Category: Industrial Chassis

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The re-introduction of the Dakota IFS kit

Initiation: 05/27/2011

This is more of an open thread, I am considering a run at the kits again but this time I want to make some serious changes to the kit and it’s function. It has been over a year since the split and my former partners plan of manufacturing the old kits. He still may at this point and I encourage him to do so. I want to push the fourth generation of the kit since it’s introduction.

 

Here is an outline of what I plan on doing.

First off, I want to try and unitize the whole kit and make it a bolt in. I have never been a fan of the current crop of bolt in kits, however I do realize there are many people that were turned off of the old kit because they could not weld but still wanted to upgrade their front suspension.

I also want to make the base kit standard with tubular control arms set up for coil overs. You will still be able to use a stock (modified) upper control arm, spindles and rack and pinion. But one of the major issues we had was matching spring rates. There just were not enough choices for the guys trying to jam this IFS into stuff that was considerably lighter than the Dakotas were.

Your input is welcome!

Update: 06/27/20121

I have been measuring and brainstorming with this for a  month now. I have some ideas to start with but I am actually kind of disappointed in the response from this. I have been tracking my hits on this thread and others related to the Dakota IFS kit and  I will continue with my development in the next few months and see if I get any uptick in interest.

I hear you guys want cheap, well that frankly cannot happen unless the kit is very raw and on the level of some of the low end Mustang II kits already available. That is just not something I want to hang my hat on, so sorry guys it will not be sub $500.00. Bolt in IS going to happen and I have a few ideas firing from neuron to neuron with the occasional flash of brilliance. To make it a bolt in, the stock coil springs are gone. The problem I am having is adapting coil overs to stock control arms for you junkyard scroungers. I did however talk to a company over the Fathers Day weekend about aluminum castings. What I am going to have to do is render the entire kit in Alibre’ and start doing my FEAs and initiate a conversation about pricing.  My initial introduction with them is very encouraging and they are casting and machining right here in the USA and Anaheim CA no less!

My backup would be to produce a fabricated or tubular control arm. Considering the fixturing required to do a proper run of tube might put them on par with what the cast aluminum would cost. So I have to consider the fabricated steel units for the base kit. My next hurdle will be spindle, rack and brakes. I might have to introduce them sans those parts and tool up for the rest at a later date.

 

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Kickbases

I built a few of these for myself, but as good news travels fast, people found out about them and wanted them. I built them with some future-proofing as best as I could see by making the foot pedal for pullrod or pushrod configuration. Also putting in ten different axle pivot positions so you can choose the leverage you want.

I had ordered an Eastwood deep throat shrinker stretcher with stand to fulfill an immediate need during the chop on Richard’s Four-door Mercury and man was I ever disappointed. It didn’t even work as shipped without modification, the pullrod was about 4 inches short of working AND it needed to be bolted to the floor. Or at least a large plate that would be a pain in the ass to move about the shop. I needed mobility and stability. So a few hours of dreaming on my Alibre’ software and I came up with a base that would meet my needs.

Alibre' design of the Kickbase

Postprocessed the files and CNC cut the plates out of 1/4″ steel plate and TIG welded my prototype machine together. This first unit had a solid body 3/8″ foot pedal on it and I used a clevis to connect the pullrod. I found out shortly some limitations to this design so I cut a pair of 3/16″ plates and was able to use a HEIM joint instead of the clevis. This freed up the feel and gave me the range of adjustability I needed. The arm pivots on bronze shoulder bushings and has a 3/4″ axle retained by a pair of snap rings. With every hole reamed to size, changing pivot positions was fairly easy to do. Once I found the arc and foot position that felt the most comfortable I threaded some heavy wall tube and welded on a six pointed thumbwheel. This also was changed out to a lighter setup and I added a pair of counter springs to the back of it to improve the pedal feel, it was just too light and was far to easy to over shrink the workpiece.

First mockup of the prototype

It didn’t take us long to put it into use…

In use on the Merc project

 

 

The most recent one out the door went to our new friend Douglas, member of the Arizona Artist Blacksmiths. He had me build an adapter to work with his Lazze branded Shrinker/Stretcher. I machined an aluminum base adapter and fabricated a new upper clevis to attach to the Lazze piece. I have these on file and can produce them for your machine also.

