2118 replies to this topic

[Heath]

SHEEL I've bought a Manchester, I don't think APA are still making tanks? But mine is a reconditioned one from Advanced Cylinder - and he's handling a twin outlet modification; seems pretty confident to keep the mounting angle still at 30deg. also which is cool.

 

lol @ the powered rotisserie. I'll just leave it turning and light a fire underneath.

 

Bought some small salisbury axle tubes off Lightyear last week. Stripped them down and got what I needed off of them.

 

 

Quick blast with glass in my mate's cabinet.

 

Oh yeah and pulled the diff out properly last night so it goes the whole way around. Now the fun really begins on the underside of this thing.

Edited by Heath, 05 April 2016 - 07:27 AM.

[Heath]

Haha speak for yourself. My to-do list is pretty serious, I've been at it well over a year and haven't touched more than a few parts on the car.

[Heath]

If they aren't really up to the task, I should possibly consider making some from scratch then. Is this covered in your thread?

[Ice]

Are you going to have 450hp and side step the clutch at 6000rpm?

Its Heath your talking about here that could be a possibility lol

[Heath]

That is my rough plan...

[ls2lxhatch]

If they aren't really up to the task, I should possibly consider making some from scratch then. Is this covered in your thread?

 

The McDonald Bros brackets are stronger than factory.

http://www.mcdonaldb...tbracketry.html

 

I changed the upper arm brackets so the bush is mounted in the arm instead of the diff. This makes it easier to change bushes or switch from bushes to spherical bearings.

 

[Ice]

Nice work Andy

[Potta]

That is my rough plan...

 

Are you going to have 450hp and side step the clutch at 6000rpm?

 

 

That is my rough plan...

 

Lol

 

Sounds like fun

 

Doing well Heath, don't worry too much about losing interest, we all do it, you'll get there in the end.

[Heath]

I've got quite a number of jobs on currently so I'm going to try and post relevant bursts of projects where possible. Bought some lengths of 50x50x1.6 for some horizontal beams in the boot to support the gas tank.
 

 

 

 

 
4.5kg, not ideal but they're a pretty neat way of tying the rear floor together.

 
Flipped the car up properly on its side to get a proper look. Decided I could do without the fuel line brackets, swaybar brackets, fuel tank straps brackets etc.

 

 
Finally I got to weld my chassis rail extensions in. Bare metalled everywhere I was going to need to weld, drilled extra drainage holes, tried my best to rust-proof everything, set the car up flat and tacked it in then flipped it on its head to weld it neatly.

 

 

 

 

 

 
And stitched it all in to the floor the whole way up the front of the firewall. Got some cleaning up to do inside the floor too now hahaha

 
Also welded in the first of the beams for the tank.

 

Edited by Heath, 18 April 2016 - 12:20 AM.

[Heath]

I picked up a 3.89:1 Auto R31 Skyline wagon diff from Harvey Wreckers down in Langwarrin.


Brad1979UC needed some brake parts for his new diff conversion so he came down and we started stripping it down.


Got stuck in with the grinder and removed the majority of the bracketry but still haven't completed the job. Bit of a pain in the arse to be honest. The wagon diffs have a lot more going on than the sedans and I was not aware of this until a friend pointed it out (post-purchase... obviously )


Lightyear decided to buy the old diff from the car which was from a VL Turbo. It had a number of features I was going to change and I figured it'd be a lot easier to just start with a new one and find the good working one a new home. Anyway he wants to get his car rolling again so I had to get my shit together and make a jig around it. He picked it up today so I hope I did it right lol

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Ice]

You got some serious talent there Heath keep it up mate

[LXCHEV]

Yeah looking good dude, very impressive.

[SHEEL]

I'm loving the underbody mods... so solid

[gtrboyy]

Very impressive.Mad skills!

[Heath]

It appears that the diff jig I made is basically useless because:

 - The R31 diff has an off-centre pinion (the VL diff was perfectly central, I'm quite sure)

 - The new McDonald Bros Lower Arm mounts have a smaller centre distance from the lower arm mount bolt to the axle centreline

 - The McDonald Bros Lower Arm mounts are clearly to suit bigger axle tubes and don't fit the Borg Warner ones well enough to weld them with a TIG

 - The suggestion has been made to move the upper arm mount location on the chassis a little bit.

 

Damn. I don't view it as a problem with the product as such, but the geometry is a bit different to standard and I don't know the best way to deal with that.

 

These are the McDonald Bros units. Nicely made, priced fairly etc. But don't fit my 75mm axle tubes very well and tuck the lower arms up tighter against the tubes which means my jig is fairly useless.

 

Anyway not getting too hung up on that at this stage, plenty of jobs to do. Most of you would have heard stories of these axle tubes ripping out of these diffs with high horsepower and the way that the standard suspension points mount, it is putting a huge torsional loading through the plug welds in the axle tubes. Whilst I am going to modify my rear suspension, the same problem will still exist. I wanted to brace it together in a different way so picked up some 2mm and 3mm material to start making more bits and pieces.

 

Finished cutting the mounts off the R31 diff:

 

 

Edited by Heath, 25 April 2016 - 09:39 PM.

[Heath]

A keen eye may have noticed in an earlier post that there's a fair bit of material missing from the boot floor in-front of where the LPG tank.

 

I wanted to explore an improvement in the Torana rear end. I couldn't justify sacrificing rear floor area with long parallel arms & watts link but had a suggestion from a friend that I could work with the packaging of. With the LPG tank being further back than part of the petrol tank, I had room behind the diff that could be utilised differently. Basic idea below but in practise the upper arm is going to be a fair bit longer than the standard setup.

 

Clearance around the old diff.

 

I wasn't thinking much when I cut the boot floor out but then realised I could utilise what was left of my spare wheel well by welding it back together

A few little rust repairs:

 

Good enough:

 

Rough placement:

 

Cut the fuel tank strap brackets out

 

Ooops, snip snip!

 

[gtrboyy]

Not that it really matters all commodore diff are offset except vb-k salisbury & late vk 6cyl borgwarner iirc

 

B/w diffs now have a aftermarket diffhat that strengthens & helps keep them alive alot long,considered a must do for high powered cars (wpn383) ..drag week blokes were all running them...adds strentgh to housing & ties in caps reduces flex & gear breakage

 

Have a look then see if will be suitable for your mods in mind.

Edited by gtrboyy, 25 April 2016 - 10:49 PM.

[76lxhatch]

Not that it matters too much now, but with regard to your jig I would be inclined to only use the forward arm mounting points (set up at vehicle ride level), then just get a couple of measurements for axle centreline and height. That way you can attach the mounting points to the diff however you like that produce the appropriate pinion angle at ride height and throughout the travel.

 

In my head (where all engineering work is so much easier) I've toyed with the idea of a 3 link where the upper arm would mount to something like your reinforced cover, possibly triangulated over the top to the pinion area somehow. I was thinking single arm (two person rear seat with an armrest) and watts link though.

 

Nice re-use of the spare wheel well, never throw anything away!

[Heath]

gtrboyy the aftermarket alloy diff hats on the market will not give me provision to mount my suspension setup, but I am considering engineering that feature with the bolts & jam nuts into my own thing diff hat/brace that I'm constructing.

 

Don't have verification that they actually 'work' yet, although you seem quite convinced? I guess they can't hurt.

 

The parallel three link between the seats was also a consideration. But the rear seat is so good in the hatches I didn't want to disturb it.

[rodomo]

Are we talking some sort of brace/link off the diff hat?
If so, you might have to dowel/dowel bolt the hat to the diff housing.