Project Minne - a 72 build thread

[jpnovak]

Ha. You are a funny man John. I wish I would be done that fast. Just working as time and money allow. Right now its just time commitment. I am saving my money for the expensive part of putting color on the car... But I have to spring for some body panels first... Oh, it never ends.

[michaelaiellosr]

any updates on this project?

[tcsracing1]

nice save on the oil flapper car!

[jpnovak]

It has been a while since I have updated this thread. I have a few updates on PP. I am going to mirror them here.

May 2017 I wish I could say I had the car in primer... The goal was March. That timelines has come and gone. My job has escalated and there is a lot of overseas travel. I just don't get a lot of garage time right now. But I have managed to get some work done.

Let's start with the cowl. Both cowl and corner dash sections were a bit rust. I bought a dash cut from a donor car to have sections to graft in. I am glad I went in, there was significant rust in the Passenger side A pillar. I cut it open, welded the inner structure and then closed up the outside.

As you can see there was a bit of rust here. The corner of the dash was all swiss cheese.



The inside was even worse. Rust had migrated fairly far up the pillar.




Here is the start of fitting up my donor section. Once it was clamped in place I tack welded with the MIG.



It took a complex arrangement of clamps and sheet metal screws to get it in the position I wanted. I also had issues with the curve angle being slightly off. The way I fix this is to clamp or screw one end and then simply bend the other until it fits. Malleable is a good thing for metal.



Eventually it was ready to stitch weld into place.



And finally I got the grinder going and smoothed it out. As with all of these projects I am just trying to get the metal work in place. I have a lot of finish work to do on these panels before final primer and paint.

[jpnovak]

May 2017

One last area to fix was the longitudinal on the Passenger side. I had a donor patch so I sectioned it in.

The offending hole of rust...



Cutout and removed...



The new section grafted in. Will be invisible once its primed and undercoated.



After the last patch the car was structurally sound for the first time in probably 20 years. It was a good feeling to roll it into some daylight and snap a picture.




And then I was reminded of the Driver's side dash section. At least I was able to rotate the car around in the garage for access to this side. Sigh, More welding to do.

[jpnovak]

June 2017

Here is where it starts to get good. I took some time and finished the rear deck and seat pan. That meant it was time to put some primer on it. I am just brushing on at this point. These panels will get coated with sound and thermal insulation. Surface finish is not a top priority.

Felt really good to get a panel prepped and some singular color on it.





The current goal is to get the inside passenger compartment ready for primer. Though I can not paint until I get my seat mounts in place. I have to lower the seats... The solution is 1.25" thick wall tubing welded across the floor. Easy to do. Cut them. Mark them. Square them.



Once they fit I had to make some for the other side. Then I made a center line and drilled mounting holes for my seats. Each part is marked for L and R sides. There is about a mm of difference in length between each side. I will trim some more and make side plates to spread the load before welding in.



One of the important aspects of changing seat mounts is getting them in the right location. This meant I had to mock up a seat. These are my old ST Rallye seats from Stefan at GTS. Comfy fixed backs. I just could not sell them when they came out of my old car.




And yes, I sat in the car and made Vroom noises. Who wouldn't... And yes, my wife mocked me and took pictures...

[jpnovak]

November 2017

It has been a really long time since I have posted an updated. Basically, the car sat all summer. Lots of day job, travel, heat and other commitments kept me out of the garage. It was always sad to see Minne languishing in the garage all alone.

I did make a little progress. One of the focus items for this project has been stiffening. Since most of the structural rust was completed I turned to chassis enhancements. I acquired a new tool. It has 3 rolls, 2 cranks and one stand. It makes very nice large radius arcs in all kinds of tubing. Here are some shots in action.





Now, some of you may ask, why would you need something like this. Well, Thankfully you asked or at least metaphorically asked in my posting. This tool is very useful to roll arcs that, for example, match closely the roof line. As you can see some rectangular tubing can easily be shaped to match the contours of the roof.





The reason for making this part is that it matches the contours of the Ruf. Pun Intended here. This tubing goes on the inside. Can you guess where I am going with this? I call it MIRH. Minne's Integral Roll Hoop and this is the first step. The tubing is notched and fits nicely along the inner roof lip. This will seat closely to the inside of the roof line. In fact, I have an average 1mm gap across the entire roofline. Way closer than a roll bar and... It will be under the headliner.





