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Go Back   Madabout Kitcars Forum > Mad Build Area > Dino 246 Builds and Discussion

Dino 246 Builds and Discussion Da da da da daaa daa da da, ohoho Dino

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  #1  
Old 3rd January 2012, 10:20
Dino Builder Dino Builder is offline
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Default DeHavilland Motor Company - Support Pages.

Firstly - A very happy new year to you all!
My name is Glenn. This is my first post on this forum and I hope that this thread will bring together any enthusiasts of the new DeHavilland to discuss the car and related topics - I personally am very excited about this new development and I'm watching it very closely. I can't wait to get more detailed info, etc.
I'm not entirely new to kitcars, however. I'm an aircraft engineer by trade, I have owned in the past a beach buggy, Jago Geep and 17 years ago I bought a second hand, factory-built JH Classics DGT Coupe. I had plenty of issues during my tenure with the car, some of them down to bad luck, others down to the car itself - but what a beauty, nonetheless.
However, I always had a desire for wind-in-the-hair driving and really would have preferred the 'Scoperto'.
Now, with the single-donor concept of the MG based DeHavilland, this is the car I've been waiting to build - and I cannot be the only potential builder who is bursting with questions and enthusiasm - so I hope we can throw ideas around on here and get our thoughts together! Any takers?...
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  #2  
Old 3rd January 2012, 12:49
Dino Builder Dino Builder is offline
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Here is a question which, I expect will be best dealt with by the man in charge himself. I like the choice of wheel for the car, looks superb. What I'm struggling to understand is that the MG PCD is 95.25mm but the industry standard is 100mm. Does the solution to fitting these wheels mean re-drilling the MG hubs? Surely these wheels are not available in 95.25mm PCD? If re-drilling the hubs is the solution, do the original bolt holes need to be filled to restore strength to the hub?

http://a7.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphot..._4140498_n.jpg

Last edited by Dino Builder; 3rd January 2012 at 12:53.. Reason: Forgot pic.
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  #3  
Old 5th January 2012, 22:27
nilfish76 nilfish76 is offline
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Default Hi Glenn

Hi Glenn, i am another one waiting for the prototype to be completed, i need to see the completed article but looking on autotrader for an MG now. I have heard so many bad things about classic replicas that it is good to at last have something to compare against, are you in the same situation please let me know if you get one.
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  #4  
Old 5th January 2012, 22:32
nilfish76 nilfish76 is offline
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Default Wheels

Would there be any change of changing the hub for a five studd as the originals, if you fid out a way please let me know i reallly want to have chromodoras (however you spell them) with the five studs.
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  #5  
Old 6th January 2012, 14:20
Dino Builder Dino Builder is offline
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From searching the net, I've seen that some MG owners have redrilled a new 4-bolt pattern into their hubs. I can't say what effect this will have on hub strength due to removal of material, though. Five-bolt pattern is a problem due to hole overlap - i don't know if it can be done at all. As far as I can tell, adaptors are the only way to fit Cromodoras at the moment, and they may have to be custom made - could also space out the wheels a bit too much considering the zero offset.
I'm moving house in a week, to a double garage (with house attached, for her), so I'm not ready to search for a donor yet, but I'm watching the development with great interest.
On that subject, I've been playing with the chassis photos using a photoshop program to look at ways of increasing strength if it might need it in the future, as I want to build a GTS, plus I'm not keen on putting loads through a glass body. Obviously, the chassis is still being developed, so I'm jumping the gun - but it's interesting, nonetheless...pics to follow...if I can get them to upload....
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  #6  
Old 6th January 2012, 14:23
Dino Builder Dino Builder is offline
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I've added a support structure to the front subframe, transferring the load through the centre rails. I've added a structure at the rear of the centre rails to rise to the height of the rear shock towers in the engine bay, with a bar across and then rearwards to the towers.
I've added structure to re-create a centre tunnel too. I haven't drawn any triangulation for clarity but, once added, this will create a stiff backbone which will increase torsional stiffness to the car also. Just my thoughts...but I think the subframes will need this extra support...
Attached Images
File Type: jpg mod1.jpg (29.5 KB, 104 views)

