Mini Update (August 27, 2002)
Toy powered mini February 25, 2002 Feb 18th 2002 Feb 19th 2002 Feb 20th 2002 Feb 21st 2002 Feb 22nd 2002 Future: ALEC'S 4AGE MINI
I have the front end mounted! I built a
double hinge design that allows the front end not only to tilt but also remove
all together. So trick. The design added 1.7 pounds however. :( So now I have the
rear half tilting up and the front half tilting up/off. I'm getting pretty close
now. Not a lot of big stuff left. Very exciting. I need to fabricate some shallow
little box areas under the door sills to house some gas struts that will be the
lift assist for the back half of the body. I also need to build some tubular sub
structure for the front that I will use to locate the fiberglass front end in a
couple places and then use Dzus fasteners to secure it down. I am looking for
some hood/trunk catches to be used to hold the rear body to the chassis and the
fiberglass front to the chassis. After that its all just a matter of detail
stuff like repairing some rusty bits and pieces of the body shell and perfecting
the way the body will sit on the chassis. I ordered a bunch of Titanium hardware
(nuts, bolts etc) off Ebay. I am also busily locating the materials to start
building the Carbon Fiber door panels, kick panels and dashboard.
Eric
Charnholm echarnho@san.rr.com
Subject: MiniMR2 update, Wow. Now were getting
somewhere!
July 02, 2002
Hunh. Go figure. I do about 2 - 3 updates on the
MiniMR2 project per year. And now I do 2 in 1 week? Well its because I am really
getting somewhere. This thing is beginning to take shape. The body is officially
attached to the chassis. I finished the pivots for the tilting body tonight
(July 1st) at 6pm. I then attached the body to these pivots and viola! The whole
damn thing swings up like a big meat slicer. And its very solid. The final
design was so simple and its integration into the chassis so obvious that it
almost didn't happen. I was thinking too much. Over engineering the thing in my
head. I tried a couple different designs some of which added 10-15 lbs to the
car. This final design is two simple bearings mounted to the chassis. The
bearings are housed in a 1 inch wide piece of pipe. An arm is then attached to
the pipe. That arm is then welded permanently to the base of the windshield
posts ("A" pillar). I did a damn good job. I can't believe I did it all by
myself frankly. Damn is welding fun. What else can I weld? huuunnnn
hunnnn
I've decided that I am not going to use a 12 volt electric lifting
actuator to raise and lower the body. To much added weight (30lbs for a pair)
and they are not very inconspicuous due to the large size of each. The better
way to go is with a pair of gas struts from the tailgate of my 1988 Jeep
Cherokee. Go figure. Sometimes to best answer is right in front of your face. I
am going to recess them into the lower rocker panels and they will lift the body
right from where the sill (or threshold) lays ontop of the rockers. I will be
reinforcing the body to make sure this lift can be duplicated thousands of times
without any possibilities of the body itself going out of alignment.
It was a
big relief to see the body go up cleanly and then down cleanly with no
interference from the roll cage etc. It looks like something right from the
IHRA. Hysterical.
Well, its been awhile but here is the latest update on
the Mini bodied MR2 I've been working on for ummm... about... 4.5 YEARS! I took
the entire week off from work and planted myself at the bodyshop from Monday Feb
18th to Friday the 22nd. I even slept on the floor of the shop on Tuesday
evening. (That won't be happening again!) The shops owner, Luis Garcia, has been
kind enough to give me the run of the place including my own set of keys and
alarm codes to the shop. I can't thank him enough. He has helped direct me in
everything you see in the upcoming pictures.
Stared out doing 30 minutes of minor trimming on the MR2's
chassis to let the body settle down a further 1/2 inch onto the MR2's chassis. I
then moved out some old Chevy Impala hunk of Detroit iron and took over its bay,
permanently! My car will no longer sit out in the ocean air at the shop. That's
good news. Once car was placed its new home I went about going over all my
internet research I had done regarding the fabrication of a roll cage. I decided
the best cage design for this car will be one with two main hoops (8 feet long
each weighing 8.5 lbs each).
