Scratch-built Mazzer Roadster - realization of a custom, unique, hot rodded dream car

Another view...

2011-10-05T17:54:00.000-07:00

Eight months have zipped by while we built a new service location for our business. Here is the Mazzer in the new location. No progress to speak of, but we're a whole lot more motivated to get on with painting finishing the interior and plumbing under the hood now that the new building is up and running.

finally - in primer!

2011-03-25T06:26:00.000-07:00

In polysurfacer

2011-03-09T07:09:00.000-08:00

The scratch built Mazzer project is getting ready for paint. Here is the body in polysurfacer.

November 2010

2010-11-21T18:59:00.000-08:00

Still very busy with other things but we ARE making some progress on the roadster. We've got the back bodywork planished and basically ready for a skim coat of polyester filler to smooth out minor imperfections before applying primers and finish paint.

Here are some descriptions for the accompanying photos.

1) The newly formed rear deck center panel being fitted and and welded in place. The fuel cap on the tank is visible through the opening.
2) A rearward view inside the left rear fender and seeing through the tail-light openings. A lot of hammer marks are visible on the inside. Even though the aluminum panels were initially shaped on a wheeling machine, quite a bit of hammering was required to bring everything in line once all the separate pieces were welded together.

3) A view of the bottom of the tail before finishing the surface of the metal underneath. The center part is the beginnings of the new diffuser. Carbon fiber fins will be attached to the aluminum flanges.

4) The tail after planishing, filing and sanding.

5) Another view of the diffuser, also before installing the carbon fiber fins.

6) We made a new panel for the middle of the deck with a sunken mounting surface for the aluminum fuel filler cover so it will sit more flush with the deck surface. A couple of aluminum rings were machined on the lathe to make a forming die and the indentation was then forced in on a 12 ton shop press. I think it came out rather nifty!

7) The head-fairing/rear deck section on a stand to aid in planishing, filing and sanding access. You'll notice that one fairing is larger than the other. The whole car is slightly asymmetric to make more room for the driver, especially in the foot well with the pedals. Even the engine is off-set to the right slightly. It lines the crankshaft up with the differential pinion shaft, which is off-set, and also allows the driver's footwell to be a little wider.

Right now the cowl has been smoothed and the doors are in the process. The trunk lid needs a little welding along the back edge to close up the gap to the body and then attention will be directed at the outer sill panels to get them ready for paint.

September 2010

2010-11-21T18:56:00.000-08:00

Were making some more progress on the Mazzer roadster. I'm so busy lately that I have very little time left to work on it. The car is mostly complete. It just needs to have the finishing touches done and painted. In the photos Clyde is installing the diffuser he is fabricating under the tail and Bob is metal-finishing the head fairings and rear deck area to make everything nice and straight in preparation for painting. The new diffuser is very unfinished looking at this point. Everything will be trimmed up and the little machine screws will be replaced with rivets. The long flanges are for mounting air ducting fins which we'll cut from carbon fiber sheet stock and bolt in place.

update August 2010

2010-11-21T18:55:00.000-08:00

Here are a couple of shots of the rear body section after doing pick and file (and sanding) work on the right rear quarter and then moving to the tail light area. We're making one new right rear inner fender panel and touching up the louvers and rear valence also. Next we'll apply and sand down a skin coat of polyester filler to hide minor imperfections before proceeding to primers and paint.

photos from spring 2010

2010-11-21T18:52:00.000-08:00

After another span of delay we're making progress again. Here are photos from this spring, the left rear quarter after planishing, filing and sanding the aluminum skin. The tape was applied around the louvers as an aid for trimming them evenly.

2009-04-03T06:25:00.000-07:00

Where the steering shaft passes through the front bulkhead is just where it happens to have a universal joint in it which complicated sealing the shaft opening to keep hot engine compartment air from coming in. I wanted to use the steering components from the donor car with as few changes as possible and the bulkhead doubles as a stiffener for the engine mounting structure so where the U-joint wound up was a little problem that needed a solution . I made and showed photos of the aluminum bellows mounting pieces earlier. Here they are, mounted ahead of the driver's foot-well bulkhead before sliding the hose up. I originally planned to make the bellows out of insulation cloth but then remembered that I had some high temp flexible brake duct which should work well as a bellows.

