More work in the garage today. Progress is good coming together nicely.

Mock up of the frame rail.



Chassis rail needs to be notched 3 inches, that will give me the ride height I want.





Chassis is level, the torque tube is level, with the cradle being lifted 3 inches it looks like I wont have to modify the trans tunnel





The firewall will need a slight recess of about 4 inches

 

Final mock up now to make crossmembers mounting plates etc........... Happy under 3 weeks since I brought the Effy. Sorry for the poor pic's bad lighting in the shed.

 

Thomo5150____How's things going ? I need another fix, L.O.L.____

 

Working on the rear rails this weekend should have some pic's up soon..........

 

Great,looking forward for them._____JIM

 

Reworked the chassis table today, been squared up and extra braces added. Rear rails need to be pulled in an inch either side. Rails are now bolted on to the chassis table, I'll fab my own crossmembers, there will be 5 in total for the Effy.



reworking the chassis table.



Should have the rear rails fitted tomorrow, just taking time to centre and square the rails.

 

Setting the cradle height today, the lower frame rails of the Effy need to be trimed. You'll notice the frame profile is not the same from drivers side to passengers side. I wanted to keep the cradle between the rails without notching the effys chassis and losing strength etc..... The tricky bit is measuring the steering arm movement then welding in the rite size tube so the steering arms run thru the rails. Now you can see why I widened the chassis rails the cradle is snug between and it still can be removed from underneath the chassis. More measuring and design tomorrow, the rear frame rails arer sorted I'm waiting for some plate to be bent up these will look pretty trick.........

 

Looking good, This is the part i like about projects,the chassis and building it your self. The chassis will determine what kind of vehical you will end up with .__

 

Planning is the key, trust me for ever change I make to the Effy something else must change too. I've widened the chasssis so I must mod cab mounts and the front horns to bolt the radiator support on. No big deal but there are subtle changes that needed to be made which you must get rite in the planning process. Ride height was critical for this project and there are so many limiting factors as well. When I researched ride height with IFS on F100's I needed to determine what ride height I could achieve with the Vette drivetrain. There where a lot of Jag IFS swaps for Effys and the new trend seemed to be the Ford Crown Victoria IFS swaps in the USA. Here's something I learnt by studying one of these swaps which I then had to factor in to my conversion.
72 F100 CV cradle fitted.

The guy did a nice job and it was set to the factory spec's of the wheel centreline.

He put some 20's on which I liked and could see what my F100 would look like.

Here's the suble change I needed to make in the planning. I liked the ride height but I new mine would be lower. I notice the tyre is set forward and the gap doesn't look rite to me.

The guy then lowered the F100 1.5 inch which made the wheel location stand out more.



Things like this which need to be sorted before you start cutting or welding will make or break a swap and the way it looks. How many of you would think that I mucked up the wheel centreline location if I left it in the factory spec location. The change being made to where the centreline of the wheel is for this conversion is not easy, I had to determine the length of the wheelbase of 116.9 inch and subtract where I thought the wheel centreline should be then that change had to be factored in to the torque tube length before I ordered it.
Just one problem on my list, I think if I listed them I'd have to longest build thread...............

 

OK here's what was done today.

Cradle set at height and centred.



Engine and torque tube back in between the rails.








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Checked the ride height, the lower controll arm is level. The bottom of the tyre is aligned with the chassis tables top rail, 100% correct. Dont mind where the top A arms are they are just bolted there trying to help get the tyre level. New A arm brakets being fabed now.



These pic's make me happy, im 99% sure I will not have to mod the firewall, the cab will bolt back on and clear the firewall and the torque tube. Bonus...........






Not the best reference pic but the back of the cleveland sits square to where the cab mount is from memory????



Ok tomorrow I'll add more things like an exhaust , front sway bar etc..... I'll then start fitting the front and centre crossmembers as well as the cradle brakets. The chassis will be boxed, but I'll try to keep it stock looking as best I can. It's coming up to a month since I picked the Effy up happy with the progress but I expect delays along the way like wrong parts or delayed parts. Guess thats the joy of building something there is always the unknown factor.....

 

At least you started out with a pretty firm plan,i allways make to many changes. I start out with about 3 or 4 different plans,L.O.L. I started building my street rod 12 years ago,got it to going about 4 years ago and still making changes. I believe it's because i like to work on it more than driving it. I agree on the other truck with the CV,it needed to be back about 2 inches,but over all it still looks good. The way you are going about this i believe you are not new at it,looking good. ____

 

Your are making great progress! Glad the firewall worked out!! Enjoying this very much, thanks

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Love the progress. Looks like you have a great grasp on details and subtle changes potentially effecting 30 other things. I feel your pain, I'm building a 69 bronco with a full frame. Seems like once you figure out one thing, you realize a minute later that changes the plans for something else.

Keep up the good work. Not sure how much you plan on lowering the rear, but I would try to situate it in the frame the way you want rather than actually lowering the suspension. If you get too crazy with actually lowering the vette IRS the driveshafts can have a tendency to bind. Just something to watch for.

 

Thanks guys more mocking up today to see what the crossmembers have to clear etc.... You'll see the rear rails are now tappered in instead of out. Bad pic's but you'll get an idea that the frame will look close to stock in apperance.

 

Let me start by saying your work looks fine. (what I can see of it) Please buy a new camera. My eyes hurt looking at the pictures! lol.