My Locost Build

Don't leave the garage door open and don't leave gun and keys in the car again.

 

you're still riding that train, aren't you...

you should really come up with some new material

 

LOL I don't keep up with you guys enough (no point to nor do I care).


Speaking of which....did they ever find Brett's gun?

 

Few things.

1. Label it all, even if you don't think you need to. If you are trying to sell a lot of stuff, label and then label the labels. I have a really really good memory, and I'm pissed at some of the stuff I can't identify (and I even labeled about 90% of the stuff).

2. People will buy anything, if given enough time. You need to judge price versus the value of your time and space.

3. Clean parts as you take them off if you intend to sell/keep.

4. A car, when fully parted out..takes up a minimum of 5-6 times the amount of space you expected it to take up.


Luckily you are NOT dealing with 40+ year old parts that sometimes have ridiculous value for stupid shit. I've had to hold onto nearly everything as it came off. I've bought shelves, more shelves, cabinets, more shelves and parts have taken over my one spare bedroom.

Consider that 85%+ of the parts I took off, are not going back on. So it's a similar situation in a way to mine. Best advice is clean as you go, and judge what you need to keep and what can be thrown away immediately (daily at most), and throw it away. It becomes incredibly overwhelming if you don't.

 

And it's no fun when it takes away from working on your actual project and you're forced to sell/organize parts you took off months earlier that haven't sold yet.

 

hrm, didn't even think about this. I may be bringing a lot of it to the office here, as we have plenty of storage space here. I'll probably take everything apart at home, transport what isn't needed down to the office where I can store it much easier. I'll have plenty of storage in the garage, I hope, after I get everything arranged, but I didn't even start to think about storing EVERYTHING.

Also, the interior is shit, so i have no problems tarping the interior and piling shit in there, too.

 

When parting out a whole car, don't get hung up on prices, just get it gone.

Make a spreadsheet of what you think you can get for everything. You will likely only end up getting about 75% of what you think so keep that in mind.

 

or just take out what you need and sell the shell and be done with that redneck piece of shit.

 

not sure what all that implies...

 

Your location helps you but don't forget to factor in the pain of shipping things if you are willing to do so. When I totalled the WRX (which was easily able to be fixed and I had access to the parts for free...just didn't want to do it) I had everything listed out. About 80% of the entire car was spoken for and people were waiting on me to give them the go ahead to send me the money (I refused to take money without having the part ready to ship). I started factoring in all the labor and the pain of shipping (most was going to NC/GA/VA) and it was gonna be a headache but I was getting close to $12,000 minus shipping costs so to be fair lets say $10,000 as a nice round number. Then asshole called me and asked a price for EVERYTHING and we settled at a vastly lower price. Well worth it in my opinion.

However you are keeping a lot of the parts so that doesn't help you but still factor in shipping and all as that is just a pain in the butt.

 

throw what you don't need into the shell, haul shell down to Newell Recycling with title in hand. Take $500.00 buy a nice bottle of bourbon and call it done.

 

pretty fucking simple, time is money so what's it worth to get shit done?

 

this isn't business, this is leisure. this project has no defined timeline, only a defined goal. No, selling off the lugnuts isn't worth it, but if i can pick up an extra couple grand by spending a few extra hours parting it out, i'm going to do it.

Plus, and this is just a personal goal of mine, but I still want to keep the entire build budget under $10k. Any money I make off the selling the shell / part out will be deducted from the overall cost of the project in the end.

 

besides engine and harness what else are you using?

 

in theory, but don't plan on it funding it. Don't say, well I'll have enough for the suspension after I sell X list of parts. It may just be psychological too, but sell the parts in time and don't figure them as taking of Y amount of dollars. You may sit on some parts way longer than you expect to.

 

What will make up the rear end components? Not using the rear diff from the donor car?

 

transmission for sure, other things I need but not sure where i'll get them:
e-brake assembly
ignition assembly (not sure how this will work yet, as I don't want to have to use the factory key)
fuel delivery system
master / slave cylinders
pedal assembly
audio system (maybe, still undecided if I want to run audio)

I'm sure there's more, but those are the first that pop into mind

nah, won't be used to fund anything, just used to knock the final cost of hte build down. I'll be taking whatever money I make off of it and putting it back into the locost spending account, but none of my budgeting takes that into account

rear end will be a ford 8.8 rear end, probably out of the IRS explorers (i believe 2004+, but it's been 6 months since I've looked into this). The front end will use a Mustang II front end w/ rack & pinion steering crammed in there somewhere

 

crap, so i just looked up the dimensions, then measured the frame, then realized i'm screwed. The dimension from the front of the crank pulley to the back of the bell housing is just over 35". I have about 38" to play with, but I think I'm going to need the space up front, and I need to mount the entire assembly where the shifter is at the point I want it.

I checked out Phil's LS1 build thread (great source for info, btw) to see how he got around this, he ended up hacking one of the main support bars and redoing it. He didn't note this via text, so I never even picked up on it, but when looking at his pictures to see how he did it I discovered this one (hope this works):



check out the support brace where the tranny bell housing sits...fuck. Phil actually raises this bar, but I think i'm just going to relocate it. This is why they say don't start the frame w/out the drive train...

 

don't worry, it'll happen again, no time line right?

 

This feeling sucks. If there weren't complications it wouldn't be fun, right???? :rofl:

 

this is why I didn't weld mine until I had a donor.

 

like you're going to finish it...

 

Ball heard the motor today, said he thinks it's rod knock. I will hopefully have it out in the next couple of weeks and start the break down, I'm having Andrew Ball with Ball Engines looking at a breakdown for what all I need. Hopefully when the motor's out and inspected, the damage is minor and can easily be fixed.

Now to figure out where the hell to sell a complete rolling chassis...any takers?

 

racingjunk or craigslist, or the regional LS1tech forums

 

trailer it up to Commerce at the next SuperChevy show.

 

8/29/12
Started working on the Camaro. Don't have a bucket so I couldn't drain the radiator, but that's the last of the front accessories to remove, then drop the driveshaft. I was really shocked to discover that half of the bolts under the hood are metric :nuts:

 

:rofl:

front emblem makes me think it's french. maybe that's why it smells so damn terrible in the interior

 

pretty sure chevrolet was a french race car driver

 

Nope

Ironically close....

Oshawa Canada....

 

Most of the newer Chebbies are switching to metric I believe. EVERYTHING on my wife's Saturn is metric.

 

Good luck with the build!

I saw a Stalker with an LS1, and your 442 build should be a hell of a beast!

 

Indeed. I was referring to the McSorley 442 chassis. I was considering using the design when I had a short term ambition to build a locost, but choose a prebuilt IRS rear suspension chassis instead.

I really hope this gets completed.. Too many people abandon their locost builds.

 

I'm in too deep at this point. The donor car sealed it in for me, there's no turning back now. The deadline may be extended, but at this point it will get done.

I'm running IRS, too. Ford 8.8 rear end out of an 04+ explorer. Entire setup is only a couple hundred bucks, it's just figuring out how to put it together. I have a great PDF document on my work computer where a guy put one together, the auto-cad'd everything so you have precise measurements and build instructions.

It's scary looking. Even with an engineering degree, some of the parts / pieces in there completely overwhelm me.

 

I really wish you the best. I parted a miata for suspension/diff, and an S2000 for drivetrain for mine, had the engine and suspension mounted and then never finished it. It was overwhelmed by all of the details. I sold the project to a guy that added a dry sump and the rest of the suspension, and then he sold it to another guy who started to add fenders over a year ago.

Hang in there!

 

classifieds are littered with them like 356's back in the 90's.

curious to see the corner weights on this once done. What size brakes on the front and tire size?

 

haven't made it that far yet. Enough brakes to bite and grab, but I want to make sure I don't have too much brakes, as I don't want the tires locking up too easily. Will have to play with it, but I'll probably keep the stock brakes off the ford rearend for the backs. Running a mustang II front end, so i have plenty of options. Wheel / tire combo is going to be a biggy, and it will probably blow my budget. I want to stay light weight, as I want as little unsprung weight as possible, but it will be used for both show and go, so we'll see. Was originally thinking vette wheels, but they're so damn heavy, I'll probably settle with some light weight 17's and run something around a 245/40/17 on all fours.

