Project: Spare Parts

[RClippa]

Like so many others I have an abundance of spare parts laying around my yard, shop, storage buildings, and many other places. Due to a slow down in my research and my impending graduation I decided it was time to do something or haul everything to the scrap yard. Prices are up you know. This build is hopefully going to be something different. I am going to be learning a lot along the way and hope to share some trials and tribulations with everyone.



Many didn't know this even existed, but this 2A body has been sitting next to my shop since about 2 days after I closed on my house. Before that it was in the back of my storage building in Raleigh. The tub, hood, and grill were aquired by me from a guy in Winston Salem many moons ago. I had big dreams of a 2A buggy, but I already had way to many projects. Still, I am a dreamer so I bought the pile of rust and put it away for a day like today.

The idea of this project is that I, like most of my friends, have way to many parts laying around that would likely never find their way back onto a rig as my wheeling style has degraded to big tires and even bigger motors. We shuffle the parts around the yard to mow the grass, around the shop to make room for other projects, tools, or anything else that is shiney and catches our eye. This is going to be a project in which the design decisions are made by what parts are free/available/super cheap. The "body" is a perfect fit. I use body loosely as it has seen many better days.



Needless to say there is a lot of surgery in this things near future.

 

[RClippa]

I am not sure how many of you I have met, but I am 6'5" tall, 250lbs. So not a small guy by any measureing system metric or ISO. Even still I think the 2A is just to big for what I have in my mind. Just to make sure I rolled a set of 33's up to it in order to get an idea on size.



Those tires just aren't big enough so I am going to have to go with the 35's that are left over from the ECORs XJ. Sure they are cut, shreaded, bald, and dry rotted. But they are mounted and stacked neatly under a tarp in my yard. Free... They will work for now.

The rest of the plan is as follows.

4.0L from my buggy. I know it works on the rev limiter and is a solid motor.
ax15 also from my buggy. Again, it takes the abuse and is just lieing there anyway.
dana300/NP231. Not sure, I don't have a complete one of either so it depends on what I find
Axles, are 44's front and rear from a waggy I parted out many many years ago, about two weeks after I bought this tub.
tires 35's
3 inch YJ lift springs
XJ driveshafts

As much of the parts will be fabricated in house. I have to justify all the money I spent in the last couple months on tools somehow.

 

[RClippa]

The first order of business is to get some solid metal somewhere on the tub to work with. The tub will be shortened approximately 22 inches to get it where I want it. Yes, trying for a clown car.

I would say around 80% of this tub is shot. I will keep about 40% of the firewall, the cowl, and a little of the door openings. The rest is swiss cheese or close enough to get rid of. Now I have a bender, but I don't have a bunch of dies. The new body will be built from 3/4" square tube, 1x3 rectangle tube, and some sheetmetal. To simulate the rear corners I need a way to bend the 3/4 to match the existing rounded corner. Like I said, I don't have the dies, but I do have tools and scrap metal.



I bolted down 2 pieces of 1/2" thick aluminum on my new mill and rotary table. (see comment about dumping money on tools) The local scrap yard has a bunch of these 7 7/8" diameter aluminum pieces so I grabbed a handfull when making my cnc table.(more dumped money).

I am not a trained machine operater, so I hack my way around and finally after some cussing, readjustment, and more cussing I had two halves of a die.



These two parts are not anywhere near perfect. They are only the second set of parts I have cut on the mill and the first ever on a rotary table. They do assemble to make a 3/4 square tube die for my JD2 bender though.



Like any square tube dies, there is some deformation in the bend. Overall I am happy though as the center line radius is really close to the tub and they work.



This catches us up from yesterday and today. Now I am back at school trying to finish up the dissertation so I can hopefully get the heck out of here. I should be back on this tomorrow afternoon. The goal before the end of the weekend is to wrap up the body metalwork so I can start on the frame.

 

[DanStew]

I would kill to have a mill. One of my dreams, but my garage is a bit too crowded for one
Good to see old iron being used.

 

[RClippa]

I would kill to have a mill. One of my dreams, but my garage is a bit too crowded for one
Good to see old iron being used.

I felt the same way about a week and a half ago. Then I picked up this bridgeport for $200. I couldn't pass it up. I lost an entire bay of my shop to my tools in the last two months. The whole thing is 25x25 and now I have just enough room to park my motor trailer in there. (Don't want to leave my motors out in the rain). I will have to try and get a picture of it, but my tools have spilled into the last remaining bay. Guess it is back to working out in the driveway.

 

[DanStew]

Damn $200 is a steal for a bridgeport. Unfortuantely the tooling gets as addictive as getting aprts for a rig, and just as expensive I saw one for $600 a while ago and had to think hard about where to put it. But I am weak and will probably jump at the chance for one if it comes by hahahaha.

 

[nbjeeptj]

it will start a bad problem. 1st its the mill then you think I sure need a lathe. Then you have to have a big wet band saw, and dont forget the 12" finish sander, all the tooling that goes with all the new stuff, you cant do machining work without calipers and all shorts of measuring equipment. welcome to the next huge expensive hobby.

