Tangerine Racing - Suspension Ear Re-Inforcement

Having re-inforced the outer suspension console, I needed to do the inner one - often referred to as the suspension 'ear'.

When I cleaned it up I realised there were a few rust holes which I welded up before welding on the re-inforcement piece.

This is the part from Tangerine Racing. Cleaned up and weld primered..

Here it is welded into place and 'tidied up' with the grinder post welding. Not the easiest thing to weld neatly! But it works...

Before painting it with Epoxy Primer I gave it a final going over with a cup brush on the grinder..and look what I unearthed..a lovely big hole on the underside of the ear. Had I not found it I suppose the suspension could have folded under heavy loading ...

 

...so I closed it up with with what could be described as a welded 'dog's dinner'! To be fair it was really tricky welding in this tight corner, especially upside-down. I think that should be strong enough now!

I should just mention, I also decided to weld all around the edges of the ear for extra rigidity.

More holes on the other side of the ear, welded closed..

..and the whole thing gets a liberal slap of primer, ready for the next 40 years.

Inner Wheel House clean-up and primer..

Here's just a few pics of cleaning up the hell-hole and inner wheel house post welding..don't get too excited! I'll do a bit of filling and sanding later to finish it off but at least it won't start rusting now.

Next job will be to stiffen up the suspension ear (bottom of the last pic) and add the Heim Rods from the stiffening kit to help stabilise the suspension under heavy loads..."fascinating" I hear you cry. Bet you can't wait to see that!

Tangerine Racing - Chassis Stiffening Installation

Now the Inner Wheel House was done, I started on stiffening the chassis. I bought a kit from Chris Foley at CFR Tangerine Racing in the US. These pics show the installation of the external suspension console. I felt that with the intended horsepower and potential track use it might be a good idea to beef up the suspension to handle the increased loads and stresses.

So first off, I cleaned up the suspension console and painted it with epoxy primer. Here it is with the paint off..

...and painted up.

I prepped the first bit of the kit ready to install.. I cleaned off the temporary primer and sprayed the reverse side with Weld Primer...

..and welded it in.

And now comes the "here's one I made earlier" moment. I stupidly didn't take enough pics and got a bit carried away just welding the hell out of everything! So here's the finished job, fully welded and just needing clean-up and paint! Bear in mind I have to do this on both sides, obviously, so next time I'll take more pics.

You can see how the kit boxes-up the suspension console to prevent it flexing or cracking under heavy loading.

Here it is cleaned-up...

...and primed.

Inner Wheel House - outside painted

I ground the outside welds down although only partially. I felt it was better to leave the weld largely intact so as not to grind the sheet too thin at any point - and once the wing is welded back in place and the wheel house itself has a black stone-chip coating on it you won't be able to see the welds anyway!

Here it is ground, wire-brushed and de-greased...

Then I painted it with Epoxy Primer. I'll eventually do one or two more coats of the Epoxy before I paint it with black stone-chip paint to finish..

Firewall Hole Patch-Up

Rust from the Hell-Hole had spread into the lower section of the Firewall, so that rust had to be cut-out and the hole filled. Here's the hole from the outside and inside...

The patch fabricated..

Welded.. I will grind it smooth and paint later.

Inner Wheel House patch-ups...

Because the main hole I needed to fill was larger than the Panel would fill, I had to do a little extra patching. Here are the pics of that....

I patched it in 2 parts. Here's the first patch from the outside.

And the second patch...

Porsche 914 Inner Wheel House Repair continued...

Now the rusty metal and crappy repair job done by a previous owner have been cut out - and the replacement panel has been cut to fit the hole, it's time to weld it in. The fit is pretty good.

I used conventional welders clamps together with Integrips to hold the panel in place.. here are pics from the outside and inside before welding.

And here it is tack welded into place.. You've got to be pretty strategic as to which points you tack weld as you move around the panel, so that it doesn't shift or stretch due to the heat of the welds. 

From the inside, you can see the plug welds I made to attach the panel to the inner structure of the Sail Panel.

It's also important that when you weld such thin metal that you don't put too much heat into any one point. So I welded roughly inch-long lengths and allowed them to cool before I welded near them again. While they cooled, I would place welds on the other side of the panel. Here you can see the short lengths of weld that I would eventually join together.

And here's the whole panel completely welded around...