683 replies to this topic

[makka]

^with data logging facilitys of course!

[rodomo]

Progress report:

Not much progress over the last week. I have been catching up on servicing the "home fleet" mowing lawns and other stuff that has been neglected of late.

I have removed more deadener from the floor pan (getting there).

I have also been trying to find out the weight of LJ XU1 to get a comparison and have found figures varying from 1100kgs to 1170kgs? Does anyone know for sure?

The weight for a standard VB Commodore is 1220kgs as far as I have found and the SL/E comes in at a staggering 1400kgs.

With an estimated starting weight of about 1220kgs (standard VB 6cyl) minus-
spare wheel, carpets, rear seat, bumpers, dash components, lighter front seats I reckon it would have to be close to 1100kgs?

[rodomo]

I weighed a bucket of deadener tonight at 12kgs and thats only about 1/2 of it.
This doesn't include what was removed from the front floor pans and not weighed.

Still the L/H rear under seat, parcel shelf and the whole boot to go

I'm not sure if this can come into the calculation though? Maybe all VB's had this amount of deadener, not only SL/E?

I should just weigh it when its done

Edited by rodomo, 19 February 2007 - 12:02 AM.

[rodomo]

About 1/2 a square meter of deadener left to go Hip Hip Hoo Bloody Ray!
I hate having to do things twice, so the deadener has to be removed so I can finally bolt the seats in and the boot had to be done before the "new" petrol tank can be fitted. I am punishing myself to get this bit done and dealt with so I can start doing some of the more fun bits. I hope to have the balancer and water pump sorted by the end of this weekend, the new bits are here, and I also have all the brake parts now to get it mobile.

There is going to be a bit of "rework" on some of the stuff. I plan now to move the battery to behind the pass. seat to move some weight backwards and also to "free up" the L/H rad support upright (the battery tray obstructs the upright) so the forced induction can be "stream lined" a bit more.

My biggest problem is I don't stop thinking about and looking at the bloody thing.

Just tonight I was thinking (as I was scraping deadener ) I should remove the 2 rear electric window motors (probably another 2-3 kilos) but it would take a few more hours (to remove and manufacture something else to hold them up) so where do you stop?

I have also fitted the gearbox and shifter but am having a few thoughts to mod. the shifter, and am thinking about another alternator that would drag less power (the sigma one that the pulley came off has a smaller rotor) so again where do I stop?

The plan now is the first run will be at Heathcote for the drag day (28th April)
Then the following day (29th) at Sandown for some flat track. There is another day at Sandown on the 4th of March that I could attend but time is slipping away.

[rodomo]

you may make it to sandown if the commo does not breakdown at heathcote.... lol

but dont worry my torrie will prob break down there as well!
even tho it shouldn't as it has just been completely rebuilt..... but i have been having some bad luck lately

Which car are you taking and what are its specs? V8? 6?

The "home fleet" is now serviced and the lawns are all mowed (I do my Dad's too, he is 80 and lives next door). The last service (today) was boy's UC hatch today, just to find the steering coupling has all but chopped out in the last 12 months. It needs a steering uni too.

Later tonight I WILL finish removing the deadener and try to finish the dash cluster ready for mounting.

Tomorrow, the balancer and water pump are earmarked.

Edited by rodomo, 24 February 2007 - 06:22 PM.

[Heath]

Rob came around on Wednesday, not on the weekend... and we (he actually) got heaps done. I didn't do much at all

[rodomo]

The deadener is all scraped. I am using petrol to remove the residue so this again is a slow task as I can't stand the fumes for too long. I by-passed the balancer and water pump and thought it best to "finish off" other stuff. So I topped up the gear box oil, removed the speedo cable and measured the hole for a welch plug, checked the new clutch cable just to find out it doesn't fit and checked the shifter to see if it could fall out of the gate as this got me thinking from another thread. Guess what? Yes it can
So 1 shifter is being made from 3. But wait! Theres more! When I undid the nut that hold 3/4 lever onto the sideplate the thread came with it
So the new oil will now be drained and the side plate replaced. While the side plate is off, the internals will be "looked at" as that is about as much as you can do through the side plate cover.
I'm glad this is all being found out at "RoDoMo Racing's" workshop rather than on the track

[rodomo]

Here are some pics of the shifter rebuild (I built 1 shifter from 2). These are Commodore shifters but they are much the same as Torana. These shifters were bought off e-bay $60 but also included a gearbox. They were from a rally car and I wouldn't normally expect this much damage from a daily.



