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-   -   250 swb build (https://madabout-kitcars.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6003)

lancelot link 6th July 2016 20:45

250 swb build
 
I was approached via Jeff H on here to put a 250 SWB together for a guy that had started the build but come up against a brick wall . He went to see Jeff's car with a view to building some similar features to Jeffs into his and , long story short ..I have the build .
Jeff will be doing prep and paint , I have been asked to fit the kit and incorporate a few changes ...

The customer had fitted the front end , placed the rear section on but not fitted , wired the rear lights in , fitted grille and plates and door frames ...and drove it 65 miles to my workshop !!

I made a start yesterday ..

I have fabricated from ally sections , some rain channels to go around the bonnet aperture .. these are bonded , rivetted and fibreglassed in place .

I have done the inner wing slice both sides , I chose the two slice method and glassed it back together .
I have removed the original BMW wing mounts ..
Washer jets and side repeaters have been trial fitted .

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...otlink/250.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/2501.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/2502.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/2503.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/2504.jpg

I have begun to fit hidden fixings to hold the bonnet in place , simple homemade 'bighead' style fixings using flat plate and 8mm bolts welded in the centres , bonded to the underside with tiger seal ...

I have also removed the doors and interior in preperation for the shorter door / higher cill modification that this ones getting too ...

lancelot link 6th July 2016 21:06

I'm not sure how well it shows in the picture , but the front rain gutter has 2 ovalish dips to allow the bonnet pins to locate fully back in their holes .

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/2506.jpg


I ended the day with seats and rear carpet section removed . Drivers seat came out in about 10 mins ...passenger seat about an hour ! The electric motor stopped working , so I couldnt get to the rear bolts that hold the seat in ...after messing about trying lots of different things , I phoned Chris at Tribute to see if there was an easy way ...Chris basically said , you are screwed ! but if you can get the cables on either side of the motor to turn , you can very slowly wind the seat forward manually ...the cables turned ! so that was cool ...I decided to cut the cables , put the cut end in a cordless drill and wind them that way ...it worked !!http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/2508.jpg

Jaguartvr 7th July 2016 09:27

Door/sill mod
 
I do like the look of the modified door and sill but it looks like an awful lot of work. Could anybody do a photoshop of the rear of the door being curved and the rear wing / sill gap being filled but leaving the bottom of the door and sill itself alone?

Barber 7th July 2016 17:24

The more different build threads the better. I am watching your thread and Jeff's avidly along with JagTVR's.

lancelot link 7th July 2016 19:18

Managed to get 4 hours in on the car today .

The bonnet pins I made yesterday had cured overnight , so a quick clean up and my nylon spacer added with a washer and the bonnet was ready to fit.

(Luckily whilst I was in Wicks yesterday I spotted that they had put the 250 SWB bonnet spacers they sell in the wrong aisle and they were in the 'door stops' category and priced at 49p a pair !!)

I drilled holes in the fixing plates to allow the tiger seal to bleed through and grab the bracket better ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...lotlink/25.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/26_1.jpg


http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...lotlink/27.jpg

rest of the afternoon was spent mostly removing stuff ...rear bumper and all its bracketry in preperation for a Jeff H rear framework to be fitted.

seat belt mounts were cut off as this ones getting a harness bar ..I welded 4 ringbolt seat belt mounts into the car as well ...2 on inner cill where a handy grommet lives and two on the rear of the tunnel...

final job of the day was to remove the passenger side boot hinge ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...lotlink/28.jpg

more tomorrow ...

Mikewade 7th July 2016 20:27

Thanks
 
Thank you for doing this thread. Some useful information and good photographs!

jones 7th July 2016 20:42

Hmmmmmm are you just fuelling the curiosity?

Paul L 9th July 2016 07:14

Gary - Love the use of door stops. :cool:

Good luck, Paul. :)

lancelot link 9th July 2016 20:36

Not much achieved today as I had my son to look after this morning and had some parts chasing to do ...

