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Old 03-31-2019, 07:27 AM   #51
JDwhiteWRX
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I got the upper control arm mounts for the double wishbone conversion into position today. I need to convert my welder back over to MIG to weld them in but otherwise they are done.

Started by marking out the position of the boxes, drilling a hole at each corner and then using a combination of angle grinder and dremel to cut them out.



Welded the nuts onto the lower side to make adjustments easier.



Here is the view from inside the engine bay. You can see I had to trim a bit of metal above the bolts so I can get them in and out.



Final photo for today showing the RX8 knuckle relative to the control arm mounts.



So I've just got remove the paint around the areas I need to weld and then weld them in. All this has to be repeated on the passenger side but I need to spin the whole shell around to do that so I'm just doing this side for now.
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Old 04-03-2019, 04:08 AM   #52
JDwhiteWRX
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My steering rack arrived today from the USA, this is a brz rack from a LHD car but I have flipped it over so it is now front steer.

Gave it a quick clean and then did some measurements to see where the pivot points would be and how they would line up with my control arm pivots as this affects bump steer.

Could not be happier with how well this will work. I don't have exact measurements until I remove the boots but the pivot points are around about the right spot. I will need some longer tie rod arms though since I have increased the front track a little.

I have done a quick mock up to show how well the pinion aligns towards the steering column. This also shows how I will be able to easily mount the rack such that it is height adjustable by adding and removing spacers under the mounting points.

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Old 04-03-2019, 02:51 PM   #53
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Looking good!
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Old 04-07-2019, 03:29 AM   #54
JDwhiteWRX
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I got some more work done on the car today.

Started by converting my multi-process welder over to MIG since you can never really get all the seems clean enough for TIG when welding to the chassis.



I had to use a little CAD to make up this piece to re-strengthen the location of the front upper control arm mount.

[/url]

This is after welding the small piece in and cleaning up my welds with the grinder.



Then I just went ahead and welded the mounts into the chassis. My MIG welding skills are not great and the majority of the welds look like pigeon poo but I am confident they are plenty strong enough as I usually run it a little hot.



After some minor cleanup with the grinder I gave them a coat of cold-gal.



So one side is now complete and I need to spin the whole shell around to do the other side.
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Old 04-14-2019, 05:20 AM   #55
JDwhiteWRX
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I got the shell up on my vehicle positioning jacks today and spun it around so I could work on the passenger side double wishbone conversion.



The drivers side took a lot longer because I was kind of figuring out how much metal to remove as I was going. With the passenger side I was just copying so I chopped it all out rather quickly, still a days work though.

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Old 04-14-2019, 05:20 AM   #56
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...................

Last edited by JDwhiteWRX; 04-14-2019 at 05:28 AM. Reason: double post
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Old 04-22-2019, 03:44 AM   #57
JDwhiteWRX
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I've spent the past 2 days working on the passenger side upper control arm mounts.

Many hours were spent making sure the passenger side mount location exactly matched the driver's side.



Once again my MIG welds look a bit **** but a slight improvement on the other side. I think my main issue is I can't really see the puddle, possibly my auto-darkening helmet settings are way off.



I have placed a large online order of rod ends and spherical bearings and tomorrow I will be picking up some more steel tube to start building the control arms.
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Old 04-24-2019, 05:27 AM   #58
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Yesterday I went and picked up some more 1.5" roll cage tube as I had almost ran out and there is still a lot more to be done. I also picked up some 1.25" tube to make the front control arms and modify the factory rear arms so they are adjustable and no longer contain rubber bushings.

In other news my order of rod ends and associated parts has arrived so I pretty much have everything I need to get started. The only but missing is some 4140 chrome-moly solid bar that will be turned down on a lathe by a friend of mine to make uniball tapered adapters to replace the factory ball joints in the front knuckles and studs in the rear upper control arms.

This is the full order, its enough to do the whole car. They are all racing series ultra high performance chrome-moly steel rod ends with a Teflon/Kevlar liner.



