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Sept 23, 2015 15:15:07 GMT
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Well it’s time to start a build thread me thinks!! Two and a half years ago part one of the project car was delivered, a 1931 Ford Model A Coupe fibreglass shell. Hoping to document the build of this car through to the day of it’s first full power launch! There are tons of ideas for this project at the moment and always on the lookout for more inspiration and ideas so don't be shy. I decided the best way forwards was to get hold of an entire donor car, this would be the cheapest way to getting hold of a complete engine, gearbox and rear axle along with all the trimmings and be sure that it all works as it should! Some time hunting later, playing with various ideas and day dreaming about breaking an SLS, we got back to business/reality which saw the hunt for either a Lexus LS400 or a BMW E34… The latter winning the battle, a 1993 BMW E34 sporting a 4.0 V8 mated to an auto box. With the car being located down in Bournemouth and being located over a 2 hour drive away, I took the ebay gamble and agreed on a price with the owner based on his word and some photographs of the car… Oh boy did it pay off! I guess you always expect the worst with buying a second hand car, but when we turned up and looked her over we knew instantly we had come up top trumps! The owner fires the beast up and she purrs into life like a kitten! Right on the button! Now was time for the huge sigh of relief as this was the most important part, further inspection of the engine bay proves that there are honest people in this world and this motor was as clean as described. Quick exchange of cash and docs and we hit the road in a two car V8 convoy home! The car didn’t miss a beat all the way home, no overheating, no funny noises knocks or bangs and a nice smooth application of speed from the motor and auto box. Chuffed. As this project started 3 years ago and not much happened in between I am going to skip ahead with the updates and try and roll a few together...
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Sept 23, 2015 15:28:37 GMT
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Lots of fun was had stripping the car out, which was almost a shame as it was bloody lovely throughout! A few people have moaned about the car being chopped up but I bought it at a great price, no one else wanted it, attempted to sell on a lot of spare parts but yet again no interest, so as far as I am concerned it's full steam ahead to rip it apart! The idea was to strip the car out to get it ready to pull the loom and all the running gear that we wanted to re use, but before taking it off the road... Give it a good thrashing on the street and make sure she behaves as expected. Which she did. Even netted a 14.79 @ Santa Pod on the old 1/4. And that deserved a beer.
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Sept 23, 2015 15:35:51 GMT
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As part of the interior strip, the exhaust HAD to come off... This is a little teaser of what the end car may well sound like... It's pretty hilarious on full chat! After all this fun, the build went pretty stale for nearly two years... The main reason for this was the first chassis builder stuck it on the back burner, it got leap frogged a few times and then moved home... Long story short, if gave me and the new chassis builder time to come up with a detailed plan and the future looks a little something like this: I will put together an update tonight if I get a chance and try and bring the build up to speed and lay out the current plan for the build. Thanks to anyone reading so far, as you can see, brand new to this forum so hopefully this build is interesting to some! Cheers, Ralph
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Sept 23, 2015 16:01:17 GMT
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bookmarked
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ChrisT
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 1,638
Club RR Member Number: 225
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Sept 23, 2015 16:46:58 GMT
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Looks promising.......
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Sept 23, 2015 17:46:23 GMT
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About a year and a half ago, me and a good friend took the Beemer down to Insane Creations workshop to strip it's guts completely and scrap the shell... The Insane Creations shop is epic and there is always something louder and faster than your car there.. Just a little 3000BHP Pro Street Willis Coupe being put together in the corner... My build is pretty mild compared to that! The car was stripped over a day and a half, not too bad going for a couple of blokes and lots of tea and coffee breaks. Was a great laugh and was almost worth buying the car just to do that to it! This was the moment we realised how bloody big this engine was despite having a very small displacement! Finally she was free... Somehow it came out of this hole?! Who knows how! After having a poke round the engine bay to see what else we wanted, we notice that dropping the front subframe was the correct(easier) way to get the motor out... Ah well. Every day is a school day! A quick offer up of the 32' grille shell shows that the motor is going to be hanging out the sides of the car.. Epic! The morning of day two sees us pull the rear end out which we do remove as a complete unit/sub frame. And somewhere in the middle of all of the big bits coming out, the entire wiring loom was removed. Better to be safe than sorry with this stuff so we have everything if we need it... So much wiring in this car, it was optioned up to the eyeballs, I can't see us using the heated headlamp washer system, but we have the loom for it! One final effort to drag the old girl on to the trailer and wave goodbye to her at the scrappy!
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Sept 23, 2015 17:53:05 GMT
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ooops missed this one... This was half of the pile of parts we kept... There is a lot there that we won't be using but it's better to hold on to these things at the moment to save time measuring things up later on.
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Sept 23, 2015 19:38:31 GMT
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Epic! Oh and MOAR info needed on the 3000bhp Willys please!!!
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Sept 23, 2015 21:00:02 GMT
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bookmarked Couldn't have put it better myself.
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Sept 23, 2015 21:49:58 GMT
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Loving this! So much potential... Bookmarked.
