BUILD THREAD “The Juggernaut”

[Rktpwrd]

A LOT of the work was done with the frame upside down on the jack stands. In this pic you can clearly see some of the holes being eliminated. The ones in the bottom of the crossmember were left to aid in drainage as water can get in thru the lower control arm mounting locations.

In this pic, you can see the location I chose for the fuel lines to come thru to the engine.

One of my more sneakier tricks was to bend and install a section of stainless tube INSIDE the frame, carefully positioned so as to give the air bag a wide birth. The red part of the fitting goes to a short section of flexible braided hose pointing towards the back of the car. The other end goes to the bulkhead fitting shown in the first pic.

Finally, the boxing sections were ready for pick up, and no time was wasted fitting them to the frame.

Initially, relief cuts were made, and the "ears" were bent out to match the shape of the body mount area and welded up. This has since changed. Now, that shape actually extends down to the bottom to make access easier.

So, how do you make a straight section of 1/8" plate with a 90 degree bend in it form a curve? This is how...

 

[Rktpwrd]

Then of course, all the small relief cuts get fully welded up and ground smooth. Unfortunately, I don't seem to have a pic of this area finish ground.

Then it was on to the tricky section. Patterns were made, and the appropriate shapes were cut out of steel and fit and welded in place and so on until everything fit and flowed. Then everything was ground smooth till you couldn't tell what was done.

A far cry from the stock untouched side...

 

[Rktpwrd]

Had a great start on the one side, but there was still the other to do... These are "before" pics.

It should be mentioned too that this was during the dead of winter, and my local do it yerself sandblasting yard didn't open till sometime in April. All the rust was ground off by hand, I had a lovely brown layer of dust in my shop for months after this!

Was starting to come along pretty good tho...

So finally, I was able to get the frame to the blasters and get it cleaned up for real.

After triple and quadruple checking which engine mount holes I needed, I filled in all the rest.

Stay tuned...much more to come!

 

[oldtinsmith]

Your vision and attention to detail are quite obvious on your frame! I keep going back and looking at your pictures!

Doug

 

[instro84]

man that looks good, giving me ideas.

 

[Rktpwrd]

Thanks for your comments and input guys! It's always nice to hear what your thoughts are regarding my build. I've poured my heart and soul and a good amount of creativity and imagination into The Jug, and it's interesting to hear what others think.

 

[Rktpwrd]

Just as an aside, I thought I'd throw up some pics of "The Brown Bomber" as well, the $1500 parts car I picked up to supplement the build. This was probably the wisest $$$ I've spent on the car yet.
Here she is after I brought her home and gave her a bath.

Don't mind the date stamps on the photos, they're wrong. Anytime I changed the batteries in the camera, I'd always forget to reset the damn date. These pics are actually from the fall of 2010.

As I mentioned earlier, it was a shame I had to part this car out, it was remarkably solid and would've made a great starting point on it's own. Not to fear tho, only the parts I had no use for got sold off, the entire rest of the car was dismantled, cataloged and stored for future use. Every single specialty nut, bolt, screw, fastener, trim piece etc got removed, itemized and tucked away. Virtually nothing went to waste. By the time it went to the recyclers, it was just the shell of the body, not even any glass in it. I even cut out the quarters for future use.
So far, The 'Bomber has donated her frame, header panel, grilles, passenger door, and passenger fender to the build, with more to come I'm sure. I do have the driver's door and fender, trunklid, and wheels that I'd still like to sell if anyone's in the Calgary Canada area. Sorry, but they're just too big to try and ship.

I'll get back to documenting the frame build again next time...

 

[Rktpwrd]

Back to detailing the frame section of the build for those of you that are still following and aren't bored out of your skulls yet!

This pic and the next are really good ones to illustrate how where the boxed sections blended into the rest of the frame turned out after sandblasting. Can't tell it's not supposed to be that way, and just like GM should've done!

Here's a scary one for ya...
This is the FACTORY weld on the passenger side front upper control arm mount, where it welds to the frame. Keep in mind, this is a suspension component mounting area! As much as we all love our cars, we need to keep in mind that GM mass produced these cars, and there were many things that slipped thru. Guys, inspect your cars. Things like this need to be found BEFORE something serious happens, especially in higher horsepower applications. It's a miracle this never failed and caused a serious accident...
So after this was found, EVERY factory weld on this frame was gone over, cleaned up and rewelded by me. I'm leaving nothing to chance, thank you!

So this pic gives you an idea how some of the factory's welds were re-done, and at the same time adding a bit of extra weld to blend in and make it appear seamless.This is the driver's side control arm mount and crossmember area.

The finished version on the passenger's side.
The next couple are to show just how good of condition the rear framerails were! I never expected to find a frame with these in this good shape here in Canada, where they used to salt the roads on a regular basis in the winter.

 

[Rktpwrd]

Just two pics of a large part of the front done.

The sharp eyed ones of you out there will note little things, like the notch in the passenger side front framerail to accomodate the custom radiator I have. (The lower rad hose bung has a 45 degree bend that would've rubbed the framerail) As well as things like extra material added to the tops of the front rails to smooth out the appearance when the hood is open.

Also note the rewelded and trimmed flange around the lower control arm rear mount. Sometimes it's the details and the things you don't notice immediately that can make the difference and set you apart from the next guy!

Now the frame has been flipped upside down, and the front lower control arm mounting ears were marked out to a more pleasing shape. Then they were trimmed and straightened.

 

[85GPLef41]

you're one BAD *ss DUDE!! that frame is a work of art IMO!! I eventually plan on doing a frame off and hope my chassis detail is up to par!