Last edited by Dino Builder; 6th January 2012 at 15:10.. Reason: Explanation added.
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  #7  
Old 6th January 2012, 14:34
Dino Builder Dino Builder is offline
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Hope this works...
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  #8  
Old 22nd January 2012, 15:39
DeHavilland Motor Co DeHavilland Motor Co is offline
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Default Chassis Developments

Hi Everyone,
Thankyou all so much for your support. I have had a look at the pictures nice to see so many people taking an interest in what we are doing. We will be posting some new photos on our Facebook page soon with some chassis updates. I hope you will enjoy the improvements made. I look forward to reading yours discusions on this page in the future.

Once again many thanks.

Regards

Terry Groves
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  #9  
Old 4th February 2012, 09:33
rossnzwpi rossnzwpi is offline
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Default 5 bolt hubs

Hi, the issue of hubs has been talked about in depth on here - if you do a search you'll find it. In summary 4 stud can't be changed to 5 without very thick
Spacers. Wellding up the hole and redrilling has been done but is only for a skilled engineer willing to use X-ray to test strength. One guy on here has actually fitted Alfa Romeo 166 ( and that is the only Alfa with the right size) hubs in MG uprights. This gives the right 108 mm x 5 PCD, the right centre bore size for Cromodora wheels or the new replica Dino wheels available at 695GBP in 14 and 16 inch size from Superformance. That is the route I'm planning on taking. All the best,
Ross in NZ
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  #10  
Old 4th February 2012, 14:03
dino_gt dino_gt is offline
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Hi Ross, good to see you over here. It is also important the engine issue.
I use alfa 166 hubs because i´m using alfa 3.0 v6 engine from a 164, so the driveshafts also match with 166 hubs.
However, you may even have other option for the hubs, with bigger centre bore, and still fitting cromodora wheels, because the wheel accepts a larger diameter hub, fitted behind the hub cap hole, where there´s a larger than 58mm diameter. No need for machining the wheel. I actually ended up doing this and goes fine. This also could allow you to use a different engine/driveshaft combination...

How is your project going so far?

regards

Dino_GT
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  #11  
Old 2nd March 2012, 20:27
rossnzwpi rossnzwpi is offline
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Default cromodora-style hubcap for weller-type wheel

Hi Dino_GT, my project is stalled at present. My dear Dad, who is storing various Dino bits for me seems to have thrown out my Dino flywheel for scrap!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Anyone know where I can get a replacement flywheel for a 206 motor???

On the topic of wheels that look like Dino but fit 4 stud hubs like the MGF - here is something I've suggested before, apologies for the rush Photoshop job.
Take one pressed/welded deep dish steel wheel - like the Weller ones in the UK. Get one to suit your drive train. Add a thin fibreglass molding in the shape of the Dino wheel and centre cap. Paint it shiny silver in the middle, dull silver round the edges, glue on a Dino badge. I've actually got ba mold of the wheel and a genuine Dino cap already.

Here's a mocked up picture
Cheers
Ross in NZ
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File Type: jpg dino_weller_hubcap_small.jpg (90.0 KB, 65 views)
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  #12  
Old 8th March 2012, 14:36
DeHavilland Motor Co DeHavilland Motor Co is offline
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Default Wheels

Love the idea of the fiberglass faceplates to suit steel wheels im sure other people would be very interested in this. keeps us updated.
:-)

