Took the leap
 

Hi All,

Took a leap of faith and bought a project. Its a mid 2000's Homebush Fibreglass car with an early 2000 302 Windsor, 5 speed Tremec, 9 inch LSD. Tons of work still to do, particularly on the front end.

Looking forward to get to know you all much better with my millions of questions.

I'm based in Kellyville, NSW so will hopefully meet some of the Sydney guys over the coming months.

Stephen

Congratulations Stephen. Looking forward to following your progress.

Cheers

I live in Baulkham Hills down the road from you. I have a deType that's registered but not finished. You are welcome around if you get stuck on something and need some ideas.

Well done......love an Old Skool project....

Congrats on taking the first step.....well done. Look fwd to following your progress.
Good luck.

An old school build thread, way to go and will be great to follow.

Pictures never get old, no matter what the item. Take plenty and share with us other cobra nutbags.

Welcome to Cobra ownership!

I am in the Hills too, let me know if you need anything.

Cheers,

Ben

Seems like the Hills are alive with the sound of Cobras. I too am in the Hills.

Cheers

Sam

Sam is it your car I see driving up and down seven hills road?

There's another one?

Maybe next year....but no, I building at the moment.

Cheers

Sam

yeh there is a red one that drives around Baulkham hills all time. Think he drives it to work as I normally see him around 7am.

I was going to say have a look at Leroy's build to see how good you can make older version Cobra look.

Congratulations!!
 

Best of luck, I know you will enjoy the build and have a great time driving it when you are done. Congratulations from the USA!

Linden,

Ray and Kay have a darkish red Classic Revival in the Crestwood area.

Cheers,

Ben

That would be the one. It is a darkish red

Update
 

So here is a quick update on my progress.

Finished all the welding, suspension mounts (For coil overs) and steering rack. coated the chassis in an epoxy and now the assembly starts.

Question, should I get an engineer to inspect before I get it back to rolling chassis or would it be better to do the rigidity tests with the motor and gearbox in?

Hi Stephen,

I sometimes feel like I'm the bearer of bad news as I see something like this and have to respond in an direct and open manner (part of being a Dutchy maybe)but I think you may have painted this chassis a bit prematurely as to me it would seem that you will require some additional lateral stiffening through the base section of your chassis in the form of cross bracing or similar.

What I would suggest is to do the torsional test now to identify any potential deficiency and engage an engineer nownot afterwards.
Question, do you have a front bulk head frame that provides a mounting point for your steering column etc.. as I would install this also and put all of the suspension back on and solid mount the suspension at the preferred ride height, then fix the rear solid to the ground at the widest point (the wheel studs are always a good mount point) then make a centre pivot support for the front somewhere suitable and you will be close enough to get the Engineer in to do the rest. This will save you some of his time and money and then you just need to have a good strong box section (100x50x3RHS) at least 4mtrs in length and work out your applied load in order to get to 4500Nm/deg of deflection and then your engineer can transpose or interpolate the rest of the figures out for you to see how linear and strong the chassis is as a start point. If it complies then all well and good, but if it does not then your engineer will need to advise you where to apply additional bracing or strengthening.

The second part is to perform a beaming test by supporting both ends of the chassis and then apply a specified weight to the centre (or seating positions) of the chassis and to measure the deflection or transitional beaming stresses and to see if the chassis is suitable in this regard.
I can send you some photos of how to set it up if you like in a PM.

Hope this helps you to move forward on your project.
Cheers
Wil

The front suspension geometry is odd, might be the angle of the photos, but I suspect it will be troublesome given the upper and lower a-arm pivot points and the steep angle of the upper arm. Maintaining proper camber and alignment, and avoiding bump-steer as the suspension articulates is what I'd look at. Not sure how that will be achieved with that geometry. Hoping I'm wrong and just not seeing it in the photos.

I agree with Antny and can advise that the problem is the top wishbone or "A" arm mounting is way too low; ideally the upper and lower wishbones will be close to parallel and it would be advisable to add in about 6-8 degrees of anti-dive on the top arm mount (rake it backwards to load up the arm through compression travel) - again, I think an engineer is your best bet right now mate. The other thing to check (and is absolutely critical to how your car drives) is the positioning of the steering rack, as you have to test the bump steer deviation through at least 3-4inches of travel in rebound and compression to ensure minimal movement of the steering knuckles (front uprights)
The other factor is to ensure good positive castor has been applied in this chassis set up (6-7 degrees is good), as I can see that you have no adjustment for this and that again is critical to how your car will handle. Sorry to load you up Stephen but if you are not completely sure of what I am talking about seek advice now before going any further.

Cheers
Wil

Gents,

Thanks for the feedback, don't think the photo's I attached are helping. I do appreciate the feedback but its clear I haven't given enough info.

Front wishbones are parallel (With coil overs installed) and mount points are racked back. The steering rack is mounted as per attached pic.

Mounting point for pedals/steering is coming along.