I have now got this section ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/250e.jpg

I'm fitting the filler cap in the 250 GTO location , which has me a little perplexed at the moment trying to find a solution to the new placement and the route the fill tube can take to enter the tank nicely , no kinks , not too slow a fill etc...I've got a rough idea how its going to work but until I start digging , not totally sure ...

The boot corner piece Chris at Tribute supplied is a good starting point , the cap needs to be recessed slightly , reducing the flow angle , but I think we can make it happen ...

I finished the hinge movement earlier , rebraced it and checked for operation ...so not much achieved today , hoping to get a few hours on it tomorrow as I only have a certain amount of time to get this car ready for the paintshop ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/250f.jpg

Mitchelkitman 9th July 2016 22:13

Is the filler going in the LHS? If so is it possible to turn the tank 180 degrees to improve the fill route? (might make it difficult for exit tubes on tank though?)
Just a thought.

lancelot link 10th July 2016 17:32

Managed to get 3.5 hours in on her today ....
Jeffs old filler recess he decided not to use on his car was a godsend today ...Combining trimming it down in height and a section of MX250 acquired from Tribute , enabled me to do this ....

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...ink/250pet.jpg

All held together with straps and tec screws for now .. a section of the SWB boot aperture was cut away and the MX panel grafted in ...the rain channels and a bit of bodywork will need fettling but I managed to get the rear back off , turned over and glassed up before I left.
The reference pics I found show the cap on close inspection to not be fully flush as I first thought , but to actually stick out a little bit ...

The cap supplied is a bit larger than the originals , so will dominate this area a bit more than they normally do , but its minimal really and once all the edges are straightened out , gapped around the cap etc..she should be good to go ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/250p.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...link/250pe.jpg

When I put it back on , I can start the bootlid mod. and then the task of connecting to the tank begins ......

lancelot link 10th July 2016 18:10

Thanks Jeffy baby .... I used these two images ...

http://www.boldride.com/ride/1960/fe...netta/image/26



http://www.boldride.com/ride/1960/fe...netta/image/27

If you take the image number bit off the end of the adress , it links to a great gallery ...

Its interesting because looking at your pic above , I would have opted to put the cap hinge above the shut line ..a few pics suggest that , but my links show it inline with the shut line ...I know they all have subtle differences , no 2 are quite the same ...and that is great news for the fakers !!

Mitchelkitman 10th July 2016 18:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeff H (Post 80956)
The filler will be mounted LHS,

This is what the customer has asked for, it will be a challenge to get the pipes routed across to the offside, the customer is fully aware it may be a slow fill but he is happy for the trade off.

Gary picked up my old filler recess this morning to use, he is so keen he is working on it on a Sunday .

So not possible to turn the tank 180 degrees so the filler can be on the same side?

Paul L 11th July 2016 07:29

Gary - So far, it does look like this…

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/250p.jpg

Is going to make a good tribute to this. :cool:

http://i63.tinypic.com/o0xo28.jpg

Is there any way of fitting a different petrol tank in the current space?

Something similar to Oxford's Sammio, but bigger, just to make the fuel hose route easier.

http://www.thewebsofa.com/carpics/f290.jpg

Good luck, Paul. :)

PS
I've only just started using those straps on my own build and they are great for this kind of thing. :D

Roadster 11th July 2016 07:51

It might be easier to modify the tank cut a new inlet and patch the old

lancelot link 11th July 2016 19:31

ROADSTER - Yes mate , thats one option I am considering ...

PAUL L - I wanted the customer to fit a new tank in the boot , thats actually how the 250 SWB is ..but he wants to retain bootspace as much as possible , even creating some extra space if we can ...

Today I continued to beaver away on the fuel cap mod ...

We are at this stage now ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...nk/250boot.jpg

I have modified the boot inner skin as well , moved the original hinge mount in to match the hinge and re-instated the inner rib to flow better with the new location ...its only roughly filled so far , another bit of filling required to straighten it out a bit , but you get the idea ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/250b.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...link/250bo.jpg

So at the end of today , we are at this point ...it still needs gapping up a bit , but thats Jeff's dept . !!

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...k/250boott.jpg

tomorrow I go digging and hopefully find a solution to the fuel flow ...