 

[RClippa]

Pretty sure I am already dedicated to the tool hobby. Picked up the Bridgeport and a clausing lathe, but I sold my southbend to cover the cost of both. Of course then there is the CNC table, bandsaw, break, press, shear, roll, drill presses..... Last time I cleaned up the shop and organized my tools I had over 130 screwdrivers and that didn't include my truck, trailer, or home toolboxes. I love tools and hardly ever pass up a chance to get more. I guess the 6 cordless drills, 5 corded drills, and numerous other duplicates show that I am not smart when buying them.

Of course the measurement stuff is where the real money goes. I feel like I can't go to travers without spending $100. It is my harbor freight, but the quality is way better.

 

[nbjeeptj]

ah yea thats what ist all about. No need to let a downturn in the economy slow down hobby spending.

 

[Ghost]

Looks nice so far. I'd like to build my twin boys a buggy based on the 90's MPFI 2.5L jeep motor. Run 8.25 in the rear and D30 up front on 33's.

 

[XJ savage]

Awesome build!! I'd love to have the time to collect parts for one of those. All I've got is a 318 v8, 727, 2 dana 44 front, cj hood, grill, and a set of tires. Got a long way collecting to go but thanks for getting me thinking.:hnd:

What's the wheelbase going to be and would there be an issue fitting a 231/300 doubler? (or did you even mean doubler?.. maybe I misread it.) If you did that, with the doubler you could probably get away without gearing the axles. So either way, 231 or not, it's going to be twin sticked right? :grin:

 

[RClippa]

No, I don't mean a doubler. I don't really plan on doing any wheeling in this at all. I have the buggy for that. The most this might see is some mild fire roads. If I can find the parts to reassemble my spare 300 I will flip and twin stick, otherwise it will probably just get a 231 since it is being built for the road.

I got a chance to work on it some more today. I now remember why I built a cnc table. I can't cut a straight line with a guide with the plasma cutter. I still need to remove some more metal, but I got the basic shape of the body I plan to keep.



There isn't much left. I plan on taking the rest to the scrap yard and trading for some more metal. Like I said, I plan on shortening the body 22 inches. This is just about perfect.



Ready to load up and scrap. Won't bring much money, but it should buy a stick or two of square tube.

From here I started to actually build instead of destroy. The plan is to build a metal frame to attach what is left of the body to, and also wrap with sheetmetal.


This is the bulk of the frame minus the mounts to attach the body, some triangulation in the floor, and the tunnel. I ran out of 3/4 box so I have to get more tomorrow.

To give you guys an idea of space here are the two bays of the shop.

The fun bay.


The work bay. Pretty much why you see the pictures out in the driveway and not in the shop.

 

[97TJGUZZY]

looks like a cool project, I'm still not exactly sure what your going for unless you are going for clown car, or perhaps one of those penny racers that does wheelies haha

 

[RClippa]

It will be interesting. The rest of the tub was just to far gone to even mess with. I could have just rebuilt the entire thing but it seemed like way to much work with all of my other projects. This one is being built around the no money concept. Of course I say that and I just spent $170 on metal to build the frame, bumpers, and the rest of the body. I still havn't bought any sheetmetal yet, but I have a sheet and a half of 16 gauge that I might use. I kind of want to run 18 gauge so I can justify a bead roller. Hoping to wrap up the body frame and maybe the actual frame and bumpers tonight.

 

[Austin Hammond]

Cool to see ya doing something with all the parts. I love that you seem to be building it to make a reason to use all of your tools haha. Ill have to come by your place sometime to see the progress.

 

[RClippa]

Yea, this one is all about fun, friends, and playing with all the tools that I have wasted money on.

Tonight Evan came over and helped out for a while. We got the new metal frame connected to the body.



It is perfect. I couldn't have asked for any better. The end result was a 21.75 inch chop of the body. There is still more structure to add, but I will wait until it is mounted to the frame to worry about it. I don't want to put something in the wrong place. I am shooting from the hip on this one and running without a plan or real design. This is pretty new for me.

After the body got a little structure back, it was time to work on the actual frame for the thing. I have always wanted to try a double stack tube frame so this is a perfect opportunity. What I didn't think about is how much time I would spend notching all the little spacers. Luckily the trusty bridge came in handy again. (I love this thing and see many sleepless nights in my future)



This is the quick notching setup. A hole saw, chucked up in the collet and a piece of tube used to fixture everything so that all the spacers come out the same size. I spent way to much time doing this, but it will be worth it as all the notches will be perfect in the frame due to the added effort. To be completely honest, I think this took less time than notching by hand but it was really teadious. After over 30 notches the hole saw is missing a couple teeth, but it still cuts great. Up next is a little bending and then some welding to assemble the frame. Then I get to design some spring hangers and play with the cnc table. It will be a fun change of pace from the manual machining.

 

[meaders]

are you building a bed for it.

this one is on time...

 

[jimbo92]

that pickup is awesome

 

[WeRideNTruX]

that pickup thing is sick. the double frame should be awesome too.

 

[RClippa]

are you building a bed for it.

this one is on time...

This is exactly what I am working on, but this one is way nicer than mine will be. I have never actually seen one so thanks for the picture. The frame is almost together. I am just cading up some parts for the CNC table to get the leaf springs hooked up.