my build story (Page 3 of 4)

So here is the seats I scored yesterday -- both seat for $600 total. One is sparco Evo, the other is sparco pro2000, they're in pretty good shape.

They are older models, still kinda pricey but much less than buying these same models new would have been.

So took the car to the welder on Saturday and I'm sorting through the pics and uploading them, I'll try to get that stuff posted here this week. But first just wanted to throw this out there. It turns out the rear windows on the arrow super easy to remove (and put back in) with no damage to the rubber gasket. In this first pic you can see there are three chrome circles right there in the window glass.....

Behind those chrome circles is a threaded insert and then on the inside, there are phillips head screws....

those three screws are short and easy work....

easiest window removal I've seen.
welding progress update in the next installment!

alright so last Saturday, and then yesterday also, we got the cage underway. This welder, Kevin has only a single car garage but amazing what he has compacted in there, drill press, tube bender, press brake/shear thingee, 80 gal compresser, plasma cutter, a pretty sizeable welder, and on and on. so with all that it is pretty tight fit getting the little car in there

We started by tacking down the mainhoop plates in there locations, then tacked the mainhoop to the plates.


That gave a reference point to sort out where to do the cuts on the halo bar. All the bars that came with this kit were pretty long. So we held the halo up in place and looking at where it would need to be up in the front by the windshield top/roof. We figured the first cut to get it roughed into position we would take a little more than an inch off. marked it with some blue tape where to cut.

then cut it with a cut-off wheel.

And then once we were happy with where it would work, we made the notch cut with a notcher that Kevin has. These fancy tools are why I am paying him, because while it is possible to do these same kind of cuts with a electric or air grinder, it sure goes a lot quicker and easier with the purpose-built tool. And for me, work and family take a lot of my week, so I don't have a lot of time to devote to this and I've got to make it count on these Saturdays. Anyway, here is the notcher, it is from Woodward Fab

it worked great for notching the halo.
so then with the notches in the halo, we held it back up into place and got it to where we thought it would work. One thing that helps in holding it up there so you can move it around and work with it is to use ratchet straps over the roof of the car, then jam a couple boards between the strap and the bar, to lift it up even further. In this next pic, the yellow strap is holding the halo up, but we were using the orange strap to pull the ends of the halo in, to increase the bend and line up where the halo ends would best land on the mainhoop bar. We were shooting to get it right at the middle of the bend.

You have to work carefully at this stage because you are trying to figure out the clearance where you need to have helmet clearance, plus trying to figure out where the A-pillar bars will line up at the floor and meet the halo, and so on. So lots of test fitting and looking at things from every angle, then tack the halo to the mainhoop.
So then we hit a snag -- the fitting of the A-pillar notch cut where it meets the halo was very difficult to do, like a crazy compound angle notch where it comes into that outside of the curve of the halo. And we couldn't figure out how best to make the notch. We were kind of stumped for fear of cutting too much off the bar, and coming up short. Then we stepped back and thought about it. I remembered from researching other people's projects and solutions on here and other forums, and someone had posted a picture of the Pipemaster tool http://www.pipemastertools.com/
So we decided that was something we really needed to solve our problem. So we had to stop working on the A-pillar bar at that time, because the tool was going to be an internet order and wait.
So then we shifted to the rear bars, and met with some success there. Like I said, the bars with the kit were all long. So for these rear bars we needed to cut off about a foot.

Kevin's got a horizontal bandsaw too, I mean the guy has tools. Anyway, we got those cut, then I was cleaning the paint off where we had decided the baseplates would be located.

That wirewheel attachment for the grinder works great for paint removal and getting the seam sealer and glues from where there was interior covering attached.
Then we finished up the day by welding those rear spreaderplates to the tops of the wheel wells.
   