Roadster 11th July 2016 19:49

I know its a lot of work but I much prefer this fuel cap location

lancelot link 11th July 2016 20:32

That represents about a day and a half ...but agreed , it does look cool ...if a builder opted for the tank in the boot option , its a lot easier to create ...

http://www.boldride.com/ride/1960/fe...netta/image/41

Very Andy 12th July 2016 08:59

Superb work!
Dont fancy taking a mould off of that area do you, for those who have the inclination but not the skills! :eyebrows:

lancelot link 12th July 2016 19:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by Very Andy (Post 80986)
Superb work!
Dont fancy taking a mould off of that area do you, for those who have the inclination but not the skills! :eyebrows:

Thank you ...How much would you mould ? at some point you need to join it into the standard kit ...I wouldn't want to start moulding one of Chris's kits . But Chris has been known to deviate , perhaps have a chat with him ?

I worked out the filler tube today , no pics as its all apart again to be welded and bracketry added etc.. but it basically comes from the original filler and back on itself through the panel next to the filler at about the 10 o'clock position ...this puts a piece of 2'' stainless pipe sticking into the rear shelf area next to the rollbar... it travels through the rear boot panel into the boot area ....it will be a slow fill but its a constant run ...

Jaguartvr 12th July 2016 20:03

I'm on holiday so won't be able to do any work for a few weeks but I had intended to make the fuel filler pipe out of 2" plastic plumbing pipe from B&Q to make the template, much easier to chop and change than metal. Lots of pre formed metal bends available on EBay for very little money and will probably join them with rubber pipe to connect them together.

Danny_HUFC 13th July 2016 06:22

Great work there. It does look a lot better in that position although its a lot of work, i think its worth it.

lancelot link 14th July 2016 19:03

BIT MORE DONE TODAY .....I have still got to put the fuel delivery pipe together , I decided to have my 'twisted U - section' tig welded as I don't want any issues with it and I ran out of time to collect from my mate this afternoon ..I'm going to pick it up first thing in the morning , so first job will be fit up the pipes and hoses , before disconnecting it all again as the roof still needs to come on and off a few times ..

Today I managed to make a start on boot guttering , very simple with B & Q ally sections bent to shape around the aperture and sikkoflexed in place with fixing bolts as well ...next time the bodies off , I will fibreglass the rear as well , in a similar fashion to the front. I need to fit a small drain pipe next to the fuel cap in the gutter to deal with a potential build up area there ..but its nearly done ..

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...ink/2503_1.jpg

I also made a start on the door / cill mods.
I am virtually copying Jeff H's technique for this and Jeff very kindly had the cill sections bent up for me using the same dimensions as before ...basically 30mm rise by 120mm deep.
I cut 40mm of the door bottom giving us a 10mm gap for wriggle room / bogging up etc..this will be reduced down to about 5mm when the car is prepped .. The door bottoms were re-instated back on the door , I tucked the lower section inside tthe top and welded around the perimeter forming 2 new ends to tie it in ...the following pic shows first cut , untrimmed and rear corner not radiused ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...ink/2501_1.jpg

I then started to fit Jeff's cill panels ...I cleaned the areas being bonded and 'glassed right back to matt to ensure proper , good adhesion ..then larger holes drilled in the top allowing access to smaller holes in lower section ...these have been screwed and glued ..I added possibly too much sikkoflex in my eagerness , but I will clean it back tomorrow to weld the panels in place ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...ink/2502_1.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/2500.jpg

lancelot link 15th July 2016 19:05

Bit more progress today but family and child duties meant that I only got 3 hours on the car ...Hoping to make up the shortfall over the weekend ..

I have continued the cill work ..welding the new section to the doorshut area and cut the bottom of the front wing to match ..when its all bolted up correctly it lines up nicely ..

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/250C.jpg

I also managed to get the body off again and turned over so did a bit of glasswork around the boot perimeter and cut out and removed the roof vent

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/250R.jpg

So , close of play today , the car is looking like an earlier version from the rear a bit more now....