Of course, a top hoop is only as strong as the supports and let's face it. The B-Pillars are not that strong. So, I decided to help them out. More rectangular tubing sleeves the outside and extends from the longitudinal to the top cross bar. These were challenging since the B pillar has two angles. It angles in and leans back at the intersection with the quarter panel/latch panel. I welded new seat belt mounting points into the upright struts before installing in the car. These will be wrapped with interior trim just like stock and not be intrusive.

[jpnovak]

November 2017

It has been a really long time since I have posted an updated. Basically, the car sat all summer. Lots of day job, travel, heat and other commitments kept me out of the garage. It was always sad to see Minne languishing in the garage all alone.

I did make a little progress. One of the focus items for this project has been stiffening. Since most of the structural rust was completed I turned to chassis enhancements. I acquired a new tool. It has 3 rolls, 2 cranks and one stand. It makes very nice large radius arcs in all kinds of tubing. Here are some shots in action.





Now, some of you may ask, why would you need something like this. Well, Thankfully you asked or at least metaphorically asked in my posting. This tool is very useful to roll arcs that, for example, match closely the roof line. As you can see some rectangular tubing can easily be shaped to match the contours of the roof.





The reason for making this part is that it matches the contours of the Ruf. Pun Intended here. This tubing goes on the inside. Can you guess where I am going with this? I call it MIRH. Minne's Integral Roll Hoop and this is the first step. The tubing is notched and fits nicely along the inner roof lip. This will seat closely to the inside of the roof line. In fact, I have an average 1mm gap across the entire roofline. Way closer than a roll bar and... It will be under the headliner.





Of course, a top hoop is only as strong as the supports and let's face it. The B-Pillars are not that strong. So, I decided to help them out. More rectangular tubing sleeves the outside and extends from the longitudinal to the top cross bar. These were challenging since the B pillar has two angles. It angles in and leans back at the intersection with the quarter panel/latch panel. I welded new seat belt mounting points into the upright struts before installing in the car. These will be wrapped with interior trim just like stock and not be intrusive.

[jpnovak]

November 2017

And this brings up to date. for now

After finishing the passenger compartment to this point It was time to start prepping the tub for paint. There were a few holes here and there that needed some welding and finish work. For example, there was a large hole in the seal channel on the cowl. That is now fixed.



Since I had some time and the days are still warm it was time for primer. I will slowly be working through each section of the car to prep metal and prime. The tub was blasted and then preserved. This has done a great job over the last 2 years keeping flash rust at bay. However, there are still a few areas that needed some work.

My process is to run a wire bush in grinder over the surface. Then spray down with Ospho and scuff with a scotchbrite to remove surface rust. I was careful to get every nook and cranny. The surface is then neutralized and then washed with denatured alcohol. This drives out the water and degreases at the same time. After significant drying time it is time for Epoxy. I am shooting White epoxy from SPI (Southern Polyurethane, Inc). So far, it lays down nicely. Here are a few shots after the first coat in the Frunk, engine bay and front fender wells. Next time, I need a larger fluid tip in my gun. It is a little thin in spots. Not a big deal right now.

[jpnovak]

Thanksgiving 2017

Taking advantage of some time away from work and the warm weather I have moved on to the passenger compartment finishing. The plan for this car is sorta GT+. By that I mean somewhere between a GT car and lightweight hot rod. I will keep the weight down but the car will have to be quiet and cool for the driver and passenger.

The interior plan will be spartan trim. sport seats, rear luggage deposit, RS carpet - and not much else. However, underneath the trim will be a multi-layer, multi-function coating sandwich.

I showed the base rust-proofing the other day. Then it was time for the thermal barrier. This will hopefully keep heat from outside the cabin from getting in. I wanted to minimize Phonon Transfer so I bought some hollow ceramic microbeads from here. These are mixed with a latex-based, silcone - rubberized coating to form a low thermal conductivity barrier coating.




time will tell how well this works. However, initial experiments in the November TX sun are really promising. Here is an example of my test panel. One side is coated and one side is not. The panel was left in the sun with the coated side down for about 30 min. It was quite hot to the touch after this time. I then flipped the panel over and placed an ice cube on each side. Huge difference in how fast ice melts. The pictures below show significant melting after about 30 seconds. I was concerned that the non-coated side would also heat up from the sun so I did not continue watching ice melt. While highly qualitative this shows lower heat transfer on the coated side. Exactly what I am after.






The paint was mixed and applied to every surface in the passenger compartment with the exception of the dash. The dash is a finished surface so no specialty coatings.

After coating the interior really looks finished but it still has a long way to go.