 

 

Other than the minor updates to the foot pedal arm and the pullrod itself, the design has worked fantastic. There are 7 of them in the world now with two available right now. Hit the E-store if your interested in one.

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Site updates!

Been working on the site today. I added a whole new page, look at the tool bar at the top and notice the TECH FILES tab. In the drop down of that button you will find information and installation sheets related to each of the front ends we use. It’s a work in progress but, there are now downloadable PDF files of the old instruction sheets. Stay tuned for more!

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Machine tool repair and rebuilding

I was given a derelict, Italian made cold saw by a very generous customer who owns an aviation repair shop. He could no longer use the machine as the guard was broken. I sat on it for years  and finally got the thing wired up to see if it even worked, it works just fine except for the coolant pump which seized up and is very obsolete. Without coolant the very expensive blades do not last at all.

I finally had enough of a lull in customer work to put some work on this machine. The guard was held on with a plastic collar. This collar has to have a quick release to make changing the cutting blade easier and it had to be fairly compact to maximize the cutting area of the blade. I found a grinder guard with a nice over-center release mechanism I could re-purpose and put in a day of labor and head scratching to build this aluminum collar with a double jointed hinge that works very well.

With the mechanical pump being obsolete, I could have repaired it but chose to install a more modern electric coolant tank and foot pedal switch. I drilled and tapped the base for a fitting in the back of the original sump and fabricated a new tray to mount the new Little Giant sump pump. I then enclosed the front and sides of the cabinet with 0.060″ aluminum panels held on by Dzus fasteners in case I need to get access to the pump. The panels should keep the majority of the dirt and grime that makes my “dirty room” what it is.

Notice the small foot switch inside the cabinet. I sourced that from Mc Master Carr for $25.00.

The original cover for the coolant reservoir was broken and filthy. I tried to save it but gave up and sliced up a section of 1/4″ aluminum and machined the sump tray on one side and punched a few holes in it to mimic the stock cover. Also needed to make some hardware to hold it down tight.


And it’s ready for service!

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9th Annual Open House Party

WHEW! What a blow out!

Three weeks ago I could not have told you if we were going to be able to do this but everything pulled together at 10 after the last minute. Aaron and Jim smoked their pork to perfection all over again. Lorna and Loretta worked without reward and Nick Flores did an 11th hour DJ for us. Fantastic.  We figure we served over 120 people, and some even got second helpings.

Chip raffled off a $150 gift certificate with a 50/50 drawing, and we were able to kick back some extra $ to the help.  Terry McG won the whole deal, congratulations!

I had quite a few ask what our demo was going to be but because of my work schedule I wasn’t able to finish the helve hammer and shrinker stretcher stands in time. But what I did accomplish got rave reviews. Even had one of our friends want to take the hammer home and display it in his living room. I did see people experimenting with the tools, that’s always cool. We have always been hands on around here so seeing Tom Roth showing the next generation of metal bashers how a shrinker and bead rollers work was pretty cool.

Let’s hope this next year is much better than this one and for our 10th annual open house we can do something truly special

Steve

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Machine building service

Our background is in fabricating. This reaches beyond just building cars, but to industrial equipment as well. From building simple fixtures to short run low tonnage stamping and forming and as far out as full machine building of a complex nature.

Recently we built new movable stands for our shrinker/stretcher machines. Their modular design allows for reconfiguration for different styles of head units to stave off obsolescence. Designed in our 3D solid modeling software, cut on the CNC plasma and press brake formed the 1/4″ steel body is fully TIG welded. Future machines will be welded with Dual Shield MIG to save time. The pedal arms are cut from 3/8″ steel and are bronze bushed with 3/4″ CR axles and all high quality hardware was used. This is meant to last.

3D solid model of the shrinker/stretcher stand
Using the new shrinker stand

And we are now in process of building a new Helve Hammer/Planishing hammer hybrid. This hammer will be modular and reconfigurable also.  This machines primary function is for sheet metal forming. Traditional Helve hammers are very large and hit very hard. Mostly used by armorers and for roughing in compound curves in heavy gauge sheet metal, our needs require a softer touch. The purpose of this machine is for the rapid forming of automotive body panel and trim. It will have multiple hammer arms and drive linkage to tailor the style of hit from a heavy fall of a Helve to a rapid plannishing action.