So that was last Saturday. Then yesterday we made a bunch more progress, At that point we had the Pipemaster and I can give it a positive review-- and I'll try to throw another installment of pics on here later, it just takes a while to load the pics. But I want to put lots of pics on here because I found that pics have really helped when I was doing my research, plus the pics tell the story a million times better than I can write it. So, back to imgur for more loading and when I get a chance I'll put them up. Also, youtube videos about roll cage installing were great too.  I watched this one a few times:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNoqn7JQ250
plus there were others, lots of good info out there so that when you try to do this yourself you understand what it is that you are doing.

Alrighty so continuing on.. So like I said, we moved the whole cage back which also brought it down just a hair

And then that gave us enough room for Kevin the welder to do the full 360 degree weld around that notch for the A-pillar to the halo
in these next three shots, we've completed those welds and then slid the whole thing forward again, so it fits nice and tight as much to the front as the halo can go until it hits the ceiling in front.

At that point, we could see where the front spreader plates would land on the floor. The only problem being that there were these holes in the floor, with metal plug "cups" in the holes. Those plugs were getting pretty rusty, and we decided to pop them out.

after popped out the plugs, began to clean the paint and rust off the floor in prep for welding the plate

Finally finding the time to get another upload of pics of how the cage welding was turning out.

So like I was saying that pipemaster does heck of a job for getting the odd shaped "fishmouth" notch:

this is the top of the diagonal in the mainhoop




then the bottom:

And then we did the dashbar:

and pax doorbars:

then getting the horiz crossbar for the mainhoop:

and then here is the door x bars being welded up:

Would have liked to try for the nascar style bars for the driver side, but that is something that can be reworked in the future as money and time permits. The cage kit only comes with the bars precut for the straight layout, one of the drawbacks of the kit route.

I don't know if it's mandatory, but every cage with plinth boxes that I seen has a spreader plate underneath the plinth box.  Plinth boxes definitely do a great job of making the cage install easier, but without a spreader plate under them the edges of the box may simply punch right through the sheet metal like a cookie-cutter.

FWIW,

Hamsa

It's easier to fix now rather than later so I would seek out John's opinion on this anyway and include these pictures.  It looks to me like the main hoop is sitting halfway on top of that box section that runs across the floor.  If so, I would point out that the end of the hoop is sitting on top of the spreader plate in such a manner that 50% of the hoop is flush to the floor/spreader combo and the rest spread across the rest of the plate.  Perhaps that would somewhat mitigate the fear that the hoop is sitting on top of a hole saw.  I would also provide John a measurement of the vertical portion of the plate (looks like the rear) so that he can make a determination of how far that spreader plate could collapse downward before it becomes flush with the floor.

okay I sent an email directly to John Pagel with this specific question about plinth direct to that floor that way, and directed him here.

1.  Please don't take my comment as "bashing" your work at all.  I've been following your build because i really like it.  I have no doubt that there is adequate hardpoint(s) under the sheetmetal.  The only concern is that there are other forces besides direct 90 degree "rollover" forces at play when particles make contact at >80mph.  A lateral hit (think wall at NHMS (sputnik)) could induce a sheer force that could cookie-cut the sheetmetal regardless of the hardpoint underneith.  No one wants a door bar to encroach on the driver's personal space, and without a lower crush bar, that cage spreader plate is the main thing that keeps the main hoop from collapsing inward.

2.  John (TEO) may be cool with it as is, or just an external spreader plate, to distribute sheer force, could make it all good.

3. Tech inspectors miss things and also reserve the right to get smarter.  Just because it passed before doesn't mean that it is the model to replicate, and sometimes the rules get updated and we have to follow suit. 

4.  I really like everything else you guys are puttin into this build and would hate to see you having to re-work a cage on friday night.  Jay has pointed me out to a team or two that needs an emergency door bar or a rear stay re-work, and I don't want you to have to go through that on your first build / first tech run.  As Cheeseroo said above, it's easier to fix now, then to fail tech and have to cut and weld through the evening....

Besides the above...You're the only one who has ever admitted publicly to valuing my opinion.  Other's on this forum now question your sanity, and my wife now thinks less of you, but thanks so much for making me feel valued!!!

