Funk-y Fresh Fab: Rebuilding the Front Shock Towers

The previous owner of the car had decided to hack the tops of the shock towers to clear his fairly terribly made camber plates. Here's a view from the bottom with the metal I welded in place and the Chedda's Auto adjuster plate in place:

As you might be able to tell, I needed to trim it back so that the shock rod would actually fit:

All cleaned up and much more structurally sound:

Funk-y Fresh Fab: Preparing to mount the lexan windshield!

Here is a rundown of another completed task on the Funks' 1G CRX H-production race car!

Running a lexan windshield safely requires a good bit of preparation and some reading of the rules. After putting our heads together, Ed and I figured that we could run the three required 1"x1/8" aluminum support straps from three of the original window trim holes, if we could figure out a way to put an easy hole with threads in those spots. Good thing someone can weld! heh

Object lesson: Think ahead a few steps and possibly save some time!

I decided to make block off plates with welded on captive nuts to cover the trim holes and provide an easy way to essentially bolt the windshield in place. I cut off six pieces of 1"x1/8" plate . . . but I should have drilled the holes in them first! LOL!

 Oops! I got them drilled and cleaned up:

 It didn't take long, but, I definitely could have saved a few minutes had I simply marked the holes and drilled them before cutting each plate off the longer piece.

Then I threaded a nut onto a bolt to hold everything in place while I tacked the nut to the plate:

Three REALLY solid tacks should never break:

First one done:

I caught one of them while it was still glowing:

I have some pretty cool ideas on finishing this part of the build, but, that's all I've got for now.

Funky Fresh Fab: Installing Lexan Windows

Yes, there hasn't been a post in a while. Yes, some of you are annoyed. There is a lot going on besides me having the time to sit down and type blog posts. But, you readers have spoken and I will get back on the train and do this again. Anyway . . .

Last I left off, I had just finished the dash. Ed mounted the Traqmate display on a spacer:

The next big task was prepping the rear window for install. It's a molded sheet of lexan, which Ed decided to use Dzus fasteners to hold around the sides. I made a spacer to hold the Dzus tabs in the right spot. This was pretty easy. I chopped a piece of steel to get the right drop:

Then welded on a longer piece:

How it's used:

I discovered that I could use a magnet to hold everything in place long enough to tack the tabs in place:

Progress:

Now it just need support:

Close up:

Measuring for the support straps:

Now, on to the front! I opted to use existing bolt holes to locate the three required straps:

I also came up with a pretty simple way to hold the bottom of the windshield in place. I made squares of the aluminum:

After cutting them out, I superglued them in place so that they support the bottom edge: