Thanks. thats good info to have.

went to leave for work this morning and there was a clutch box blocking me from opening my door. was a pleasant surprise as i had been trying for over a week to get an update on what was going on with my order.





the clutch is a spec 3+ non sac clutch for a 2.4l solstice/sky. spec sells 2 different designs of clutches for the solstice/sky, a stock replacement for use on a stock flywheel, or the non sac clutch designed for use with their aluminum flywheel. the big difference here is the stock replacement is a 225mm diameter where the non sac version is a 240mm diameter. i also got the upgrade for the billet pressure plate. spec says it should hold 671 ft/lb.

one nice surprise for me was the flywheel thickness. the flywheel i currently run is listed as the same between a 2.2/2.4l cobalt and a solstice, so ive been using a junk fidanza as a reference, and i was a little concerned with the spline engagement, it seemed like it was going to be a little on the shallow side. well, the flywheel i got measures out around 0.600" thicker between the crank flange and friction surface, so it wont be an issue at all.

 

work has begun. had a very productive weekend, drove the car into the shop friday evening, and its back to a rolling state with the new trans bolted in the car.

here is the back of the car with the trans and fuel tank pulled. i decided that with things going to be very tight around the factory fuel tank im going to ditch it for a fuel cell. you can see the factory torque tube, its still bolted to the engine here. note the rear suspension mounting tube



after removing the rear suspension, torque tube and getting the clutch pulled out it was time to get the corvette torque tube put in. commence floor cutting




it really wasnt as much floor cutting to get the torque tube in as i figured there would be. moving on, the trans was hung






built a new crossmember to hang the trans, originally i was going to modify the factory crossmember, but with getting rid of the fuel tank this made more sense. it bolts into the factory crossmember and fuel tank strap locations, and will have bolts added on the vertical.




the biggest thing was the suspension. the factory torsion bar tube wants to share room with the transaxle, and the fix for that is it gets cut in half.



most people end up cutting more of the floor out around the trans and end up putting a hoop over the top of the trans to support the torsion tube. i went a different way. right around this location there is a bolt in brace, and the attachment points are located tubes that go directly into the main structure of the body. we elected to machine some tubes to bolt into this, and then fab brackets to attach it to the short pieces of the torsion tube.




with the torsion tube no longer dealing with spring tension, 3 mounting points on the outer end of the tube, and the inner end really only being used to locate the rear suspension, this should be plenty strong. the inside of the car will get some bracing to the mounting points as well.

by the end of sunday i had the car back up on its feet to get out of the shop. before moving it out i was able to measure for axle shafts, and they are now on their way. the next step will be closing in the holes in the car, removing the spare tire well and measuring for a fuel cell. we have been talking about putting a roll bar in, with my goals ill need one eventually, and now is a good time as i can use it to tie the car together where structure has been removed. i also still have to get the rear coilovers sorted out, however i might be doing something kinda ridiculous there.

 

Nice updates! I can't wait to see it finished!

 

ive been going back and forth for a while on what i wanted to do for seats. i hadnt planned to put seats in it now, but i noticed that my driver seat is bent, and if i put a rollbar in it would be best to build it around the seats im running.

long story short, i ended up taking these out of a customers truck last week, they will do the job nicely.



kirkey 55 series "drag seats".

 

didnt get nearly as much done this weekend, but still forward progress.

i got the tunnel trimmed a little more so we can start the sheet metal. also got the spare tire well cut out




also got the swaybar mounted back up. i already had made some adapter plates for my splined swaybar, just had to make a new pair to move the swaybar down 3/4" to clear the transmission case.



with the spare tire well out of the way i was able to measure up for the fuel cell. i was hoping to be able to find an off the shelf fuel cell, and while i found stuff that will fit, none of them will work that well. ive drawn up a fuel cell in cad, going to see what its gonna cost to have built. the fuel level sensor is going to be a problem, porsche changed from the common vw resistance to its own oddball thing starting in 85, and its an odd mounting, so im gonna have to sort something out. also going back and forth on what i want to do for fuel pumps.

 

a little more progress today. would have liked to get into the sheet metal work, but i need to do some serious prep work removing all the old undercoating (thats more like thick seam sealer), but i wasnt able to make a pile of dust due to a car being wet sanded in the shop today. seeing as i got my axle shafts yesterday i decided to work on putting the axles together.

these axle shafts come in various lengths and can be shortened, although i didnt have to alter the length. all i actually had to do was machine the inner snap ring groove. these axle shafts are intended for offroad buggies with lots of suspension travel so they prefer to not run an inner snap ring to allow the axle to plunge more than the joint allows. here is the first inner groove machined in.



and a little bit of assembly and here it is. a corvette inner joint and a porsche 930 joint mated together.





obviously i still have to fully assemble them with grease and boots, that will happen once i pull it all back apart.