The rear sub-frame was removed and modified and the rear body-work fits much better now. Once again, now that everything fits, I'm planning to sand and repaint the red rear sub-frame black before riveting the rear bodywork back on. I didn't bother with pictures since it's just more of the same thing. I'm looking forward to moving onto the next stage.

2009-03-24T19:14:00.000-07:00

The rear body work was re-fitted to the car early this evening but I'm not happy with they way it aligns with the rear sub-frame (red). I'll have to make some more alterations to the way the rear sub-fame attaches to the rear suspension cage. It's the old "two steps forward, one step backwards" routine but we'll get this problem resolved. As soon as I'm happy with the way the tail fits, I'll install the doors to get the cowl, doors, rocker panels (outer sills) and tail all lined up and work the remaining high and low spots out of the aluminum skin. The nose will have to be refitted also. After that we can start getting the body ready for paint, which should be exiting.

I also finished carving up the motor mount brackets. The first photo of these, which I posted about a week ago, showed them already considerably pared down from original. They should weigh less than half of what they weighed originally. The left mount held several accessories, such as the AC compressor, on the Quattroporte donor car. I still need it to help anchor one device so I couldn't chop it up as much as I would have liked but it's way smaller and lighter now.

More on rear shocks and springs

2009-03-22T07:12:00.001-07:00

The new rear shocks and springs are on the car now. It wasn't a quick
1, 2, 3 operation (when is anything ever simple?). The shocks came with
5/8" I.D. bushings so I had to make sleeves to fit the 1/2" upper shock
bolts. The old Konis had sleeves in them too but they didn't fit the
GAZ shocks. The shaft that mounts the lower shock eyes has a 16mm O.D.
so the lower 5/8" I.D. bushings had to be reamed a few thousands to
fit. The adjustable threaded spring perches were left low on the shocks
for now while the car is light with no engine, trans, much of the body,
etc. I also had to make spacer rings for the outer radius arm rod-end
bearings so they would fit snugly in the clevises attached to the rear
up-rights. I couldn't finalize the installation of the radius arms
until the new shocks were installed due to mechanical interference.

After the rear suspension work was done I installed the rear sub-frame
so I could tighten the upper shock bolts and the inner fulcrum shafts
for the lower control arms, which the rear sub-frame attaches to.
Attaching the front and rear sub-frames with the already existing front
and rear suspension hardware seemed like an elegant solution when I came
up with the idea but it does complicate assembly of the car with so many
fasteners doing double or triple duty.

As I said before, the rear sub-frame is red because I originally planned
to paint the whole chassis red. When I'm finished fitting the tail
section (rear body-work) I'll remove, sand and paint the rear sub-frame
black (urethane enamel) along with the roll-bar braces.

Since a slight adjustment had to be made to the rear sub-frame I wanted
to make sure the fuel tank still fit on it's mounts and it does. I
bought this tank from Summit or Jegs a while ago and modified it to
fit. I may have mentioned it before but the aluminum cylinder at the
right lower front of the fuel tank is the fuel surge tank. As long as
there is enough fuel left to keep the cylinder full (about a gallon),
the fuel pick-up will never suck air like it would in the bigger tank.

I also made and installed a bracket to hold the brake-line T-fitting to
the rear suspension cage. I used a piece of 304 stainless sheet so I
wouldn't have to paint it.

The motor mounts received a bunch more "lightening" holes and trimming
today. Tomorrow I'll try to finish them up with some more sawing and
grinding.

rear shocks and springs

2009-03-20T18:06:00.000-07:00

The new rear shocks and springs finally arrived today and I assembled them earlier tonight. Need to make up some sleeves for the upper bushings before installing the shocks. The 1/2" I.D. sleeves from the old Konis are about .003" too big in diameter to fit.

some other tasks

2009-03-15T19:26:00.000-07:00

The front shocks are on the car now which is sitting back on the ground. The front end is sitting kind of high but that should settle once the weight of the engine, body, etc are installed.

