One of the big issues with my plans for the build seems to be the pedal box / steering column.
We need to drop the pan into the body, to be sure...but I'm trying to get all of the "pan issues" or "pan questions" sorted before dropping the body back on, so that I can mock-up as much as possible and save doing the body-on, body-off, body-on, body-off dance as much as possible. When it comes to the pedal box, however, all indications suggest I’m going to have to sink the box into the floor if I want to use this one. (Big feet being the real problem.)
Tilton makes two different pedal boxes that might allow me to do this without cutting the floor. *might*. Now, if you don’t want to buy two pedal boxes at roughly $800-1300 each, what do you do? You spend way too much time on the computer, and hours waiting for the 3D printer, and then you can mock up yet another way that won’t work. I'll have to add some photos later, but despite the overall height being 20mm less, the base fitment of the Tilton 650 series box (which I can afford) is much less desirable than the Tibuc box pictured above. The Tilton 850 series box (which sort of really can't afford) is almost an inch narrow at the important point...but the height is a mere 9mm shorter than the Tibuc pedal box I have here, so I'd rather just make this one work. It’s frustrating, I feel like I have spent all week measuring and modelling, not fabricating and DOING, but if you are going to use non-standard parts this is going to happen.
I told Boris that I absolutely wasn't going to sink the pedal box into the floor...but more and more I'm thinking I might just do that. Why the obsession with the Pedal box? Essentially it allows me to use whatever brakes I want (front and rear) and set them up for perfect balance. If I use the calipers I want with the factory-style master cylinder, the math suggests the brake pedal travel will be 10-15% longer. Driveable? Absolutely. “Excellent feeling”? Probably not.
Of course, this is only the measuring / printing I did Mon-Wed. The 3D printer has been running 24hours a day, all week...which means there is more I've been working on for the second half.