 

That is looking really good. Sure wish I had your skills.

 

Nice job!

 

That was the Porsche I was telling you about. They finally listed it and I just missed it.

https://www.facebook.com/marketplace...code=undefined

 

in all honestly, that car was priced about $2000 too high. the early 944 really isnt as desirable as the late cars, combined with seats that need reupholstery, and not running, really its a $1500-$2000 car. also have to factor that with it sitting for 3-4 years, it needs a timing belt inspected before being cranked anymore, and if its ok to proceed, get the car running and then do the timing belt right away. dont get me wrong, what i can see is a solid project car at the right price, the asking price just wasnt the right price.

i bought my car as a garage kept driver, with full maintenance history starting in 1985, overall was in very good condition (a few things kept it from being considered excellent), and i paid $4k canadian. the value of these cars is slowly coming up, a few low mileage 944 turbo S have sold recently for near $100k, and a few 944 s2 have sold in the mid $70k range. thats started to bring the value up on the late late n/a cars, but it seems the mid year (85.5-86) and early cars really havent moved much in value.

if you want one, look around a bit, there are lots of solid cars out there for less than you would think.

 

The 944 and the 986 Boxster... everyone thinks they're worth gold now. A year ago I was considering a Boxster for a track car and found multiple examples under $2500. Can't find one under $4000 now. The one local one that IS $4k... is spray painted flat black and has 325,000 miles.

I've been looking at them both lately for possible track cars... mostly the Boxster. They're both fairly easy to do a VW/Audi 1.8t swap on.

 

I am actually looking at those right now as well. Nice entry level cars with 256 hp-264 hp not bad for a light weight car. My cousin has one and he loves it.

 

I would have offered him 1k tops for it. You don't know what you are getting into with a non running car.

 

This is one of the better deals on them. The one in Haltom City looks promising except the top looks wore out.

https://www.facebook.com/marketplace...code=undefined


There is that Caymen for 15k that you could probably talk them down to 13k. I just don't know much about them and past 100k what their reliability is. That one is sitting at 101k.

 

I'd honestly prefer a Cayman, but even the 06-08's are still holding value quite well in that mid-teens range. That might be the path I end up going... but I'm a couple years out from being able to make that kind of initial investment on a track car. If I had a single ounce of patience in my body, I'd save all my babysitting money for the next couple years and do something like that.

 

I really like this one as a driver. I am sucker for red.

https://www.facebook.com/marketplace...code=undefined

Thats the cayman

https://www.facebook.com/marketplace...code=undefined

 

almost 2 months has past and ive gotten next to nothing done. between christmas, buying my new truck, selling the cobalt, and being slammed with work, ive just had no time to get the car back in the shop.

i did get the drivers seat mounted in the car, sort of



i had a set of brackets lazer cut and bent for me, although i didnt get pics of them. i put the seat in the drivers side, but the brackets that are welded to the seat have some offset and after getting the seat installed i discovered i the seat was not centered on the steering column. ill have to swap the other seat i have in its place as its offset the other way. i also need to move the seat ahead a little, i feel like im stretching to get full throttle. being the seats are mounted fixed i need to get them in the right place before i start the roll bar.

i got a nice box full of parts from QA1.





these are double adjustable coilovers. i chose 450 lb/in springs as a starting point. im still missing a pair of extended upper shock mounts for the top, they are currently on backorder.

i had a custom fuel tank made



it holds just over 18 gallons. because the fuel sending unit is an oddball resistance, using a universal one was out of the question, so i had to design the tank to be deeper than i had wanted. it was also quite a challenger to fit it to the tank, now im just hoping it will seal.

for fuel pumps, im going to be running an aeromotive dual phantom drop in setup.





the column of foam goes into the tank to keep the fuel at the pickup. the pumps are aeromotive 340 lph, together they should support up to 830 hp on e85. i will run the pumps staged so i drive around on one pump and the second will switch on in boost. i will be redoing the entire fuel system, moving the flex fuel sensor to the back and onto the main fuel pump feed (currently its on the return line), and ill also be running -8 feed and -6 return lines using teflon core braided hose.

im hoping i can get the car into the shop again within the next couple weekends. id really like to get the sheet metal work done and getting the fuel tank mounted. once that is done i can slowly pick away at wiring and plumbing, and then it shouldnt take too long before the car is mobile under its own power. i will still have to built the roll bar, that will be an important part of the cars structure. i figure i can knock out a full roll bar in a weekend.

 

Been a while since ive been on here. Really good progress man. This thing is going to feel like a whole new car when youre done.

