Unibody Mk4 Spitfire 6

[Gunner1]

Oops,

Last reply related to a posting on this thread back in May.....

 

Gunner1

[BiTurbo228]

No problem! Happy to direct people back to that link as it's a useful one

 

I like what you've done with the suspension turrets. Should help locate them a bit better plus, sorts out your engine mounts quite nicely

[BiTurbo228]

Grabbed some pics of the new shell

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yeah, it's pretty rotten. Those are just the highlights too. Both rear wings are dented, all that's left of the sills are the top horizontal bit (mostly), and there isn't a single panel or bracket that's free of rust. Not just 'oh that'll wire-brush out' rust, but 'full-edam' rust :S

 

The roof is certainly of use at any rate

 

Oh, and one of the things i picked up on my round trip was a fibreglass bonnet for my Spit Slant starting to look slightly more like a car!

 

[richbike]

Was it stored in a lake?

[Nick Jones]

Something saltier than a lake I reckon.  It's even rustier than our Spitfire was, I'm duly impressed!  Be even more impressed if you managed to mend it though I wouldn't blame you if you decided life is too short for that kind of foolin'!

 

Nick

[BiTurbo228]

My money's on peat bog...

 

It is very far gone, and without a chassis jig to get everything back in the right position (it's very wobbly) I doubt I'd be able to repair it.

 

However, it will donate its roof to one of my projects so it will live on

[richbike]

"my roof will go on" Celine Dion?

 

What are your plans for the rear suspension? I keep looking at diagrams of Elans and wondering...

[BiTurbo228]

For my current Spit6 and this GT16v I'm shamelessly copying Marcus' (GT6M on CT, not sure if he's over here) lower a-arm design mounting underneath the chassis. For the blue Spit (which will get the Slant 4) I'll be keeping the rotoflex wishbone setup with CV joints and perhaps trying to make up some kind of adjustable rotoflex wishbone

 

Chapman struts would probably work very nicely in the rear of a Spit, provided you can tie them into a strong enough hardpoint on the body.

 

Not a fan of the lack of camber change in compression that's inherant with struts though. Forces you to run more neg camber dialled in which shortens tyre life. Not that that's much of a consideration given how light Spits are, but when you're already halfway to a decent enough double wishbone setup it doesn't seem worth it to go the extra mile for a compromised design...

[richbike]

Bung us a link to gt6m stuff...can't get registered on CT for some reason. So your keeping the leaf spring?

[BiTurbo228]

Huh, odd. It should be in here: http://club.triumph.org.uk/cgi-bin/forum10/Blah.pl?m-1431122300/s-0/

 

Yeah leaf spring up top, mainly because I don't want to have to sort out locating an upper wishbone. Not sure why given all the other changes I'm making, but what's life without whimsy?

[BiTurbo228]

Long-time no post! 

 

Lots of things have happened in the past two months which I won't go into detail about, but suffice to say that they have given me a lot of time to get on with projects...

 

First off, I've got pretty much all the way to boxing in the roof on the Spit til i ran out of welding gas :S unfortunately, the nearest BOC is only open 8 til 5 so for a 9-5 worker makes it pretty difficult to get a refill. In the end my dad went to get one for me so back on track.

 

 

However, the main project has been a solution to the fact that I have two partially-built Spitfires and a very rusty MGB (boo-hiss this is a Triumph forum ) sitting outside in the elements which is a little too close to being 'that bloke who just buys cars and lets them rot' for a chap who's managed to accumulate 11 of them so far...

 

So, I managed to wrangle an area near the borders of our land (feels very disingenuous saying that, we jointly bought our family house with my grandparents to afford it). We cleared the junk that had accumulated there, and mixed and laid a concrete base (27'x9' with a 19'x13' triangle attached)...

 

 

...laid a couple of courses of bricks...

 

 

...and managed to source some timber from a chap rebuilding his house so i could build a timber frame.

 

 

It's currently one length of 4x2 from being completed which is most frustrating. With this month's paycheck I should be able to get some roofing material and breathable membrane for the walls

 

One cool thing though is that the house the timber was from was built in 1951, and its most likely British slow-grown pine so much stronger than the newer stuff you get. Plus, the trees it came from were likely alive during world war two which is damn cool

 

Loads of progress

[oldtuckunder]

 

 

One cool thing though is that the house the timber was from was built in 1951, and its most likely British slow-grown pine so much stronger than the newer stuff you get. Plus, the trees it came from were likely alive during world war two which is damn cool

 

 

 

Careful that GT6 shell doesn't start pining for the open road!

[BiTurbo228]

Hah I do appreciate a good pun

[Nick Jones]

You've been busy!

 

That GT6 shell is a long way from any road..........

 

Is that a corner of a Lada Riva I see there?

 

Nick

[BiTurbo228]

Yeah the closest it is to a road is the iron shale beneath it...

 

It's a Niva 4x4 brilliant little thing. It's currently in retirement as a farm hack after living a hard life. Apparently it's ~60k miles, but we're fairly certain the 100s column is kidding itself...

 

[Nick Jones]

Looks unusually tidy in that pic.  The ones I see are usually being abused by off-triallers (real abuse that).

 

Nick

[BiTurbo228]

I strongly suspect they cleaned it up just for the sale (that was the day we bought it).

 

Judging by the lift kit and knobbly tyres, and the fact that there were only ~1/2 the teeth left on both the front and rear diffs I strongly suspect it had been used solely for offroading.

[spitfire6]

I had a brand new fuel injected VAZ Niva while in Russia. The heater was good and the parts very very cheap, which was good as the OEM parts are made of Russian chocolate and break, easy.

We called mine the Silver Bullet as it was a four door, metallic silver and slow. 

[BiTurbo228]

I really like them very honest cars, and it's still true about the parts prices provided they'll ship them from russia for you.

[BiTurbo228]

Also, this is the view from my 90% finished parts shed roof ran out of cellotex insulation so it's not quite done, but enough for the first denizen to move in

 

 

[BiTurbo228]

Progress on the parts shed it's now fully enclosed in breathable membrane with half of the floor sealed ready for paint.

 

 

Because cladding's so phenomenally expensive (it's not really, I'm just tight) that'll have to wait for a while, but denizen A is pleased to be out of the coming winter weather.

 

[BiTurbo228]

First lick of paint on my parts shed/garage floor it's already nicer than my actual garage!

 

[BiTurbo228]

Well, I've been very lazy recently and not progressing as much as I'd like on the Spitfire or the garage :S

 

Still, I have managed to make a little progress

 

Finished boxing in my b-pillars on the spitfire, as well as the inside of the hardtop to the rear deck. Had a go with a sanding disc to flat off the welds and it works really nicely chews away the weld but doesn’t cut great gouges into the metal if you slip off like a grinding disc.

 

 

Also, I’ve got my shelves up in the parts shed, as well as the floor wholly painted which i don’t have a picture of yet. Planning to move the yellow spit in shortly

 

[Nick Jones]

Should end up a bit more robust than the average Spitty - though a bit heavier too.

 

Garage looks good.

 

Nick

[BiTurbo228]

Thanks my dad's bought me a load of timber to make some doors for it for my birthday so those should be up soon!

 

It will end up a bit heavier, but hopefully quite a lot stiffer (whether that will be worth it in long-term back problems I'm not sure, but it'll be fun while it lasts!).