FWIW, Hamsa

10 days later better get the next installment in here, it's a doozy.
Okay so hang with me folks, this story is just gonna take a left turn to freakytown for a bit here. So, a little history. I bought the little blue Arrow 160 for $450 way back around 2003 or so. I bought it from an older gentleman in Henderson, Colorado. He had bought it for a teenage grandson, who his grandson had driven it hard sliding it around on the dirt roads out there east of Henderson and he slid it off into a ditch, bending the rear axle. At that point the grandson didn’t want it anymore although it did still move under its own power but with a wobbler of a rear wheel, as the axle was bent out at the end. I bought a rear axle from Seven Sons junkyard off hwy 85 in Brighton. (Seven Sons is now gone, they are building a big water treatment plant there now) Anyway, I drove that little Arrow as my dd for a few years, and loved it. It was cheap, super-reliable, and was a somewhat sporty of a ride in a very minimalist sense.  Plus, it was one of those cars that not everyone immediately recognized what it was, nor knew about. It had these weird classic japanese car lines and proportions that spoke to something in me, as I was just the right age to notice that kind of stuff when these cars were out and about on the roads in the early 1980's (I was born in1970)  So, as I drove it and fixed it up with slot mags and so on, people would ask about it, and I learned a little about those early mitsu-mopars. Started searching more for them online, and around 2005 I found another one for sale on ebay. In Oregon. Yep, in 2005 my girlfriend (now  wife) and I bought a 78 Plymouth Arrow GS on ebay and then flew to Portland, Oregon and drove it back to Denver.  Time goes on, I was still enjoying owning these odd little cars. The ability to find them via the internet kept improving, and by May of 2007 I found a non-running 1980 Fire Arrow for sale on the Pueblo, Colorado CL, and I bought it and dragged it home as well. Fast forward to now, and after a few really fun Lemons races in other cars over the last few years, but also really wanting to give the Arrow a shot. Thus the story being brought up to date somewhat, anyway --  So this past Labor day weekend I got to work airing up tires, cutting weeds (okay trees) and pushingpullingcursing the 1980 Fire Arrow up out of the weeds it has been sitting in for over seven years... 


the Fire Arrow has quite more rust than the blue one, close up of front of the rear wheelwell:

and sadly the windshield is shot, windshields are no longer being made for these cars as far as I can determine.

But the Fire Arrow has a whole extra liter of displacement, scope that rear badging a 2.6 liter four cylinder.

So, I got it up in the driveway and up on jackstands and decided to start at the back and work forward. I am going to try switching the Fire Arrow rear end (disc brakes!) onto the Arrow 160, and vicyversey.
Got her up in the air here,

that 2x4 is doing a couple things, dispersing the load on the tops of the jackstands so they aren't such a pinpoint load spot, plus also holds up the driveshaft which is about to get unbolted from the yoke.
here's the brakes I'm looking for, a little cleaning up definitely needed here:


not sure if it is visible, but at the top of that brake caliper there is the little triple diamond Mitsubishi symbol so prevalent on the cars now. That symbol stamped on almost every single part on these cars.
And here is where it started turning into some work,

that little cotter pin, one on the back of each brake. It's key to getting the parking brakes off so you can take the rest of it all apart. Those cotter pins very rusted into place and ultimately just cut,twisted and broke them off, with still some of it left in the holes. one of those deals where you're laying on your back with rust dust particles dripping in your eyes.
crunchy crusty shock bushing:

rubber brake lines will have to be pulled and replaced:

Off to Rockauto.com, that website is pretty amazing for this project. Rockauto totally beats the local autoparts store for this stuff, by a wide margin. I got all the various leaf spring bushings both the front end and all the ones for the rear, which has upper and lower bushings for the shackle, brake lines, axle seals, pretty much everything to replace all the junk and the prices can't be beat, just a few bucks for the various bushings each, and same for the brake lines. Plus ordered some windshield wipers that they had a deal running as well. It was actually the shipping that jumped the price up by an extra $25 but even then the grand total was $75. okay sorry for sounding like a total advert there.
Alright let's see if the forum server going to balk when I hit the submit button with all these pics in here---