Also keep in mind, I'm only using rack and pinion steering, no power steering. Will be like my first car...'84 toyota pickup, lifted, 33" tires, front / rear solid axles. In the winter time, that front steering damper would freeze up and it was almost impossible to turn. DON"T want that

 

I'm looking forward to this build which is local to you guys. AllPro and Topspeed is involved.

http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2093090

 

son of a bitch!!! that's my color green I want to use, too. Lol. I'm interested to see what the build cost will be. I would've loved to have the shops involved, but i just can't justify the outrageous costs they're going to charge for all of this work (sorry vendors...tis true).

I think i'm going to use a black base with grey accents, similar in color to the my UGM STi. I want to powder coat the block, frame and a few other accent pieces in that green color. I also want his seats...

 

I think he will probably have $25,000 in it all said and done.

I believe the kit itself was $13,000. Add in the parts and the build....labor, etc.

He wrinkle black powder coated virtually EVERYTHING. Very clean and well done.


So clean with the wiring install...hid everything they could



I dig this look

 

:eek3:

:eek3: :eek3:

must be nice to have that much money to throw away on mere toys. i know i'm getting older...priorities are definitely starting to shift in my life. Granted i'm only 28, but I would much rather invest that money in long term growth or family oriented things.

when i win the lottery, this build will progress soo much faster. Cmon retirement plan...cmon :sx:


edit - this is also why i'm SLOWLY working on this. a $10k budget spread out over three years hurts much, much less on the overall bank account. and for the most part, my largest financial purchase is already behind me. My drivetrain was almost half my budget, the remaining pieces should have a much lesser effect on my budgets

 

Not to mention the pride and satisfaction in knowing that you built virtually everything from scratch and did it all yourself.

 

OP updated

 

I know you are trying to recoup money by have a good shell to sell but is there a market for stripped shells and would you get enough money to warrant keeping the shell intact?

Reason I am asking is another option is you can cut out (not sure if the radiator support is unboltable) the radiator support and just unbolt the trans/engine and slide it forward and out easily vs tilting rocking banging cursing etc.

 

they seam welded that turd in, lazy ass manufacturers. from what I've seen, racing junk has rolling shells going for around $750-1000, depending on what's done. Unfortunately, mine's not caged, but the chassis has very low mileage and is untampered with (only has aftermarket wheels, head unit, cheap ugly blue HID lights).

We shall see, but i'd rather not cut and lose the money b/c i'm lazy. Granted, if push comes to shove, my give-o-shit meter will eventually hit zero and the sawzall will come out

 

after our recent trip to the dragon, it's got me wanting to work on this thing more. Got the prop shaft dropped, never done that before (on any vehicle), was surprised at how easily it's held in there. Time to start finding some youtube videos of people dropping the motor out the bottom, see what all is required and if it's even possible for me to do it in my garage

 

Found this gem. I've done most of it, but I broke down the youtube link with step by step instructions so i can make sure i've completed everything. Still not sure how i'm going to get the car high enough, but that's future drew's problem...

[youtube]vp1lkz3VtS8[/youtube]

Driver's side:
Remove Brake Booster
Remove Master Cylinder
Remove shock tower bolts
remove intermediate steering linkage bolt
remove two front brake lines (from square metal thing on top)

Passenger Side:
Something with harness
Loosen strut tower bolts
Upper AC compressor bolts

Underside:
Brakeline heat shield from drivers side
Clips holding brakelines to frame
Disconnect constant power line from back of alternator
Remove front sway bar
Remove AC compressor
Remove starter
Remove all sensors and ground straps
Remove hydraulic throwout bearing hose
Remove exhaust y-pipe
Drop drive shaft
Remove top bolt from torque arm bracket (long black brace running parallel to drive shaft)
Disconnect wheel speed sensor off spindle

Dropping Motor:
Remove 6 bolts on front cradle
Remove 4 bolts on transmission crossmember
Position dolly where front cradle is towards front of dolly for weight distribution
Don't drop the car...

Summarized another tutorial, copied from the forums onto a word document, includes pictures <click me>

 

usually the prop shaft is flanged to the rear diff and slides onto the output shaft at the tail end of the transmission. was the T56 the same way? probably a bearing in there halfway down the length of the shaft also