Month: January 2016

As most are aware, the 240 leaves the factory with a uni body construction and frame rails that don’t run the entire length of the car. They have frame supports that only go about two thirds of the way back.

Given the choice to replace these short frame supports with full length ones, I took it. Figuring it would help with overall rigidity, give me options down the road if I chose to do more with the car and honestly, just because it seems to make more sense.

So I began by taking a piece of 1×3 tube steel and cut a notch out of one side so I could bend the tube and weld it to the desired angle. I did this to both ends.

I fit it to the car a few times, cut some 14 gauge to bridge the gaps between the tube and the car and tacked it all together.

This was also around this time I tried to cut my thumb off with an angle grinder… Good times. Had I not been wearing leather gloves, I might have succeed.

After I patched myself up, I welded together the tacked frame supports, then welded them to the underside of the car.

After I had attached the frame rail supports, I moved on to the transmission tunnel. Cleaning it, like the rest of the bottom of the car, was no picnic. Media blaster or rotisserie or both is on the menu for the next project.

I was having a hell of a time removing the brake and fuel lines without removing the rear suspension too, which is why they’re wrapped  up out of the way, below the car.

With the bottom of the car pretty much taken care of up to the rear axle, I epoxy primed then seam sealed all the joints. Using a caulk style seam sealer was the right choice. This also made me think of a saying I just read that I thought was so fitting, I stole it from @barra260z.

Remember,  a grinder and paint will make you the welder you ain’t.

And the frame rail supports turned out great in my opinion, but I was especially pleased with the battery tray area after everything was cleaned up.

It might not be perfect, but for some guy new to sheet metal fabrication, working out of his garage… I’m happy with the results.

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The torsion bar brackets were going to have to be reused (another part I would think should be available aftermarket but isn’t – I don’t think) but first I had to remove them from the chunk of frame rail they were still attached to.

Aside from this being a lot of work, my method of removing them left them in need of a bunch of repair work before going back on.

First the passengers side…

Followed by the drivers side.

Which I was able to remove with drilling out the spot welds, but unfortunately had a rusted out cup where the bushing sat.

Then, I attached the suspension crossmember and proceeded to measure and remeasure several times. So much so, I created the two dimensional model below to help me make sure I was putting them in the right spot.

Click here to download this SketchUp model, but use it at your own risk. I’ve lost some files since this was drawn and can’t remember if this was the final version I made (meaning it may have mistakes).

Once I finally committed to the dimensions I’d figured out, I welded the brackets in place. Now I could move on to the next step of the project, fabricating a frame rail support.

Did I mention it was below zero at this time? And the garage I work out of, while nice and spacious, isn’t heated or insulated.

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With the drivers side floor pan worked out, I began to chop away at the frame rail so I could test fit the new piece.

Not much adjustment was needed to fit the new frame rail in place and the philips head bolts you see at the bottom right of this picture, were used to temporarily hold the frame rail in place while I mocked up its location. They were the only bolts I had with the same thread and pitch as the frame rail, but happened to be extremely long. So I just used nuts as spacers instead of cutting them down.

Once I was happy with the fit and welded it in place, I cut out a new inner wheel well lower section and bent it to fit the new rail.

It too welded in place without much excitement.

Now that I had both frame rails taken care of, I could move on to other items under the front of the car but needed to be able to work under it without anything in the way. So I strapped it to the rafters and had all the room in the world.

I remember texting my dad that picture and he overreacted like most dads do, telling me I was going to bring the roof down or the car was going to crush me. I assured him that I’d shore up the front, which I did, but there was truly nothing to be worried about as the car was so light with almost everything removed. I could easily lift the front by hand.

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