It's over at Walt's Custom Services now. He has a nice trailer and was nice enough to come over an pic it up today. Having the rear steer right now makes for easy moving around.

Walt's Custom Services

He'll be making up the rear strut mounts. They have to be removable from the main superstructure so the whole think can actually come out of the car without splitting the body from the pan.

He thinks it will be done pretty quickly! :)

Jason

I'm thinkin' you need to incorporate the rear steer as a permanent option!


Jeff-

I went down and talked to Walt on the clock today. In a way it's nice to see him sweating over the details. I was just not getting anywhere, and I think he'll be able to get us a great result. I can breathe easy for a bit till it's done. Apparently the wiring harness(now from another source) will be arriving tomorrow and the radiator this week as well. Things are starting to move along.

Here's the plate that may be used for the strut mount, but the whole idea may be scrapped due to spacial issues

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/237712.jpg

Jason

Well, she's back home now. Walt did a great job on making these strut mounts. There is adjustment for strut angulation front/back and then there is camber adjustment. Everything is tacked up, so I'll need to pull it all apart and do the final welding, throw on a coat of paint, then get the motor back in and see how she looks.

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/238883.jpg

The hole got a little bit on this side, but when your doing things for the first time, a little elbow room goes a long way to keep the nerves settled!

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/238884.jpg

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/238885.jpg

Here is is on the welding table. It's not perfect, but when all was said and done, this thing ends up being pretty close!

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/238886.jpg

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/238887.jpg

The welds are VERY nice. This will have a collar welded to it along the main plate to minimize flexing.

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/238888.jpg

Walt says he's an old man, but as you can see here, he still works very fast, he's just a blur!

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/238890.jpg

Here's the radiator. I had it made by Brian McCullough at Custom Aluminum Radiators in AZ. He did a great job.

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/238881.jpg

I had him make up this bleed srew as well. It will reside in the drivers front inner fender. It will allow me to bleed the air from the line up front, while the stock cooling system will bleed itself in the rear, or so the theory goes!

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/238897.jpg

Coming on great Jason!

Rich

More surgery. This JUST fits in here with the fans installed. It's butted up against the back of the spare tire area, but fortunately it's angled so airflow should still be great once the ducting is done.

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/241581.jpg

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/241582.jpg

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/gallery/pix/241584.jpg

Ahhh, radiator in the front. I like! :cool:

Sweet design for the rear struts. :agree:

Looks like it's really taking off. Can't wait for the next step.

1.8 T
 

This looks awsome!!

You would! How's yours coming anyway? Is the house and the wife giving you enough play time? If your still having trouble, think about having Brian build you a really wide but short one. You could mount it at the front almost flat and duct air in from a front lip maybe?

Thanks guys, I think I'm still on target for it running sometime in the spring. It will be a rolling monstrosity, but I'll leave it rough till all the tweaks are done then rip it apart and make it look purdy.

I just got a call from Bruce at Eyeball Engineering and he's done with my chassis stiffeners, so apparently those will be shipped out shortly. $450 for 2 sets of jig bent stiffners and hardware ain't too bad I don't think. If you have been following along, I tried to build my own a long time ago and it was really difficult and not nearly as strong as jig bent ones, so I'm very happy to part with the cash.

Jason

I have been working on it. Not the cooling part, mostly front suspension re-do. My front control arms are at the fabricators now, getting gussets and new lower shock mounts. Once that's done, it's cooling time!
I wish I could do something like yours! The big hurdle on buses is the steering box. It's big and right smack in the way. Ditching it and going to a rack would be awesome but there's the whole deal about the steering being so far in front of the front wheels... :rolleyes: I have yet to see anyone design anything different on bus steering. I do have some room on the passenger side, enough for something like a motorcycle rad... which I just happen to have coming :D . It wouldn't be enough to handle all the cooling, but I'm thinking pre-rad kinda setup.


Jeff-

Hi Jeff

Sorry to highjack the post. Regarding the steering on the panel. Do you have Mitsubishi L300s in your neck of the woods? They are a forward control van that uses a rack & pinion. At the base of the steering column they have a small gearbox that changes the shaft direction, another shaft then runs back to the rack & pinion.

Steve



They look like this

http://img.drive.com.au/drive_images...m/2989_1_m.jpg

Thanks Steve!
I'll be on the lookout for one. Come to think of it, the early toyota vans have a similar look. I need to get my head under one and see whats what.


Jeff-