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I pulled the rear underpan off and reattached the exhaust. I've got some new theories about how to make this part work and look right but that's for later in the summer. 

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For now I'm back into my final punch-out list. The steering wheel is now attached to the car. This required that I file down the 25mm nut that comes on VW steering wheels to 22mm so I could fit the socket down in the hole. Really.

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Synching the carbs. I also noticed the oil temp gauge isn't working right. Never got above 80 and really barely touched it and would bounce back down to like 45C. 

I ran it for like an hour and a half. It got so the oil filter housing was pretty dang warm, so I know it's warmed up.

I ended up switching the oil gauge wires, pressure for temp and back again. Pretty sure it's wired correctly. The sender is new can came from Hartmut. Weird. If anyone has any ideas about this I'm all ears.

Anyway I got the cylinders all firing and the snail to show the same on all four holes.

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Also got the clutch adjusted pretty close. All four gears and R, babies. 

Jacked the rear up two inches to check clearances between the axle boots and the exhaust. It's good enough that I might not even have to redesign the underpan before reinstalling.

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I'm going to copy Danny's limiting straps to prevent the possibility of jacking out back; 2 inches in that direction seems like plenty.  

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So I re-set the left front wheel camber to something closer to .3 degrees negative and that of course putched-up the toe in. Just now re-set toe-in to 1/8 inch, re-checked camber: good @ .3 to .4 deg negative on both fronts. Rear P is .2 or .3 negative and rear d is 0 with no driver. all taken before clam and spare tire are added so I think those will probably settle in to like .4 and .3 once the car is fully assembled with me in there. Front-to rear lengths are now dead-on to within 1/16 inch so if I tightened up everything right (gonna check/re-tighten tomorrow) we should be good enough for road test-aligned at least.

After that I can straighten out the steering wheel as needed and pop the horn button on. 

My punch list has 10 items remaining before visiting the Maryland State Police and MVA to get the titling/registration underway. Unfortunately the MVA was shut down Friday until further notice due to corona virus.

Last edited by edsnova

Ed, I guess you know this, but I think you have to go for the Street Rod classification.  AS I did. Of course, I had the donor VW registration/title, so that helped. Did not have to show anybody the car.  No inspection.  Do you have a donor title?  If this car was built up from scratch, not sure how MD deals w that.  If you take it in to be looked at by a certified MD gov't employee, I can about gar-un-tee your punch list will get a lot longer, and your temper will grow a lot shorter.  As always, keep us posted.

 

PS Street Rod in MD means "substantially modified".  So please tell me you have an old VIN somewhere that can be used and a good title to go with it.  If there is a category for hand built, I don't know about that.

I should mention that the rather small portion of my frame/pan that is actually from the donor car does include the tunnel where the VIN is stamped on.  An exceedingly important aspect of the registration and titling process.  I get stopped, I flip up a little flap of carpet just behind and between the seats, and there is the VIN that's on my registration. "thanks for checking officer, have a nice day."

edsnova posted:

Yes, she'll get a real 4-wheel alignment by a competent shop . . . unless the thing drives perfectly and my own re-checks after 50 or 100 miles show it's dead-on.

Neither one of my Spyders has ever been to any shop, especially an alignment shop. Set the front camber, set the rear ride height, set the toe and drive it. If it drives straight I wouldn't stress about it.

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