This shot shows the 1.25" DOM tube with a weld in bung and 5/8" rod end. Everything will be adjustable.

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Old 05-02-2019, 09:37 PM   #59
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Great project! Any updates? Also, how feasible would it be to make a front double wishbone suspension kit that re-uses the Mazda RX8 spindle and lower control arms like in this video (7:12 mark)?:

https://youtu.be/fqf0Os5xoao
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Old 05-03-2019, 12:27 AM   #60
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Quote:
Originally Posted by HumanBoost View Post
Great project! Any updates? Also, how feasible would it be to make a front double wishbone suspension kit that re-uses the Mazda RX8 spindle and lower control arms like in this video (7:12 mark)?:

https://youtu.be/fqf0Os5xoao
Thanks, should have some updates tomorrow night.

You could certainly use the factory RX8 control arms and this was something I considered but the only real benefit is the potentially lighter weight of the alloy arms.

The downsides include the expense of replacing the rubber bushings with expensive aftermarket spherical joints, no ability to adjust the camber with the upper arms, ball joints are not replaceable, you have to buy complete new arms.

I just figured I would have much greater flexibility with the design and much less cost overall if I built my own arms.
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Old 05-04-2019, 07:43 AM   #61
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I have officially started making my control arms today, starting with the rear trailing arms.

I started by making a simple welding jig with some scrap metal.



Then I cut the OEM arms at the kink. I no longer need the kink as I have lowered the trailing arm pickup point similar to what the MCA Suspension "traction mod" does. Also this car will run much less droop travel than a road going car.



The jig keeps the original length but I have adjusted the rod end so that I can mostly lengthen the link as this is most likely what will be needed as I adjust camber.



Then I cut some tube to fill the gap and trimmed part of the OEM arm so the tube could slide in.



Here it is after welding, you can see I also boxed in the lower part for some extra strength.



Side detail



Then I quick clean up with the wire wheel and some cold gal primer.



These arms ended up being 230 grams heavier than the originals and cost about $50 AUD to make.
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Old 05-12-2019, 07:43 AM   #62
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I made a start on my rear lower arms today but ended up running out of argon gas for my welder so didn't completely finish them.

They are similar to what I did with the trailing arms except this time I added a ladder bar adjuster which basically gives you extra adjustment length and allows adjustment without having to remove the rod end from the mount.

This photo shows the arms after I cut them and the small welding jig I made.



I ended up cutting some more length off the arms after my initial cuts just to make the welding easier.



I used a bit of CAD to make the sheet metal pieces that hold the tube into the factory arms.



I mocked it up in my jig and then tacked this inside piece in place, then removed it from the jig to weld it properly to the back of the tube.



This is as far as I got before the gas ran out. There is probably another 30 minutes of welding to go and then they are done.



I'll pick up some more gas this week and finish them off before priming and doing the weights.
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Old 05-19-2019, 05:00 AM   #63
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Picked up some more gas this week for the TIG welder and managed to get the rear lower control arms finished.

I finished the remaining welds first and then leveled the tops off with a flap disc for a cleaner look.



Then I hit them with the wire wheel, some wax and grease remover and a couple of coats of cold-gal.

[/url]

They came out about 250g heavier than the factory arms, I guess this is the weight penalty I'll have to take for the solid mounts and adjustability I require.



Moving on I made a start on the rear toe arms. Again I am using the ladder bar adjusters, the original ball joints and some old control arms off my WRX that I have cut down and cleaned up with the wire wheel.



All I need to do now to finish these is get my friend to turn a female left hand thread into the cut down control arm pieces to suit the thread on the ladder bar and then I will weld the ball joints into them. I really wish I could afford my own lathe.



The final thing I was playing with today was the A-pillar gusset design for my roll cage. I don't really like the usual circular dimple die style so spent the time to come up with something a little more unique and streamlined.

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Old 05-19-2019, 06:16 AM   #64
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Slick! Still one of my favorite threads. Keep up the awesome work!
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Old 05-27-2019, 08:25 PM   #65
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Sorry no update this week guys, I used my day off to go racing in my WRX.