Regards Terry
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  #13  
Old 14th March 2012, 16:57
thecarbuilder246 thecarbuilder246 is offline
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Hi
recently looked at your progress on your facebook page. I assume your finished car will need an IVA test as you've used a new chassis?
ian
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  #14  
Old 15th March 2012, 22:23
nilfish76 nilfish76 is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by thecarbuilder246 View Post
Hi
recently looked at your progress on your facebook page. I assume your finished car will need an IVA test as you've used a new chassis?
ian
The car needed to have IVA done anyway as the chassis was altered in the first place?? now needs one because of a new chassis, much prefer there latest chassis, looks much stronger. I have a few concerns over the project which are mainly to do with the use of the original moulds from JH classics which are very different to the original GTS, if the body panels are the same then the boot (rear) will be shorter, the front won't be straight and about 3inchs too short, the nose will be droupy and the doors will be different sizes, there are a few other differences such as number of airvents to the engine cover, some of which could be explained as moulds being from a 206, but the 206 was never a GTS. Also as this is to be a replica, 108PCD 5 studd hubs are a must as all ferrari's (Even the latest ones) have this as a trade mark. This being said, i like the project alot. If I was to make improvements i would use body panels supplied by classic and sports cars unlimited, details can be fould on this forum with the username "fiberglass" and also same usernme on ferrarichat.com forum, which i can confirm from actually physically looking over the bodywork is identical.
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Old 16th March 2012, 10:48
thecarbuilder246 thecarbuilder246 is offline
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Thumbs up jhc moulds

Hi Dino chums
Your right the jhclassic's moulds did have a few anomalies.The jhc moulds were from supposedly a 206,which was a handmade car,so there may have been discrepencies from car to car anyway.Most replacement panels for the dino are supplied oversize for fitting to individual cars!
For my car I re-made the mould for the boot/engine engine cover and have finished them the correct sizes and with the correct 7 vents. The doors do differ in size as you have said by about 5mm but I will correct this too. As to the droppy nose I know some have this and some dont-maybe a sagging nose is from incorrect storage before fitting,I dont know. The very front of the jhc shell doesn't sit on the chasis and is only supported by the bonded in floor so I suppose this could sag over time? Or may have been bonded in incorrectly? Again I have cut all the front floor/wheel well away and have resolved this on my car. Extra supports have gone in for mounting the front bumpers and to strengthen this area.
As to being some 3" shorter on the nose,I'm not to sure about.Alot was talked about this in the italian exoctica replica forum some years back and a guy on there listed every fault with the jhc and,as he owned both a real dino and a jhc he had the chance to compare the two side by side.He found the jhc was slightly shorter but by only 14mm overall, and actually had a identicle 206 wheel base!! Width wise it was around 4mm smaller overall. But this could be down to shrinkage in the moulds. A 4000mm shell would end up only 3980mm with just 0.5% shrinkage! And think if the mould shrinks by this amount,then you shell is already smaller before the shell itself shrinks! This is why patternmakers make the patterns biggar in the first place-so the finished item will be the correct size after casting.I should know as I'm a pattern maker.One thing you didn't mention was the rear wheel arch-this is from a 206. Apparently the later 246 had a slightly more rounded front edge.
If you read any ferrari books on the 206 and 246 the latter did grow in lenght and width anyway.I know the cascu moulds are more realistic as I've chatted with him and they were in fact taken from a 246.But in reality if the average guy in the street saw one would he know?
ian
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  #16  
Old 17th March 2012, 00:28
dino_gt dino_gt is offline
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Hi guys;
Here goes my opinion as well;

I wouldn´t consider the JH classics a bad replica, but I understand that something happened in the production of these replicas over the years, causing discrepancies between the very first moulds/units produced and the later ones.

First of all let´s make clear one thing that´s been said but I think that it has to be remarked:
The JH classics replica is a dino 206 and not a 246 dino replica.
Therefore, the wheelbase is shorter by 60mm and the number of air vents of the engine cover is 6 instead of 7 on the 246, among other differences.

The original 206 dino was an all aluminum bodywork hand built in the late 60´s and, therefore, as many other italian cars of the time, asymmetrical.
We can however consider all this measuring stuff, but the truth is that if you get to see one real 206 it´s probably going to be as “bad” as the replica is.

Even the later 246 are, as well, asymmetrical, specially doors. Remember that these cars were made between 1969 and 1973. The same happened with other alfas and maseratis of that time.