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...link/250RO.jpg

Customers visiting Monday with a little pressie to add another change ...hopefully ..

lancelot link 19th July 2016 18:55

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...link/250rw.jpg

THAT PICTURE PROBABLY SPEAKS FOR ITSELF .....

I have had to take a slight step backwards as the hinges had to be removed to do this mod ...I need to re-instate them about a half inch lower than standard with a spacer block between hinge and boot to compensate for the drop...not the end of the world but extra aggro ..

lancelot link 22nd July 2016 21:06

A couple of intensive days this week and a little help with the 2 man bits has resulted in the car getting a 'correct' rear screen aperture .
My customer turned up on Monday with a 250 SWB rear screen from GTO Engineering in Berkshire ..its the earlier vented example - perfect for our look .

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...link/wind1.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/wind.jpg

This has really transformed the look of the car , it may not show in the pics very well , but the curved screen , wider glass , combined with filler cap / bootlid mod and the smooth roof , gives the car a great rear profile... I had to lower the boot hinges 15mm and 'relieve' the boot aperture a bit ...the original lip for the rubber seal ..

I have also shortened the passenger door 40mm in height , shortened the outer skin and reglassed it ...as well as fitting the first section of the raised cill as well ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...tlink/door.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...link/door1.jpg

tomorrow should see the fuel pipes bonded on , as well as starting to modify the rear shelf to live with new hinge position and longer window aperture ...

Roadster 22nd July 2016 21:28

Lots of work but its worth it
It will be very special when its finished

Jaguartvr 22nd July 2016 22:08

The rear window is a bit of a game changer, combined with the fuel filler it makes it the look to achieve. Well done. Was the window very expensive?

lancelot link 22nd July 2016 22:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jaguartvr (Post 81298)
The rear window is a bit of a game changer, combined with the fuel filler it makes it the look to achieve. Well done. Was the window very expensive?

They are plastic and we need to make a little shroud to cover the vent , but agreed , it does look great .... They are £495 + vat = £594 !!

lancelot link 23rd July 2016 18:59

carrying on from yesterday , today I made a start on the rear shelf . It supports the rear body as well as blanking off the boot area visually . By enlarging and exposing the hinges , this panel no longer fitted . I cut the area around the original hinge points and cut along the side to allow the upright piece to be pulled out and down . The rear lip that supports the body was removed and replaced behind itself , if you get my meaning ...by glassing it back on alongside its original position it stretched the panel whilst retaining the adhesive lip ..I then glassed over all the gaps and splits to create a solid panel . Although not finished until the body is finally fitted , its a step closer ...
My customer wants a 3rd brake light on the rear shelf , hopefully this can be fitted through the original BMW rear panel ..

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...link/250rp.jpg


Work continues on the elongated front wings too ...a section of cill has been removed and joined to the front wing ..the original wings travel all the way to the bottom with a vertical line seperating it from the cill line ...we are trying to recreate that without complicating bonnet opening too much ...I have cut about 120mm of cill away and joined it on ...The internal section of inner wing has been cut back approx 150mm and capped off ...its early days but it looks like its going to work ..the front wings are close but they clear the tyres on opening .. last job today was glass all this together , next job will be to trim and tidy this area and re-cut the cill line to give the arch a longer and slightly more teardropped shape ... then I need to cap the cill sections left behind ... an initial patch has been temporarily rivetted and glued in place whilst I figure it out ... ....

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...ink/250bon.jpg

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...nk/250bonn.jpg

Paul L 24th July 2016 07:51

Gary - This is really shaping up nicely. :cool:

I am always impressed when people who know what they are doing get "stuck in".

As I am sure that by the time the paint goes on, you would never know there have been so many changes to the fibreglass & metal work.

Good luck, Paul. :)

lancelot link 26th July 2016 22:00

Thanks Paul ....Jeffy baby is the one who has the unenviable task of getting this one straight and in paint ...I am going to do an initial first pass with the filler when all mods have been finished , but straightening and final gapping is his domain ..

