Skip to main content

Reply to "Maui garage find Intermeccanica rebuild"

End of the year update: I got the chassis drivable. My wife captured a great video with her saying "Don't do it, don't do it" as I drove it down to the corner and back. I've also been doing some body work to touch up the fiberglass in areas that have seen trauma sometime in the last 35-40 years. Nearly done with that. I'm just completing some modification to the battery box and body front support to allow the installation of a "universal" air conditioning evaporator box. I doubt there's a lot of interest in this mod, but I'll share it for those rare hot weather fans.

The A/C plan: Keep the under dash as clean as possible, route vents to our feet and through the dash to our faces, plan on using it with the top down mostly to increase driving enjoyability, hide the fan & temp controls under the dash (going for visual simplicity).

Decisions so far: Coldmaster Universal Underdash kit w/o compressor 404-000DC - Even though I'm not mounting it underdash, the evaporator/blower seems to be a reasonable size and the blower puts out a lot of air (important since it will be used with the top down mostly). I'll be able to use most of the other parts in the kit and the price is reasonablish. i had to slightly trim the steering gear side of the evaporator to make it fit (see pics). I plan on buying a SD7H15 compressor since it is designed for engines of smaller displacement and still puts out plenty of cooling. Big decision - I decided not to worry about recirculating the air from the cars interior back into the blower inlets. It will be all fresh air. This reduces plumbing challenges and fits with the top down use case. I haven't finally decided on the compressor mount. Gilmore gets good press, but I may end up fabricating one myself.

evap

Left side will need to be trimmed back to clear steering gear.

hole

Hole cut into batter box

evap in box

It fits...

evap under

Outlet hoses will go through holes cut into front body support and then over the front axle tubes

 

evap cut

Evaporator corner notched and aluminum flashing cut for riveting into box

evap rivet

Riveting done and patch in place

Evap Mod

Patch sealed with black RTV and painted to match

support

Front body support cut to allow cooling hoses through. I added two additional fiberglass vertical supports between the holes on the back side to make sure no strength was lost in the support

 

I'll update after I make some more progress. Hope everyone has a Happy New Year!

Mike

Attachments

Images (8)
  • evap under
  • evap in box
  • hole
  • evap
  • evap cut
  • evap rivet
  • Evap Mod
  • support
Last edited by Michael Pickett
×
×
×
×
×