Only 152 units of the 206 were ever made, which makes it even more valuable than other Dinos, being originals sold for 200,000 US dollars nowadays. There were only 7 of these cars ever imported in the UK and they were all left hand drive.

Finally there is, to my knowledge, at least one 206 dino made with a removable roof, although with the rear quarter glass in place, like the GT, which is very rare and interesting.

I´ve been working with my car for 3 years now. One mistake made at the start was to consider the 246 as a reference to do the job. Today, I´m completely sure that it is not the way to go, although you can decide to transform the car into a 246, which is another possibility.

I personally prefer to stand as close to the original 206 as possible because this is the car that was copied at the start.

I have talked to David myrelees and John Hurst from JH classics, the men involved in the copying of the original 206 and I believe they made a good job. If you take a look at David myrelees´ car you can see how close it is to the real 206, it is almost identical.

However, it is true that, for some reason, that Deons have some differences from the original 206. We have corrected almost all of them in my car by now, as far as it was possible.

However, I think some of the most important are still not mentioned here. In my opinion, these are the most important:

-The width of the car: the deon is wider than the original, causing the wheels to look “pulled in” the bodyshell.
-The lower nose and lower rear end panels: These are missing. They didn´t copy these parts and are not present on the JH classics moulds.
-The dropped nose.

There are more, but these are probably the most important. However, regarding the dropped nose and wider bodyshell, it is not a problem of the moulds, but just the way the bodyshell was finished, when fabricating the inner tub and fitting it to the chassis, forgetting about the correct dimensions.

So I believe we have to separate the next 3 things, before judging the JH classics Dino:

-The asymmetries on the original car (which was never crashed, as some people say)
- The wrong finishing of the fiberglass bodyshell on the chassis.
-The missing or altered panels on the moulds.

In my opinion, the first one can´t be considered as a fault of the replica. The second one, causing dropped nose and wider bodyshell can be fixed (not a minor thing however) and the third one is really a fault in making the moulds, but it is also possible to modify.

One last thought: let´s not criticize and devalue our cars because they are probably not that bad as we may think…In fact, which other replica of a true 206 Dino has ever been made? I don´t know any other. Think about it.

Cheers everyone, and enjoy your cars/work.

Dino-GT
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  #17  
Old 17th March 2012, 12:14
thecarbuilder246 thecarbuilder246 is offline
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Hi dino builders.
Just to add some more into the mix if your interested go to JHClassic's web site and take a look at his gallery.Top of the page is DGT0001 the vey first dgt produced and used in nearly all of the companies advertising.One thing that shows up is the lack of a quarter lite on the door window. And the first car also had a rain gutter too,that seem to disappear on later cars.
As to the missing lower panels front and rear these have been omitted to enable the shell to fit over the chassis. Easy fix really.Just glass in some panel edge returns to the shell front and rear, make a simple one off mould the correct (ish) profile and then fibreglass that. Trim and finally bolt to panel edge returns on the bodyshell. These could be finished in black gelcoat and left as is. Maybe cascu might be willing to mould these and offer them to dgt owners? Just a thought.
I think your right with the droppy nose being a fault of bonding in the floor/wheelwell. I've cut away most of the the floor on mine and rebuilt the wheelwell as I've hinged the bonnet the correct way and mounted these on the front chassis. I've move the radiator back about 100mm,fitted the fans to the front and the nose does sit alot better. If you look at the body swage line this runs through front to back almost horizontal to the road.
Another thing that can make the dgt look wrong is when the bumpers are fitted poorly-sloping down as they sweep around from the front to the side,both front and back.This also adds the the droppy nose look!!
With the pulled in wheel look again some cars seem to have it and some don't. Could this be down to wheel offset? I guess some adjustment to suspension could alleviate that? or fitting some concentric wheel spacers.
One thing I've come across with all Jhclassic's car and deon cars is a small dent on the passenger side door. Located about 10 inches from the front of the door and just above the swage line. Must have been on the original when the first moulds were taken. Looks like a carpark dink! Remember spotting this on a dark blue dgt at the Stoneliegh kit car show some years ago.There were several other dgts there that day and they all had it!
But as I said in my earlier post would the average guy in the real world know?
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Old 17th March 2012, 14:14
dino_gt dino_gt is offline
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Hi there again;