 

finally an update. been crazy busy at work. got my car moved back into the shop a couple weeks back, and didnt get a whole lot done. everytime i tried to work on it id end up distracted. being a long weekend i decided i was getting the sheet metal work done, and not going to allow anyone to distract me. well, it sort of worked.

so starting back a couple weeks ago, i got the seating position finalized and the seat mounts finished.




with the seats mounted, i started looking at the tunnel. the tunnel was very tight to the new torque tube, and was touching in a few spots. initial plans were to cut out the ribs and weld in flat sheet metal, but after looking at it more, the best option was a little more radical




i had mocked up a tunnel out of template board, but i really wasnt happy. it was looking like i was not being able to run the center console at all, and overall i was real unhappy with how it was going. fast forward to this weekend, i started digging into the sheet metal work with something simple, filling the large hole that was the spare tire well.




moving on, i started looking at the tunnel again. after looking at why it wasnt going the way i wanted, i took a different approach. on the corvette torque tube, the shifter box is offset to the drivers side, as a result the tunnel had to be a lot wider. the solution in the end was to move the shifter. to do that i hacked off the stock mounting pads, spun up some aluminum bosses and tacked them onto the torque tube. the shift rod has the dogleg removed, and its now a straight rod.




breaking out the template board again i mocked up the tunnel




the template was removed, unfolded and transferred to some 18 ga steel



i didnt get pics, but i drew out a pattern and step rolled it the panel, then bent it up and tacked it in




i didnt take much for pics along the way today. i got frustrated trying to design the rear section of the tunnel, i went through several cardboard iterations and none of it really looked right to me. finally i just went with one and started building.



it was a bit of an interesting piece to build, the rear section had to be rolled in the slip roller to give the curve, step rolled to add the raised section (this is done to add strength to the panel), and then bent in the brake. the transition between the curved rear and the flat tunnel was another interesting part. i ended up having to curve the rear section by hand, and then flattening out the front were it lands on the tunnel. this had a lot of hammer finessing in it. in the end it turned out alright.





obviously im not finished yet as its only tacked in. seeing as everything is built with no overlapping metal stich welding it isnt an option, i will need to fully weld all the seams. before i start welding ill need to get the drivetrain pulled back out to give me some room to work from underneath. i need to scrape all the undercoating from anywhere near the weld areas, the undercoating porsche used was more like a rubberized seam sealer, its quite thick, heavy, and very flammable (a single tack will light the stuff up). that will likely be another full weekend of work to get all that done, but at least its forward progress.

next will either be building the roll bar, or mounting the fuel tank. im hoping to get tubing this week for the roll bar, but i hit a little snag when i discovered we dont the die for our tubing bender that i need. generally when we do a roll cage in a car its either a street only non legal cage, and build it out of 1 1/2" DOM, or a race car that needs a full 10 point + roll cage thats legal for 7.50 or 8.50 1/4 mile, and thats generally built from 1 5/8" chromoly. seeing as im only planning to run 10s a 6 point roll bar should be all i need, thus i dont want to put a full cage in the car (on the street when not wearing a helmet, less roll cage is better). the thing is a 6 point roll bar is required to be 1 3/4" diameter tubing regardless of material. its kinda stupid, but what i have to do. im trying to track down a die set i can borrow cause i dont really wanna spend $550 for dies ill likely never use again.

 

Nice progress Sharkey! It looks really good!

 

Awesome stuff! Look forward to the progress. Gives me motivation for my next project. I need to replace floorpans on my '86 GTI... and I think they used a very similar type of undercoating, if not the same. Putting a cage in it for track days (road course) would be awesome, but I'd need a lot more welding practice.

I want to start getting more into some metal fab. Now that the Cobalt is out of its parking spot, I need to get back in the garage and practice my TIG.

 

Nice progress, that's odd about the 6 point harness diameter being the same no matter the material. Almost seems like they just said we don't want to spend anytime figuring out the specifics for this class just say 1 3/4" no matter the material.

 

the rules on the 6 point roll bar havent changed in forever. i think what it comes down to is almost no one will use chromoly for a simple 6 point roll bar. chromoly is far more expensive than dom tubing, and it has to be tig welded, making most people not bother with it. the upside to using chromoly is the weight. a mild steel cage requires tubing to be a minimum of 0.120" wall, where chromoly can be 0.083" wall thickness. this translates to nearly half the weight. i just wish the spec was 1 5/8" like everything else.

 

Thats true, at the time rating for the 6 point people don't care to much about that added weight as you're pushing things but not razors edge of professional race team setups. At least not enough care to cause a rule change or review.

 

Hey, it almost looks like you know what youre doing.