Lots of thanks to those who have suggested ways to hold the doors closed. I
will consider all.
Now, the rest of the story....
As ya'll know, I sometimes get to big in the head and it was thusly about
the windshield. I say to my self, hell I am an engineer, it can't be all
that bad or hard. So I first took the windshield frame from the car and put
in on the work bench. Pretty flimsy, it is. It was pretty rusty so I buffed
it with the wire brush and gave it a coat of primer. The I set about making
myself a poster board template. Cut, try, cut some more, oops, cut to much,
add some more back with duct tape. Keep trimming until it fits wonderfully
well. Well, Ok, it really wasn't wonderfully well, but ok. So I bebop on
down to the local ACE hardware place and got mysely a piece of Plexiglass,
cast acrylic, that is. It was cheap! But it looked like the right stuff. So
I marked around my template and cut the drivers side. Oop! I cipped a
little. Ah, not bad, I'll Just be a little more carefull. Put in in the
frame and jeezze it was hard to fit. Struggle, struggle, snap! Broke that
puppy right in the middle. Drat! $%^%^$##@ and other words. Then I remember
you all and got your advice...LEXAN is the olny product that is even
acceptable. So I asked for suppliers and lots of ya'll responded. But, I
went ahed and ordered a piece from Aircraft Spruce Specialties...Holy MOley,
only 59 bucks for a 4 x 4 piece! But UPS would not ship it. Would have to
come FedEx from So Cal. and that was gonna be another 30 + bucks. So I
cancelled the order. Went to the Las Vegas Home Depot and there it
was....LEXAN....70 bucks for a 36 x 72 piece and no freight...Well yesterday
I decided I had screwed around long enough on this so I got my template out
again and marked the Lexan. Cut that puppy with my jig saw with a small kerf
blade.WOW! What a difference between Lexan and Plexiglass: no rips, no
tears, no nothing except good cuts. So Afte trimming the drivers side abit I
starter "messaging" the Lexan into the frame. I had already drilled about 2
million scre holes for 6-32 SS Phillips Pan Head bolts. I used SS Nylock
"thin" nuts and 2 tiny flat SS washers (Mil Spec on those puppies). Anyhool
I am grunting and graoning trying to get this sucker to fit the frame. I
anchored it down with several C clamps and it didn't look all that bad. So I
drilled the Lexan and put the fasteners in. Well, most of them. I developed
a large warp and bow. Ah, crap a dooly. Take it all apart and start file
fitting it into place. Now I have a couple of sets of holes along the top
flange. Stuill has warp and bow. More fitting, more fitting. then it dawns
on me that my paper template is thin in comparison to the actual part...so I
cit it down some more. Looking better...Whoa! the frame is now stretched!
Fortunatley I had measured the center and marked the pre installation
dimension down, somewhere....ah, finally found it. MAde myself a strut to
hold the frame at the correct center dimension and used a bailing wire
turnbucle to hold it to that dimension. Now, started at the center and
worked to the side, cut file, hell with it, cut more with the jig
saw....finally it fit pretty well. Got all the bolts in and it is reasonably
decent, but it will win no awards. Next side....learned my lessons by now.
Oh and in all of this bith hands developed cramps in the thumbs and index
fingers...all at the wrong times. Damn, those hurt. Anyhoo, marked the
passenger side piece and this time cut to the inside of the scribe line.
Much better with only a little "adjustments". Got all the bolts in and
doggone if it doesn't all look pretty good. I made a couple of backup
pieces for the joint in the middle from aludimum and put fasteners in then
at about the same spacing around the edges. Almost looks professional.
Nah...not! I am an engineer, and a weldor, but not a plasticator. I am gonna
take a pix of the protective sheeting because it says LEXAN on it in about a
dozen different languages...
Now, for the door latches......
mayf the sometime dumb, always ignorant, desert rat
///
/// land-speed@autox.team.net mailing list
/// To unsubscribe send a plain text message to majordomo@autox.team.net
/// with nothing in it but
///
/// unsubscribe land-speed
///
///
|