Carrying on from chopping the cill up ...I have finished one now subject to a bit of filler ...the second one needed a patch putting in where I cut too much off first go round ...I laid some glass onto the passenger cill on top of some parcel tape to create a patch panel for the repair ....this was cut in and glassed into place just before I left for the day ...

The first cill looks like this at the moment - notice I have slash cut the front edge slightly , trimming the BMW cill very slightly to get the inner arch to follow the new , longer flowing front arch that continues its line through the cill to help with the full wing appearance rather than seperate cill as the Tribute features ...( nothing wrong with the Tribute offering but my customer is wanting to enhance his example with a few tweaks towards the originals )

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...ink/250C_1.jpg

As there was some spare filler kicking around on a couple of occasions today - I always mix too much ! I started to gap the filler cap and straighten out the window aperture a bit too ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...ink/250GAP.jpg

lancelot link 26th July 2016 22:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeff H (Post 81430)
Looking good Gary,

So the bonnet clears the tyre ok when opening ? how much wiggle room is their once it is lowered ?

The customer is popping in to see me this Thursday, means I will have to push a broom around again.

YES IT CLEARS ...My first attempt didn't ...I wanted the cut line as far out of sight as possible but the first one touched the tyres as it went past them ...I had to trim about another inch off to get clearance and cut the inners back , but they need cutting right back and re-modelling anyway ..the horizontal line is just out of sight ..if you stood right back , you'll see it , but its low enough to not draw your eye ..... the vertical line at that point and the extra taper on the wings will give it a different look ... I can't see lowering it changing any of the above ..

It was the cut and then re-trim that forced me to do the repair on the drivers cill ...

lancelot link 29th July 2016 21:31

UPDATE ; The last couple of days have been fairly intense but some good progress has been made .
The customer visited yesterday and he decided he wanted the rear shelf as flat as possible towards the rear screen ...a slight ongoing mod on the hinges and I was able to flatten the hinge humps and re-glass the shelf pretty much flat ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...link/250hs.jpg

I also managed to do the latch mods on the BMW doors and fit the door skins and modified Herald handles ( The push bolt on the rear of the handle was replaced with one 15mm longer and bent 45 degrees approx. to strike the new latch plate )
I cut the recommended 100mm wide by approx 50mm deep hole 50 mm down from the top edge and 65mm from the rear edge ..a rectangular plate has been fitted to the mech. with the adhesive and a couple of pop rivets ...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...nk/250%20h.jpg

Window frames are on and the 250 skins are pretty much fitted ..little bit of fettling needed but not bad first fit...

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...ink/250hss.jpg

The rear quarters were pulled forward to match the doorline . I sliced the front face / door shut area and pulled it forward to duplicate the rear door line , braced it in position , put a flat sheet patch behind it and fibreglassed it in position ...
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y18...nk/250hsss.jpg

Final job of the day was to do the Hilltop mod of cutting the tabs off the screen pillar covers and bonding them on ....

Jaguartvr 5th August 2016 20:15

Whats with the big hole in the door?

Its not that hard to find the striker plate! :laugh:

Jeff H 5th August 2016 20:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jaguartvr (Post 81658)
Whats with the big hole in the door?

Its not that hard to find the striker plate! :laugh:



Watch this space Steve,

We have a cunning plan....

Jaguartvr 5th August 2016 20:21

How did the leading edge of the door/ trailing edge of the bonnet go?
Any pictures?
It's nice to see the colour contrast between the filler and blue gel coat. Gives me a heads up on where to concentrate my efforts.
Doesn't look as if you have had to do much work to level up the bonnet aperture, or have you not got round to that bit yet?

Jeff H 5th August 2016 20:28

Steve,

The bonnet aperture and flash lines need a lot more work, this is just the 1st pass with some filler.

I will bung some pics of my bonnet to door gap for you on my build thread, I am quite happy with the gaps on mine, still a bit to do but getting there.

Jaguartvr 4th September 2016 08:51

Any progress?

Jaguartvr 4th September 2016 19:01

Good idea bonding the skins on. The only reason for having them removable I suppose is for door handle and mirror access and that can be done with access holes.
Rest of it is all looking good.


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