fbekholden.com

Picked up the panels today. The photos don’t do them justice - they are awesome (and mighty sparkly - large metal flake) in the sun.

Name of the FED in gold leaf - Amethyst. A name that made a pun would have been nice, but in the end my limited vocabulary could not come up with anything that didn’t sound corny. The name goes well with the paint (and purple chute) and feels era correct.


Cheers,
Harv

Hell yeah!


FB ute fixer upper, EK van on rotisserie

WOW, looks brilliant

Wow that looks awesome - similar to the colour one of my old speedway cars was but much much nicer than the shed blowover job I did

They look fantastic Harv

Wow!!


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Bit the bullet and purchased the Willwood brakes. They are significantly lighter - the Commodore rotor and caliper weight in at 7.3kg, whilst the Wilwoods weigh in at 3kg. Quick dummy up shows that they fit. Now to pull the axles, delete the Commodore caliper plates, replace the wheel studs with longer ones and make up some new ally caliper brackets.


Cheers,
Harv

Mmmmm, if you go fast you will want to stop fast as well !!!!

Light weight is your mate when racing.

Greg

More dummying up. Longer wheel studs so the wheel nuts have thread protruding. Torqued and lock wired the hats to the rotors. Got rid of the conformadore backing plates. Ran brake lines. Now have much better body/caliper clearance. Templated the brackets out of ply.
Cheers,
Harv

Love that colour Harv

Chrome plater has finished with the chrome work, arranged the pickup for mid next week. Looking forward to seeing more shiny bits. Still some odds and ends to do, but 95% now done (enough to piece the thing back together).

Plan is to run it with painted panels and chrome, but bare-steel chassis. Suspect I will find a few things that need moving around in the first dozen or so runs, some of which will need tabs/brackets relocated. Get that sorted, then strip it down again and get the chassis painted. Not sure yet on the chassis paint - paint shop 2-pack, powdercoat or Harv's backyard POR-15. Leaning towards the latter... this thing needs to be functional.

Cheers,
Harv

Belly pan. This sits under the transmission, inside the bodywork/cowling but forward of my feet.


The sump in the belly pan is required to clear the Aeroflow deep pan on the slide-and-glide. The 'glide doesn't run an oil cooler - the ports to/from the cooler are simply looped to each other with a length of pipe. I intend driving this thing back down the return road, so it needs a bit of help to keep the oil cool - the extra oil volume in the deep pan will help.

This could turn into a pain-in-the-rear if that sump wants to hang up on the tilt trailer. Won't know until I try. If it does, then I can section the deep sump (sacrifice some oil volume) and make it more flush to the chassis.

Softly, softly, catchee monkey.

cheers,
Harv

What s the philosophy behind not running a cooler Harv, weight/space? Tidy bit of gear, you made that?

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Errol62 wrote: ↑Thu Sep 28, 2023 7:17 pm What s the philosophy behind not running a cooler Harv, weight/space? Tidy bit of gear, you made that?

Mostly weight, and simplicity.

The engine will run on meth, which runs very cool. No need for a radiator, and truth be known I could probably run the block dry/grout filled. I'm a bit leery of doing that for fear of the temperature differences hurting the Repco head, so will run water filled, no pump. With no radiator to hide the trans cooler in I could run a separate cooler. It's neater if I don't (and one less thing to leak) so will run without one.

The belly pan was made by the same bloke who built the chassis. He does the tubework, mounts the steering up front and the diff out back, does the engine plate and pedal assembly and builds the bodywork. His work is only roughly measured by tape, and is done a lot by eye. It is surprisingly accurate, and dead straight - everything fits and bolts up, with no slop at all in the alignment holes. Big difference to anything I make (or Holden for that matter) where there is enough slop in the holes to allow some wiggle room to get bolts in.

Cheers,
Harv

Slow progress on the FED... my grand plans of finalising the brakes whilst on holiday got shot down by covid

Found the source of the expression "slingshot" though:

"You know what that beast reminds me of, Mick? A slingshot. You know, the way the driver sits back there like a rock in a slingshot."
Santa Anna hot rodder Leroy Neumeyer to Mickey Thompson, 1954/5.

Cheers,
Harv