HumberSS

Zero excuses for shit welding now. Woke up this morning and though fuck it, just gotta work harder this month.. Thanks santa That was third pull of the trigger.

Made a thing for holding the spare wheel. Not sure if I'll drill through the hard AF chassis to bolt it or fashion a few little edge clamps. I fucked it up a bit as didn't allow clearance for the protruding wheel centre as I lifts up. Nothing an angle grinder won't fix, but defeats the purpose of having done a mint job of profiling it...Such is life..I want to throw my mig in the bin too. Grrr. Tonights shenanigans involved trying to put the 4 holes in handbrake disk for mounting to diff flange. Fyi, I am not a machinists asshole. More of a crayon guy.. So I spent quite some time fishing around for the right clock (long story, my machinist left nearly 1 yr ago, lots of unpaid bills so I've effectively taken ownership of all his gear. Lawyers. Boring...) got it all clocked up with .01 on the centre bore and proceeded to pitch out the holes. Hole 1 went well. Broke the pilot drill on hole 2. Managed to fish the broken bits out without too much drama but when I went back to have another crack with a new bit I realised the part moved. Motherfucker. Now home on couch with beer. Was feeling defeated and unsure how to clock it all up again but my good friend who actually knows what he's doing has furnished me with the approach for setting up again so I'll have another lash tomorrow. He clearly did not want this shitty job. Will report back.

You might wanna check this out if you haven't seen already @Mitch.W

Those are some decent numbers. No doubt there is more in it too. We need more sooty merc love here.. the om612 in my farm hack is making about 170kw with the same 320cdi vnt turbo. I wish there was more support for them here in NZ, everyone is too scared to tutu..

Awesome. I reckon they look so cool. Good luck with the restos

Cool cars. Got any pics of the 61? My mate had a 61 plymouth coupe years ago in welly he daily'd (dereg too!) back when gas prices were 2 digits.. it was Matty B and dropped on its ass with a small block. I loved how weird/cool/ugly it was. Mopars of that era are just so awesome.

Finished joining the dots. It sounds perfect, not too loud, doesn't get raspy with a rev. I'll post a video some time. I'll put a tail pipe on once it's all together and I figure where it's going to run. It had a slightly noisy lifter sound this time which seemed to dissipate with time and I noticed some fan belt squeal too. Perhaps I couldn't hear those things prior when it was uncorked. Will investigate. Stoked to get to this point. It's no show pony but good enough. Final engineering tasks on/around chassis are to mount spare wheel hanger a bit further back, as the muffler occupies the position where that was. Build the handbrake caliper mounting. Finish gear shifter things. I got an auto column shifter from an early Previa at pickapart which have a similar 4 speed auto. It also has an overdrive button. I need to check out lever linkage ratios but have a pretty good idea how that's all going to go, half of it's already built. Probably only other things are to build an additional fresh water tank which will occupy void above the trans or down low in front of radiator above front axle to push a bit of weight forward to counter the engine setback and spare wheel shift. Also think about mounting a trans cooler - I'm not sure if I should do this now or just wait till it's on the road and measure trans oil temp to get a feel for size of cooler needed?

So in all of my froth I neglected to take account of my handbrake shenanigans. The exhaust route was a but tight (see comparitive pic 1 below) and whilst would have been fine if no handbrake stuff was going on the diff, I realized I was blindly ploughing on without considering that. Luckily I hadn't finished the exhaust, so I spent a night chopping it up and rerouting with more space around the diff head, it's much better. Just gotta connect the headers now, hopefully tonight's mish. I'm excited to hear it.

Thanks man, will check. Didn't think of that. Cheers

Just doomscrolling on tm and saw this. Say what you will about hugong but I've had this exact same tig for 12 years and it's been a champ, done heaps of steel and stainless work with it. Sound like this thing is basically new for $250.. https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/marketplace/business-farming-industry/industrial/manufacturing-metalwork/welders/listing/4980962879

I take mine to a local outfit who's been pretty good in the past. Maybe I just need to take it back there. I honestly thought the xcel arc were shit until i read all the fan boys on this thread. I inherited mine from the old man when he died, it sat for about a year or so until I got it which I thought maybe had contributed to it's demise. Definitely the liner was an issue on mine. I had been thinking to buy a new welder but don't really have the funds, I should persist if it is as good as what you're all saying...

My xcel arc is running like a sack of shit. I wonder if it has a dodgy board in it. I got it serviced and new handpiece and it went a bit better but still really inconsistent. Sometimes the amperage or wire speed decides to change of its own accord. Sometimes when pulling the trigger it just spatters and fucks around and doesnt strike a good arc. Sometimes it welds really nicely. It's starting to give me the shits. It's a 210 Amp single phase unit. Who's the agent for them??

This thing is batshit crazy. Excited to see progress. What sort of power?? I'm assuming it's a drag car?

So school me on this shit. On the 4V in the Dyna I'm weighing up the idea of a speeduino efi conversion. Maybe a future project once running, or maybe before.. my reasons are that I need a set of plug leads, which will set me back a few hundy, and the carb needs a rekit. After which it will still be a leaky carb.. ive previously discovered 2zz toyota coils fit perfectly (conveniently also dirt cheap and common), and was thinking I'd drill/weld bosses to factory manifold for the injectors. Might do this anyway to give the future option if i dont commit immediately. I'd have to run wasted spark, and apparently I wouldn't need cam phasing due to it being a wasted spark v8. So crank trigger and throw the dizzy away? And how many teeth? Curious as to best injectors (300hp would be ambitious for this donk). I like the idea of being able to tune for economy rather than outright power, no shitty fuel seeping carb and associated smells, and all-weather consistent running. I don't like the scope creep, but am entertaining nonetheless. Hardware wise it appears simple, of course the devil will be in the detail. Fuel pump and delivery setup recommendations also welcome. Speeduino recommendations? TPS? MAP? Throttle body or just gut the carb and use?? Apologies for naivety.