I agree with you in many things. That DGT001 looked great. Regarding the wheels, I think that some cars can be wider than the original. The correct width for a 206 is 1703mm, so it´s easy to check. My car was wider for almost 100 mm!
If you have cut the floor, then pushing the door sills inside is possible, however some modifications to the chassis might be necessary as well… I´ve done this, and the car looks much better.

I believe this “pulled in” wheels look like it´s not only a matter of the wheels/offset/spacers …If the car is wider, it is not going to look good once you fit the cromodora wheels. I know this because I did it. In fact this is how I realized that we also had to correct the width. It´s a hard thing to do though, but possible.

Yes, the space for the front radiator is much bigger when you lift the nose, this is really helpful.
The car looks very different and the swage line looks parallel to the floor as well. It´s a great improvement.

Omitting the lower nose and rear end panels was not a good idea from my point of view. Using cascu´s panels may not be the best solution, since it´s a later 246 series replica with the air intakes for the brakes, which the 206 didn´t have…however it´s my personal point of view.

The 246 bodyshell is also different in many other details, not only longer. The shape is different.

All these modifications involve hard work of course. I believe that Tom Marr was the first to start with them, and I have to say that he did a great job.

I saw his car in august, and it looks great. I think any of these changes can be a great improvement to these cars, that´s why I say the car has a lot of potential, and, therefore, not a bad replica, as many people are saying…

Good progress with your car. It´s certainly going to look good.

regards

Dino_GT
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Old 17th March 2012, 15:29
nilfish76 nilfish76 is offline
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Yes I agree its a good replica, i would say my issue is that i know the original car so well because as a kid cleaned my neighbours GTS, he even let me drive it out the garage at 14, so i have been in love with this car all my life. for a number of years i have been picking fault with other peoples replicas and comparing them to the original and for years putting off getting a replica only because i am still slowly saving. I know the old JHC cars well, but i have been to see his new car, i could seee that the quality is there but the shape and proportions were not, i think he made a mistake going for the MR2 mk2 bolt on panels, Last year i picked up a extreme murci dvd and could see the ease on how the original mk2 car can be complety altered so that the wheelbase and tracking changed to match the original shape. also this got me looking at woodsport on how they carry out engine swaps to put a toyota 3.0 V6 into a standard mk2 and they have a demo car which i can say has superb power and reponse ideal for these projects. However the mk3 is already a convertable it has a shoter wheelbase and tracking than the origanl GTS and i and thinking an engine swap following by resizing the chassis remove the A posts (front windscreen) and fabricaing framework to bond cascu body to could be an option for me to go along, I will have to IVA the cacr anyway so the original seats and iterior can be used to pass the test and then the focos will be to match the iterior the the original. However what would be better than that is to confirm that the Dehavilland chassis can be bonded to Cascu's body, i know that dehavilland are looking into a v6 option so i am going to keep watching there progress and hope that they are at stonleigh this yea, i still need more time to save anyway.
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Old 17th March 2012, 15:44
nilfish76 nilfish76 is offline
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Dare i say it, the best replica i have ever seen has been a classic replicas gts last december. Very good, very expensive even as a kit, and still has faults (but not many). It is much better than there previous attempt at copying Deon. However i have already been warned about some peoples dealings with the owner, which people can look up for themselves. However i wouldn't rule him out as an option, he has always been quite open, informative, and pleasant to deal with from my own experiences. As i have stated in other posts i still need time to save so i am taking my time and keeping an eye out on all developments. I am especially looking forward to seeing Dehavillands prototype completed. And i hope thay keep it as a demonstrator for customers to try, JHC and CR don't have this which i think is daft and concerning, put it this way i didn't buy my everyday car with out giving it a go first.
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