The red arrow indicates where the piece of coat hanger wire had let go, this is how they were from the factory, and the yellow arrows indicate where the welds at the spring locater had also started to split. Some pretty harsh shifting to have caused this.



The "through shaft" (blue arrow) from the shifter was used to guage the gap when it was rewelded. A piece of railway track (green arrow) now replaces the coat hanger wire. When it all cooled down it was tight and valve lapping paste had to be used to "work" it and free it up.



The welds were then beefed up (purple arrows)
The shift thrust washers were broken and replaced with the best I had.



As was the 1st/2nd shift lever. You can see the forks on the R/H lever had started to spread, again from harsh shifting.



Another thing to look for is wear in the side plate shift lever slotted holes. (Exaggerated in yellow) These have to be a tight fit on the sideplate or they will work loose regardless of how much you tighten the nuts. Also note there are different lengths of these levers if you are mixing and matching shifters.
Fit the wrong bits to the wrong shifter and your gearstick can jump out of the gate. Also worn side plate levers will cause this.



Other wear areas are circled and arrowed below in red. Excessive wear in these holes and pins can make shift alignment a nightmare and again the stick can jump out of the gate.



To adjust the shifter, the next pic shows what you are trying to achieve. The yellow dotted line indicates the alignment of the gates, the blue arrow indicates the area that DOES NOT HAVE TO BE ALIGNED as the cutouts in the gearstick dodge around these misalignments. The red arrow indicates the mounting plate that the other shift levers have to be aligned to. I have left the gearstick out at this point for ease of explanation but you can see this alignment through the floor with the shifter in place to make the job easier.
The alignment is adjusted at the trunions on the shift rods.



When you've made your shifter "bullet proof" and done all your adjustments there is one more adjustment left to do



In my last post I mentioned that with the side plate off there isn't much to see but you can "feel" radial play in the cluster. Guess what? gearbox rebuild coming up.

Edited by rodomo, 05 March 2007 - 12:03 AM.

[TerrA LX]

Awsome work there mate A+++

[rodomo]

what clutch set up are you running???

do commo's run cable or rat trap style, i am guessing cable....

Yep, cable. Similar to UC. I had trouble finding the correct cable as the Burson's bloke couldn't read the parts catalogue. Sent me home twice with the wrong cable.
Ended up reading the bloody thing myself and quoting a part number.

Progress report:
I have stripped 2 out of 3 gearboxes and haven't found a good cluster yet

[rodomo]

Score: 3-0 on the clusters
All 3 have been sleeved and the sleeves have collapsed.
Can anyone tell me if they have had success with a sleeved cluster?
But I have a plan More info if it works later.

Edited by rodomo, 08 March 2007 - 11:36 PM.

[rodomo]

I got a cluster off e-bay, it arrived today. Made in Japan
$237 delivered.

Have a look here:
http://stores.ebay.c...0QQfsubZ9650609

I am going to put a box together with the best of the other clusters and the 2nd best of all the other bits.
Then later build another box with new bearings but use beefier input and output bearings.
Hopefuly this "she'll be right" gearbox will last until I put the 3.5 in it.

[rodomo]

The link ^ has them for $79 but I wouldn't be using the front and rear bearing anyway. I reckon I have enough usable bits to make a reliable box. It only has to last 12-18 mnths and it's not a daily driver.

[rodomo]

Progress report:
Dash:
Before:
This is what I could see when I went to mount the dash.



After:
This is the modded dash, not perfect but a lot better



Its still not mounted, I have to fit the fuel tank and recalibrate the fuel guage to suit the 120Y sender before I mount it permanently, but at least some progress.

[Heath]

Wo0o0o0o0o0o racing style. Love it! But you've gotta rotate the tacho like 30 degrees anti-clockwise to really fit in with the racing interior fashion

Looks good Rob!