bad on the car I bought.  I'm looking for just some thin rubber tube sleeve type but they are ~$5 each so they car will probably be solid for now.  The design of the mounts should be pretty easy to cut out and put in 3 rubber sleeve type post challenge.  

nocones said:

each doing dozens of miles a year 

well played.

I will likely order 3 of these to use Post challenge.  They are the Spring Bushing for basically Every RWD solid Axle GM vehicle made.  These are $4.07 from Rock Auto and use a .5" bolt for the middle.  For the Challenge on this car I'm thinking I'm going to be close enough to the $2000 limit that the $12 will be to much.

In reply to AxeHealey :

I wondered if anyone would notice that.  

In reply to nocones :

How about casting your own using a jug of two-part urethane? Should be Challenge budget friendly once you prorate the volume/mass of material used.

I think I bought 18 hockey pucks for like $12 on amazon years ago... I bet you could get 3 mounts out of a single puck!

on the other hand I budgeted for a full bottle of loctite on f-dat. Willing to split. 

nocones said:

In reply to TurnerX19 :

I'm looking at cheap options.  But the stock mounts are hilariously large/heavy/expensive and were bad on the car I bought.  I'm looking for just some thin rubber tube sleeve type but they are ~$5 each so they car will probably be solid for now.  The design of the mounts should be pretty easy to cut out and put in 3 rubber sleeve type post challenge.  

I made my motor and transmission mounts from a rear lower control arm for a Miata. It has four bushings that can be pressed out and pushed into pieces of tubing. The engine mounts are just the arms of the LCA cut off and welded to a plate. I didn't bother pressing them out and using tubing from my budget. The control arm was from a pile that I recouped down to zero.

In reply to DeadSkunk (Warren) :

OHH I do have 4 lower control arms that have already been hacked up to donate their LBJ bung to the project from various Subaru..  Those would be $0 to the budget.  DeadSkunk you are a Genius!

In reply to nocones :

Thank you, but I'm not a genius, just a cheap bastard.

Edit: ....and rather than use more tubing , could you cut the tubes off the Subaru arms to use? Every penny counts.  You owe me a beer now.

In reply to DeadSkunk (Warren) :

Either way engine mounts harvested from old control arm bushings will forever be known as DeadSkunk mounts at Nocones Garage and expect them to get called that in the Video.

so, I'm not the greatest with structures.  but I wonder about tweaking your rear structure like this:

do you have enough triangle with spreading out to the mount point that you could maybe just gusset the pickup flanges to the tubes?  would certainly give you more room for suspension and axle placement/movement.

Control arms hacked into mounts is genius!

In reply to AWSX1686 (Forum Supporter) :

RIGHT

In reply to sleepyhead the buffalo :

The design you show is closer to what I will go with.  The Green tube is suprisingly out of plane with the upper and lower tubes running front to back.   I will likely put in a gusset at the top of the front and then have one go down to where the green is.  

DeadSkunk Motor Mounts are complete.  

I hacked off the end of the A-Arm, cut/ground it to the right angle to sit nicely against the rubber removed OEM engine mount plate and made some simple steel plate brackets.  Total budge cost is $1.63 for the plates.  I didn't weld it all together because it was late and I wanted to be a bit more fresh before I locked the engine in the chassis in a big hurry.  

Now I only have 2 of the Subaru arms.  I thought I had 4 but I forgot that I shipped 2 of them off with the Brighton Shell when I re-rollered it.   So that means I don't currently have a trans mount.  

I have 3 options, I deal with them in increasing build cost.

1.  Use OEM rear A-Arm bushings.  Pro, free. Con, Huge and probably to soft

2. Use OEM swaybar endlink bushings. Pro, Free. Con, not super large but 2 should be fine.

3. Use cutoffs of the suspension from the actual suspension that was on my MG before it became rediculous.  Pro, MG parts on the Subaru for LOLz. Pro, Justifies my Life as an Episode of Hoarders.  Con, I don't have a Value for these, they are literally junk anyone else would of thrown them away but I didn't, complicating my junk claims they have poly bushings which seem "Blingy" again despite the fact that anyone else would of scrapped them when they cut them out if the MG 15 years ago.  Con, Justifies my life as an Episode of Hoarders.

I'm going to try to use the Subaru swaybar ones but if they don't work I will use the MG ones and put them in the build as scrap based on their weight.

+2 hrs, +$1.63

Those mounts are genius.

Engine mounts are welded.

MG a-arm cut and modified and welded to the OEM trans mount.  

I'm calling the MG A-arm scrap.  I removed them from the MG 10 years ago, put them in a box, that box got stuck behind my workbench so I never actually bothered to take them to scrap.  I had modified them to allow for "adjustable spring perches" when I was 13 and did a bad job.  I would of genuinely felt badly giving them to someone else to use on a project.  By weight they are 2 lbs total of steel.  Current scrap metal price is $160/ton so I'm rounding it to $0.25 for the scrap A-arm out of my Hoard.    

+1.5 hours, +$0.25