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Old 06-02-2019, 04:35 AM   #66
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Half a day to work on the car today so I kept going on the A-pillar gussets. I'm kind of stuck at the moment doing odd jobs because the person who usually does lathe work for me has gone on extended holiday in Europe. Without the lathe work I can't continue with the control arm fabrication.

Traced out my cardboard design onto some sheet metal.



Cut both sides out with the angle grinder then taped them together to drill holes in each corner.



Used my dremel to make the smaller cuts between the drilled holes.



Cleaned them up with a hand file.



They are now ready to be stitch welded but I ran out of time.



These were time consuming but I see them as a very noticeable feature when you look at the car from the outside so I wanted to take the time to get everything perfect.
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Old 06-02-2019, 09:47 AM   #67
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Once you're driving this car on the track, do give a little extra attention to the corners of the holes. They're a whole lot better than sharp corners, but they still represent points of stress concentration where cracks will start if they're going to start at all. The dimple-die round holes that I know you don't care much for at least leave a little reinforcement in place.


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Old 06-16-2019, 04:26 AM   #68
JDwhiteWRX
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I went snowboarding last weekend so missed my day on the car, got some work done today though, finished welding the A-pillar gussets into the car.

Stitch welded with the TIG.



and a coat of primer so it doesn't go rusty.



I'm very happy with how these turned out, it looks a lot more sleek than the typical dimple die gussets IMO.

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Old 08-19-2019, 04:04 AM   #69
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Sorry guys it has been a while since I posted an update. I won't bore you with excuses as to why I have not been working on the car but don't worry the project will continue eventually.

Some small progress has been the toe arms which are now essentially done but I do have to run a weld around them at some point.

I am just going to leave them un-welded for now as I am not sure if I should just center the adjustment or possibly skew it for lengthening to get the camber I want. It will be easy enough to figure out once everything is assembled and the welding is only a 20 minute job.

These were made from the factory arms and some old lateral links I had from my wrx. I had to get some lathe work done to make it all come together and since it was just a favor from a friend it ended up taking a very long time, plus the work ended up being fairly involved.



So my problem now is that I have used up all my favors on the lathe and I still need a whole bunch of uniball tapered adapters made up to complete the front control arms and upper rear arms.
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Old 08-20-2019, 11:44 PM   #70
toson1911
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WOW!

Really love the fabrication that has gone into this, definitely following to watch progress on this!

ALSO where abouts from Sydney are you from, im in sydney too!
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Old 08-21-2019, 03:48 AM   #71
JDwhiteWRX
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Quote:
Originally Posted by toson1911 View Post
WOW!

Really love the fabrication that has gone into this, definitely following to watch progress on this!

ALSO where abouts from Sydney are you from, im in sydney too!
Hey mate, thanks!

I'm in the southern area of Sutherland Shire.
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Old 08-22-2019, 12:03 AM   #72
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JDwhiteWRX View Post
Hey mate, thanks!

I'm in the southern area of Sutherland Shire.
Yeah done a bit of custom stuff with my STI but nothing like yours, But it is so cool to see!

I'm from Hills area
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Old 10-01-2019, 10:10 AM   #73
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Great work! Just followed you on IG. Any updates?
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Old 10-06-2019, 03:12 AM   #74
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Nice work! Looks like one heck of a project. Best of luck with it. My family built race cars for many years so it always brings me back reading threads like this.
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Old 11-17-2019, 07:10 AM   #75
JDwhiteWRX
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Today I made a welding jig to build some rear upper control arms. The jig works for both passenger and driver side arms. Making the control arms will not be easy due to the large angle of the stud into the knuckle which is part of the factory design to clear the chassis rails. Those are gone in my car but the angle remains in the knuckle so I have to keep it.





The stud is held in the jig with a bolt just like it is in the knuckle.



Next weekend I hope to start building the new control arms.
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