'73 Notchback Road Racer

[DrewP]

Thanks, it's finally coming together!

Thanks for the great tip on the oil pump and priming. Just about to start that end of the my engine rebuild.
You car is looking very good.

I love all the info I glean from everyone else here, I'm glad to do the same.

Recently saw a fresh engine build where the pump didn't prime and the pump chewed up the aluminum cover pretty badly, I go pretty ape over getting everything lubed up now.

With that much grease in there I know I'm gonna change the oil immediately after start, and again after something like 50-100 breakin miles to get all the goop out, I'm sure it will clog the filter up pretty quick.

Otherwise a handy trick.

I pack the gears with a little assembly grease when I do oil pump seals too on engines that are already running, easy insurance.

[sjones]

I'm interested in possibly getting a Lexan windshield, but I would rather not rivet it in place. Is it possible to get a windshield made as an exact fit? $150+shipping seems OK if you guys think its good for a daily driver. According to the polls folks say I should wait on Pilkington.

My other option is about $310 which gets me two windshields, 600 miles of drive time including gas at $4/gal. I guess the best thing is to go with the real glass for a car restoration. For rally, Lexan seems the best.

And this morning we were driving the 900 and saw a crack about 6 inches long starting from a rock chip. fucking fuck fuck.

ahh well .. :) I should have gone to the BBQ.

[DrewP]

For road use I'd wait for Pilkington - the Lexan will get scuffed up by the windshield wipers prety quick I think unless you get a tint (or 'tearoff' film) for the outer surface. That or used glass.

The Lexan is probably only suitable for race uses that don't forbid them. We don't have inspections in CA, only emissions testing, so I can get away with it for a while, bit I wouldn't do it for an every day car.

[Jordan]

Looking great Drew. I used the later rear springs in my car using the donut bushing and a one of the rubber isolators. I haven't had any problems with it, but the fit is not as good as you have with plates you made. They look great.

I use an adjustable panhard rod with 5/8" heim joints like luke uses for his rally car. Using high-misaligment spacers reduce the bolt size to 1/2", I think they had to be turned down a little as well. The aluminum rod length is 31" for a < '73 car and 900 axle. I find there is a little rubbing on the bar and on the mounts. I think the mounts could use some reinforcing, even for road use I'd think there would be a lot of weird forces on it with sticky tires.

edit: here is the only photo I seem to have.

[DrewP]

Thanks for the photo. I just love how clean your car always looks!

I completely agree about the mounting tabs probably not surviving. This was about the one thing I completely overlooked until I had to get the rear suspension on to set the car down and we threw this together in an afternoon just to get it mounted so I could flat tow the car (looking for my own shop space to move to). I'll probably make exactly what you guys have.

About the spring perches - I lost one of the stock towers and was a little stuck about what to do. I ended up finding the one I misplaced when I was digging for my instrument cluster parts the other day. It's good to know they seem to work OK with the mismatches springs, our solution was definitely overkill, but at least now there's some billet-bling on the car!

[SwedeSport]

That billet perch is pretty sweet. I need to do something like that for my 71 99 project. I have the original ones, but I'm not crazy about how the 900 springs fit them. Ill likely go the same route that Jordan went for the panhard rod, as well as the trailing links.

Not that my 99 has seen any progress in a long time.

[99Super]

I love your Panhard rod solution!
I wanted to install a later axle in my 73 EMS but ran into those same issues so i put it off.
I'll try it when I get back to that car!

john

[DrewP]

Thanks, I will go on the hunt for an early 900 EMS/TURBO tach then.
Must have 8K tach in my raceproject 99...

Jakob,

Sending you a P/M now, I decided to use an EMS tack in my cluster so it suits the period of the car a little better, I'd sell you my 8k RPM tach in these photos that's already modified to go right into the 99 cluster if you're still looking for one.

[aero84]

Drew

you got PM...

[DrewP]

We got the front and rear windscreens mounted in the car this week!




I just used a bead of Permatex Ultra-Black silicone on around the flanges as a sealer, seemed to set up and seal nice on the Lexan, and it was already loaded in the caulking gun at work.








I bought 'sealing' rivets, they are solid on the back and won't allow air or moisture to work it's way past the end of the mandrel and get into the car. This is what riveted fluid tanks would be put together with. These are aluminum with a steel mandrel.







We put the window on, drilled and riveted the top and bottom into the center position to keep it from moving, and then marked all the way around and drilled & riveted from the center working outwards towards the edges.

I also like to use rivet washers on the back side to spread the clamping load a little bit, seems to help them from shifting and elongating the holes as much on stressed members.











Working it around...





Looks like a real window!

[Jordan]

Nice work...I know how tedious a process that is! I applaud your dedication to even spacing and drilling straight. Better than I could do. (Although I didn't do it on either of Luke's rally cars, I just watched.. )

WWLD: painted a black border around the outside to hide the metal edge and sealer

[SwedeSport]

Pactra RC car body paint works great for that. I hear it also works to paint the lettering on your tires for that Race look. Ill find out soon enough.

You could always cut strips of sign vinyl and cover the edge from the outside.

[DrewP]

I knew I forgot to thoroughly research The Luke Chronicles before mounting those!


We were thinking of running a stripe of like 1/2" wide chrome tape around the edges of the front and rear, since I still have the chrome trim around the door and side windows, but it's very possible that will look terrible.

Thanks for the tip on the RC car paint, I have zero experience painting plastics.

[SwedeSport]

RC bodies are polycarbonate,... vacuum formed of course.

Imagine the abuse those RC racers go thru and the paint holds up well.

if you paint the bodies on the inside, the outside of the body is shiny. the paint dries flat. Since youre all glued in at this point the only option is going on top of the window. You can get silver and I think even a chrome look model paint.

[Jordan]

I think the spray paint or whatever we used held up fine.. but the RC stuff is probably better. Depends on how easy it is to apply since it probably comes with a tiny brush. I like the vinyl or weather stripping idea. Most weather stripping is adhesive backed and would probably go on pretty easily, I just wonder if it would sit flat enough. But it IS a race car, so I only brought it up as an idea if/when you do the other windows.