The main hoops would be welded to 1/4 inch thick
steel plates which would be fabricated and welded to the MR2's unibody. So I set
about fabricating custom mounting plates. Using a big chop saw it went pretty
fast although no two plates ended up being the same. I ground the areas of the
MR2's unibody where these mounting plates were go and started welding them in.
All mounting plates welded in place. A total of 23 plates
had to me made, all by myself mind you, and all had to be carefully welded in by
me as well. Keep in mind, I have never welded anything before. It was a crash
course, no pun intended. But I got the hang of it in all of 15 minutes (220 volt
MIG welder) and was laying down some butter like welds. The next step was a trip
to Harbor Freight and Tools where I purchased a pipe bender ($69.95) to assist
me in hand fabricating my very own roll cage. Now a pipe bender and a tube
bender are two different things. Pipe, as defined, carries material within its
walls such as liquids or gas. Tube is used for structure. Pipe is measured by
its inside diameter whereas Tube is measured from its outside diameter. The
reason this is important, as it turns out, is that Harbor Freight doesn't carry
a "Tube Bender". And if I wanted a Tube Bender from a race shop supplier it
could set me back $600 or more! So the pipe bender was going to have to work.
And with some 2 hours of custom work to that Harbor Freight pipe bender I made
that some-beach work great! Ha! I started measuring the main hoops and gently
bending with the help of a torch. It went very smooth and by the end of Tuesday,
I had the two main hoops formed.
Started welding in main hoops. I had to do some very time
consuming trimming of the hoops but 4 hours later they were both in. Perfect fit
BTW. I am the man! God I like it when things work. I have a perfect 1/4 inch
space along the door frame outline and the thing is just like BAMMM!
After
main hoops were installed I made two small 16 inch tubes that welded on the rear
face of the back strut towers and slope down diagonally to what was the floor of
the MR2's rear trunk. I then fabricated a horizontal cross member that will be
the main support for the steering column and dashboard components. Called it a
day.
Cut holes in front bulkhead where two 11 inch tubes will
attach the rear face of the FRONT strut towers to the main hoops in the
passenger compartment. This got complex and really challenged me as there was
very little room to work with. I purchased a $50 air powered body saw from
HFreight that did the trick. This tool is like a skinny jig saw with one
exception... it could cut a car in half in about 10 minutes. Its very cool.
Arrrr Arrr Arrr. I did two 6 degree bends on these 11 inch pieces and notched
both ends. (all tubing was natched for a perfect fit) Welded them in. I even
fabricated some gussets and welded them in.
Made the vertical "B" pillar bars with some very tricky
bends as well as de-seamed the car. That is I removed the exterior seams that are
prominent on all Minis. It really cleans up the appearance of the body. Much,
much better looking. I also cut out the rear most firewall because of future
clearance issues I am already aware of with the new Eaton blower. The
replacement with likely be a Carbon Fiber piece that I will have to construct
myself. Of and we started fabricating the dual trunk. Luis and I discussed at
length the fact that I don't have much room anywhere in the chassis for stuff
like electronics, fuses and tools. What we came up with is a trunk with a false
floorboard. In other words the original shape and design of the MR2's floorbard
is being kept but will be removable revealing a 6 inch space under the trunk.
This is located where if Muffler in the MR2 used to reside.
Well, I am trying to commit to a one day a week thing at the shop.
Saturdays probably. Luis and I guesstimate 300 hours are left to do. One of the
big changes to this car came when a man named John came by the shop and saw the
Mini. Turns out he constructs GT5 Porsches. He really helped with ideas. One
problem John helped solve is the lack of both access to the engine as well as
access to the inner adjustment nuts for the door hinges. Both were big problems.
Not anymore. Get this. We are building a roller bearing pivot point on both
sides that will allow the entire body (sans one-piece front end) to tilt forward
on a axis exposing the entire chassis. We purchased some HD gas struts that will
assist in the lift. Mini body weighs 60lbs right now. With front end cut off
figure 40 lbs. Lexan windows, S-glass fenders and structural support will up
that to probably 80lbs. No problem for a pair of struts. So that is
exciting.
Eric Charnholm echarnho@san.rr.com