The body is made fro 3/8″ and 1/2″ HR A36 steel and will be welded with Dual Shield. The stabilizing legs are 1 1/4″ 0.125″ DOM tube and will be gusseted. The body assembly will be mounted to the floor with anchors and high density polyurethane mounts and machine feet for leveling. This will absorb some of the vibration and dampen the machine for slightly better user comfort.

Helve Hammer hybrid base and arm

Helve hammer drive system detail
Helve Hybrid base tack welded together

Earlier this week we produced a simple stamping die to press a design into 18 gauge sheet metal for a firewall on the ongoing 1931 Model A sedan build. This die and punch was made from 3/16″ HRPO A36 steel and will actually last on a short production run.

Die and punch set for firewall design
First pressing test

These are just a few recent examples of what we can do for you.  Feel free to contact us about your project, fixture table, art design, structure or small machine. We have the experience in metal fabrication and forming , tube bending, notching and pneumatic power, hydraulic power, plumbing and and mechanical power transmission to meet your goals. We can build from your spec or if you need our design services to turn your napkin sketch into a reality, we are here to service your needs.

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1931 Model A build up: Front Suspension

Last left off with the frame fab, we have done a ton since.

This HAMB thread covers quite a bit of the progress: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=404411

This is one of those things that gets overlooked in the details. The aftermarket has come up with some stellar components and some not so stellar. But when you use high volume production parts, your car will look just like everyone elses. This car does use SoCal hair pins and a SoCal forged heavy beam axle but that’s about where it all ends.

This car runs the spring behind the axle, what is commonly known as “suicide” and requires special batwings or hair pins to mount the spring and carry the entire load of the front of the car. Not one to skimp out we cut and machined a nice pair for this car. Our initial mock up was using the supplied SoCal stainless steel pieces. Very nice with a shock mount integrated. Just not the parts we really wanted.

With a way to attach the spring to the axle, we needed to attach the hair pins to the frame. The shape of the frame plus the location gave us a few different options. Most people would weld a tube or bung into the frame to attach a HEIM or bushing to. We opted for stainless steel tie rod ends from So Cal and fabricated this nifty little plate that cancels the angle between the frame and hair pin.

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1931 Model A Sedan build

This build has been in the works for a few months now.  A 1931 Ford Model A that has made it’s way here from Bakersfield California passing through many promising hands before our customer got it. Now we are working for a classic hot rod look in the lineage of Doane Spencer 1932 Ford Roadster.

Starting off with two lengths of 2X4 inch pickled and oiled box tube, we capped the ends and filled them with packed sand. Using a process called bump bending in a hydraulic press we are able to curve the frame rail sections to conform to the outer profile of the body.  Once the basic profiles were created using a simple drawing on the floor we were able to transfer these dimensions into Alibre’, our solid modeling software. This allows me to make design decisions before committing our customers cash in wasted labor. We can also take this data and export it into the CNC plasma to make one off parts for each build.

Perimiter frame mockup

The center crossmember is fabricated from 1 3/4″ tubing, the frame rails got a series of 2 1/2″ holes on the inside and the rear kick-up is fabricated from 2X3 P&O steel tube. The front spring crossmember is a generic hot rod Model A part. we did several mock ups with the front and rear suspension parts in place to confirm our measurements and to make sure we had the “look” down tight.

Perimiter frame and mocked up suspension parts

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Open House and the holiday Kick-Off

Howdy folks, It’s that time of year again. Man oh man did this summer fly by, its been a tough one for sure.

I wanted to say a good by to a good friend and mentor to me, Rick Stewart. I owe a ton of my style and techniques to this man. He is one of the very few that pushed me into this business and I am honored to have known him and called him a friend. I will miss him.

http://www.hansenmortuary.com/obit.php?id=229

On a brighter note, the annual Open house party. This will be the 8th one, so that means the seventh annual? Whatever, it’s gonna be a blowout again. Chris Swanberg is bringing his furnace and we’re gonna melt some metal and show everyone how to do at home casting techniques! This should be a crowd pleaser. And I will give everyone a demo on gas welding sheet metal. DJ Dan and his side-kick Dedo or is it the other way around will be spinning the wax and vinyl again. Most likely an impromptu mini-bike race will break out and there may be some burnouts, you just never know.

We have had some employee shakeups but are pleased to announce Wes Zeller as our newest addition to the staff.

Check the Photobucket over there on the right for the latest pictures.

Steve