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Just saw there was voting requested. DONE. Glad I was able to add a vote before the deadline.
Jack, VA beach sounds wonderful about now.
Bill Ascheman
Fiberfab Ford
Modified 5.0, 5sp., 4:11
Autocross & Hillclimb
"Drive Happy"Thanks, all, for the votes.
Yeah, Jack, I very much would like to show this car at Air & Auto 10 in October. I think some of the members of the First Settlers PCA would get a kick out of it. The stars may yet align.
Bet that feels good, doesn’t it?
Bill Ascheman
Fiberfab Ford
Modified 5.0, 5sp., 4:11
Autocross & Hillclimb
"Drive Happy"Weird.
I cranked the rear suspension up about half an inch and managed to leave the driveway without scraping the tail pipe. Then I put the car back in the garage so I can mess with the brakes: driver’s rear line hits the inner fenders so needs to be re-routed. I also need to bleed the system harder to get a higher pedal, and check to see if I need to shim one of the calipers to cure a rubbing pad.
Hope to get that and a couple other minor things done by this weekend to do a bit more of a test drive.
After that it’s oil leaks. I bent a couple pushrod tubes last time the engine was out, so they may be dripping. Something is under there…
I posted a short test-drive vid yesterday.
Very cool, Ed. Looks like it tracks straight, stops straight, sounds good. Sweet!
Bill Ascheman
Fiberfab Ford
Modified 5.0, 5sp., 4:11
Autocross & Hillclimb
"Drive Happy"Been a while since I updated the Spyder project here. We had a setback involving the front suspension, the fixing of which may be relevant to owners of VW-based TDrs.
Short story: the inner bushings were mostly missing from my torsion beam.
Completely rebuilt it with Delrin bushings.
Since then I’ve put about 60 miles on the car in testing, and found oil temps are a bit too hot—shading toward 220F after about an hour’s stop and go dilly-dallying on an 80-degree morning. I installed a full underbelly pan to keep the exhaust heat out of the engine bay, as the original cars were equipped.
One of those things hardly anyone will notice, probably, but from the right angle it looks cool…
To my chagrin, this extremely hard to make bit of kit had little to no effect on oil temps. So I have an auxiliary cooler on order.
Missed Carlisle but I gave my sticker to a neighbor, who drove his dune buggy up Saturday and picked up my “goody bag.”
So it goes in 2020.
Been sorting the Spyder for a few months now. It’s running strong and tracking straight, stopping short and sounding delightfully loud. On Tuesday I revved the engine to 6000 rpm in second gear on a highway entrance ramp, and it seemed to like that. The dyno slips with these engines (I have one for a sister build, not this engine per-se) indicate they made peak horsepower at 5500 with a slight fall off at 6000. Seat-of-the-pants, it feels like it’s still building at 6k/60 mph.
I have a set of Jet Doctors to install and I still need to tune my “Black Box” electronic ignition; waiting for a new old laptop running Windows 7 to do that; the software won’t run on the new Windows version.
Taking pictures of the car to send to magazines and virtual car shows and probably an auction site pretty soon.
I think I did OK for a first build.
Very nice Ed – love to drive it – can’t believe you are going to sell?
Hopefully you change your mind before that happens.
Spyder debuted in public over the weekend at cars & coffee in Hunt Valley on Saturday morning and Annapolis on Sunday.
People seem to be interested…
Sent the pics to Rare Car Network magazine (fka ReInCarNation fka Kit Car Builder) which may or may not still do a print edition.
Wow, Ed! The car looks great. Outstanding work!
Vicenç - (bee sense)
Pembroke Pines, FL
1986 Aston - BCW Model 52 - "Montse II"(1983 FiberFab MiGi II - "Montse")
Ed,
The car looks OUTSTANDING!!!! DO NOT SELL IT…. You need to keep it until you can buy another fine kit. That way you have an in-place reference to use in building the “new” kit….
THEN you can sell this beautiful blue “better than an original” “tribute” Porsche 550 RS Spyder……
THEN you can buy another and build it and then sell it and then buy another…… and…..
….after all, you do have a lift and welder and……can’t let that stuff go to waste!!.
Keep having fun….pray for a Carlisle and then a Virginia Beach in 2021.
Vicenc — Va Beach next year???? It’s only a little bit of a trip up from Fl…
Drive, Drive, Drive and stay COVID-19 free…..
Happy Jack
Making an aluminum half tonneau for the Spyder out of a scrap piece of .050 5052.
CAD was first…
Here’s a shot of the real-deal part I lifted from Type550.com:
and as installed on the car I’m copying:
I made a second model out of masonite and them traced it on some scrap lumber I had in a rack hanging from the ceiling. Some of this wood has been with me for a decade or more, cycling through various projects.
Rough sawn:
I also took profiles of the front and back elevation changes, then used a dado blade on my table saw to remove material from the stringers underneath and from top of the buck to get the shape right in three dimensions.
After that I dug out my old plunge router and put a quarter round radius on the inside edge.
I left the back corner a little sharp because I need to fold a little tab there behind the rear flange.
With the buck basically done I transferred the CAD pattern to my aluminum sheet and set it on there for trimming.
I used a MAP torch to heat the area above the carved part of the buck, and shrunk the metal to fit.
I’m now making improvements to my bead roller so that when I buy or make a set of tipping dies I’ll be able to accurately fold the edges down 90 degrees all around that line.
Meantime I took the seamer, flange tool and a hammer to that curved inside edge…
And folded in that tab I mentioned earlier.
When I’m done, that whole edge will be rolled over like a tube, 270 degrees at least. The other edges are going to be flat 90(ish) flanges, and the key to getting it right will be in the de-wrinkling (i.e. shrinking/stretching) the excess material in the curves. That’s why I want to start in the bead roller instead of just attacking it with the seamer and hammers: if I do it right it’ll be close to smooth throughout the process.
Anyway: so far, so good. And since I’ve spent nothing but time so far I won’t feel terrible if I end up with just a learning experience instead of a cool period racing accessory for the car.
It’s a shame you have intentions of getting rid of this.
Bill Ascheman
Fiberfab Ford
Modified 5.0, 5sp., 4:11
Autocross & Hillclimb
"Drive Happy"BTW I did finish the tonneau (except for paint) and hung out my shingle offering to make these for others.
My sheet supplier was out of .050 thickness 5052 aluminum sheet so I’ll make the next one out of .040 (18 gauge) and see how that goes.
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