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Sept 24, 2015 7:36:49 GMT
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Epic! Oh and MOAR info needed on the 3000bhp Willys please!!! Haha I just looked back through an old thread as I couldn't recall the details on it and I'm sorry to let you down. It was only 2,500 BHP! Such a let down I know. It's got a 565ci big block Chevy (9.2 litres) and two MAHOOSIVE turbos hanging off it. Was a mega build but had to get sold on to fund other things, it's a bit odd really as it was pretty much finished yet hasn't surfaced on the drag racing scene yet. It may well be getting broken up for it's running gear Couple of pics of it's under pinnings... Ron, the main man at Insane Creations who owned that Willis is now putting together a 509ci big block Chevy (of course) with 2 stages of nitrous, 1967 Mustang Coupe. It's bloody lovely.
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Sept 24, 2015 7:48:56 GMT
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There was a huge saga with the body work on mine, the body was and still is pretty rough. It went away to get sorted out but after a 10 month holiday at the body shop, it turned out it had been sat in the corner and barely touched. So I just picked it up and will deal with that later on in the build... You can now start to see why this has all taken so long... No more favours from mates on this build. In between the battle for the body we had a little mock up on the chassis with the motor and trans... Nothing a nice bit of wood can't help out with.. Grille shell dropped in place to get a little perspective... Hmmm... Looked like this motor was going to fill the engine bay somewhat! And that the gearbox was going to fill the interior a little too well...
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Sept 24, 2015 8:55:25 GMT
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Ralph.Wrecked.It That grill shell is a thing of beauty!!! Gonna watch and see where this goes. The modern take isn't to my taste really but the rendering looks awsome!! BTW if you need the door logos painting on let me know. I'm a Signwriter/Pinstriper
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Sept 24, 2015 10:20:29 GMT
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Nice aproach with the engine combo ! did you know about the other one with the bmw engine (stanceworks). That engine just screams for 8 velocity stacks and throttlebodys
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34 B Ford V8 Flathead Hotrod 55 International L170 (Cummins 6BT) 65 Mustang V8 supercharged Coupe 58 Plymouth Belvedere (Christine) 05 Dodge Ram 1500 HEMI
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Sept 24, 2015 10:28:32 GMT
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Thanks slackerTHEpinstriper, I may well take you up on that one day. Hi 65mustang, When I started this build I had no idea about the Stanceworks guy, was a little bit bummed out when I saw his build but ah well, I was never going to re invent the wheel. Got a few little tricks up my sleeve yet to make it a little different. I would love an ITB setup but there will be a little something else taking up the space...
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Sept 24, 2015 13:16:23 GMT
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To be honest i'm liking your direction more than the other BMW hotrod, it just didnt do it for me ! First thing when i saw that "what a shame about the engine" and with your build i think the engine suits it !
Really diging the front grille !
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34 B Ford V8 Flathead Hotrod 55 International L170 (Cummins 6BT) 65 Mustang V8 supercharged Coupe 58 Plymouth Belvedere (Christine) 05 Dodge Ram 1500 HEMI
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Sept 24, 2015 14:41:30 GMT
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Very kind words 65mustang, there were/are some bits I really like on his and some bits I don't. I didn't think the motor sat very well, a little too high, or rather the car was a little too low which forced the motor too high in the bay.. Hopefully as I say, mine will be a bit different and not judged upon his work. Anyway... When mocking up a seat position and doing some measuring of where the body was going to sit. It became very apparent that the gearbox was far too big for this car.. In light of this discovery: Shortly followed by this: Just a little Getrag 5 speed from a later E39. Much smaller, much better and a MANUAL! Victory. All the fun internal stuff will be done at a later date, I just needed to get this bolted on quickly to allow more mocking up on the chassis rails.
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Sept 24, 2015 14:49:52 GMT
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I'm loving where your thread is going already, if you haven't already seen this it may be of interest to you. Great choice of running gear, should power it quite nicely! Edit: Sorry didn't see it was already mentioned!
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Last Edit: Sept 24, 2015 18:46:22 GMT by Deleted
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Sept 24, 2015 15:13:10 GMT
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Yes that was the "problem" the engine was sticking outside the top. Complete with the shortbed it was weird to see.
The paintwork and the wheels was a nice touch !
Whats your direction with the engine ? make it look older (seen it once with a cossie engine that looked like it was made in the 30s awesome !)
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34 B Ford V8 Flathead Hotrod 55 International L170 (Cummins 6BT) 65 Mustang V8 supercharged Coupe 58 Plymouth Belvedere (Christine) 05 Dodge Ram 1500 HEMI
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Sept 24, 2015 15:30:59 GMT
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Hey @jxke, that's the Stanceworks car we are banging on about. Some very nice bits on it indeed. Lovely video too. As far as the engine goes and well, the rest of the car too really, there will be little nods and hat tips here and there to 'traditional' stylings but the car will be a little more modern all round. I won't give the whole game away just yet but there are certainly ideas waiting in the wings to bring my vision to life. This Eaton M112 blower has been flowing me around the workshop... Unsure if it will make it on the the car at the moment. It was bought for the build, but it may be waiting on the shelf until I've got the whole motor up and running again.
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