It has begun - G-Pete's 289FIA Scratch Build

[tkb289]

G-Pete,

Great progress and beautiful craftsmanship

Looks like you have quite a shop at your disposal, with a wide variety of tools and machines, that you are putting to excellent use. Keep up the good work, thanks for keeping us up to date.

[PDUB]

Awesome shop, awesome work!

[G-Pete]

Foot boxes, the bottom are one inch below the top of the frame and have on the side a slight angle.



This is the top of the pedal unit. To squeeze more room out of it the clutch arm need to be straight and the shafts cut off.

[G-Pete]

Just like here - that is close to 0.5 inch



Cutting the shaft tube by 0.25 inch on one side. That is 0.75 inch more room, so I can get space between the foot box and exhaust headers.



Steeda clutch bracket attached to lever.



Fitting the assembly into the food box.



Clutch and brake pedal preparation. They come not drilled - good thing.



The fork for the clutch pedal.

[G-Pete]

The brake lever needed a little more work to get the spacing right. Also the fork sits in the center.



Without the pedals.



Gravity pulls the AC Pedals down to the 5 degree stop.



The movement forward.



That's it for today...

[Fullchat289]

Really enjoying these updates! Nice to see the pic of the wifey...she appears well supportive of the project.

Just a quick observation...what happens if you need to change out a starter?

- Allen.

[G-Pete]

That question I asked my self in case of a starter failure. Well, two possibilities:


one-- I make a hatch and squeeze myself into the foot box, may I ask a smaller person to do that and change it out.

or

two-- I buy a new starter and if the starter fails in the future I have to lift the engine off the motor mounts and change it that way.


The donor starter worked just fine for the last 12 years. Close to 100K on the clock means about 4000 starts (daily driver). If the new one holds just the half of it, by that time I'm 85 years old and have forgotten why I came in the garage in the first place...


...I choose number two.

[G-Pete]

Driver side lower seat belt mount.



Upper driver side mount.



Passenger foot box completed.



Center frame completed.



With the passenger foot box angled, it is possible by removing the header to access the starter

[dallas_]

Pete, thanks for taking the time to show me your car today.

VERY nice work!

Thanks for keeping us posted on your progress.

[migge]

Very nice work but I wonder what the weight will be, a lot of heavy steel.

Cheers
Migge

[jbmatth]

I was concerned about the same thing, but I'm sure the thicker steel will add strength to the chassis. What are you expecting the car to weigh once complete?

[jbmatth]

Very well explained, thank you for the info, good luck and I'm enjoying reading your build.

[migge]

Under 2000 is very very okay I guess :-). My last one was 2.134 lbs.

Keep us posted.

Cheers
Migge

[dallas_]

Pete,
I think the minor amount of additional weight in the footboxes is well worth it.
Especially since you are still very light overall.

Does that also add rigidity to the chassis?

How much does the carbon fiber body weigh?

[G-Pete]

Yes John, the chassis is stiffer than before. It increased by calculated 5000 lbs over 90x64 diagonal torsion test in SolidWorks Pro.

The body including the trunk lid, hood and doors totals 39 pounds.

[G-Pete]

Quick check about the windshield height.



The first part of the rollbar is fixed and has the same height as the windshield. The rollbar will be braced forward - thus it needs more work.



Tubular sub frame for the rear part of the body - later also base for the door lock.



Rear passenger side splash shield welded in place.



Inside view of it.



The driver side, as you can see I mostly work on two or more places at the same time. This is the final version of the dashboard.



Time to start on the sway bar.



Stay tuned. Soon I will fabricate the inner frames for the hood, trunk and doors. The door latches should come in any day.

[Fullchat289]

Pete:

45 degrees is a good place to start for an FIA windscreen...some guys have gone a bit lower than that - closer to 43 degrees... It makes the look of the car, IMHO.



- Allen.

[G-Pete]

Yes Allen, 45 degrees that I had in mind too. The roll bar loop height was measured with the 45 deg. angle.

BTW: did you notice the dent near the passenger head light?

[Fullchat289]

Ha..no I did not...my gaze usually stops at the sight of webers..

Considering that's CSX2345, I guess it's allowed to have a dent or two.

- Allen.

[G-Pete]

Dash fabrication, I elected the drop-down style for the switches.



First test fit, the angle is perpendicular to the steering column/wheel.




These are the tabs which hold the dash board.



There are 8 mounting points for the dash.



Brake-fluid reservoir mounting bracket made from stainless steel.



Front showing. The Hydroboost is too close to the frame, the solution is to make the reservoir remote.