By "squaring" the chassis and suspension I had to shim out the rear suspension sub-frame slightly which caused problems for the rear body section, part of which bolts to the back of the rear suspension sub-frame. Back when I was just beginning construction of the body, I kept telling myself to precision "square" the chassis and suspension before going too far but I didn't listen. So, now I had to make some modifications to the tail so it can go back on the car. The aluminum tail was riveted to some framework that also acts as a rear crash barrier. Since I earlier-on thought the chassis would be red, I sprayed the rear framework red before riveting the rear sheet-metal in place. To get the tail to fit I needed to modify the frame-work slightly but doing it without removal from the tail wasn't viable. Today I drilled out multiple stainless rivets, cut off one of the lower mounting bosses, prepped the end of the brace for, and made a new, mounting boss. Then the framework was mounted back into the tail but with Clecos this time to everything can be lined up on the back of the car to tack weld the new mounting boss in place. The tail sheet-metal will then have to be removed for proper welding access to the new mounting boss. After that the rear frame-work will be prepped and painted black to match the rest of the chassis and it'll be riveted back into the tail.

Without help, over this weekend, I couldn't move the car or the tail to continue the work so I decided to look for some other tasks to take care of.

The sheet aluminum door hinge covers had some redundant mounting holes in them so I TIG welded them shut, ground the welds smooth, and screwed the covers back onto the car. Now what?

The steel motor mount brackets that bolt directly to the engine block always seemed kind of agricultural in quality to me and much too heavy. Who cares if you're building a 4,000 plus lb. Quattroporte sedan right? I started trimming off the not needed pieces and drilling and boring some lightening holes. It probably won't save that much weight but It'll make me feel better to stream-line these clunky things a little.

front shocks

2009-03-15T07:29:00.000-07:00

Got the bump-steer squared away so I finally came to the point where I could install the front shocks. I originally designed the chassis to accept a pair of racing Konis for the front but I later decided they're a little too rich for my blood and at that point I hadn't discovered VariShocks yet. I don't know, maybe they didn't even exist then.

Anyway, I had to make a few minor modifications to the varishocks to get them to fit. The upper bushings were just a little too wide for the chassis mount and I wasn't too eager to change the chassis. I disassembled the upper bushings, shortened the inner steel sleeve and the urethane bushing halves in a lathe. The urethane doesn't machine very well but if you're persistent.... eventually enough material was chewed off to where they were close to the correct thickness and then they were smoothed and finish sanded to size with 80 grit sand paper on a cast iron lapping table (any flat surface would have done the same job).
The bottom mount on the lower A-arm had the opposite problem. It was too wide so I lathe cut 4 Delrin plastic spacers to take up the extra space. I got the left front shock and spring mounted late today. Once the engine and other components are installed I'll have to set the ride-height and even out the corner weights of the car on scales.

bump steer

2009-03-11T07:19:00.000-07:00

Time to check and adjust bump-steer.

For the uninitiated, bump-steer is a condition where a wheel self steers as the spring is compressed while passing over a bump or while cornering or braking. You can imagine that the car will be hard to control if the wheels toe outwards every time you brake hard for a turn. Having the wheels toeing IN under the same circumstances is not as bad as toeing OUT but it's still not desirable. Whether or not this condition exists can be measured and usually it can be adjusted away by raising or lowering the steering-rack or the tie-rod ends until the wheels stop self steering as they move up and down with suspension travel.

Since this car started with a bunch of components and a clean sheet of paper, it's important to check for,and measure for, bump steer and to adjust the condition away. The cross-member which the the steering rack attaches to was designed to adjust up and down in anticipation of having to deal with bump-steer.

I borrowed the bump-steer checking outfit shown in the photos. I don't like it as much as the one I used to own (I loaned it to someone and never got it back - note to self!) but it certainly does the job. Basically, a flat aluminum plate, with a piece of measuring tape attached to each end, is bolted to the hub, substituting for the wheel. Dial indicators touch the horizontal center-line of the plate with the suspension in a neutral (at ride height) position on a small bottle jack. The coil-over (or in this case the metal strut) is removed and the suspension is jacked up and down slowly while the dial indicators tell you if (and how much and in which direction) the plate steers. In my case the plate (wheel) was toeing out under suspension compression (bump) and the steering rack had to be shimmed upwards slightly. Adjusting away the self steering under bump is more important than under droop since under real world conditions, if the wheels are in droop, the car is coming of the ground and the tire doesn't have much traction to do any steering until you come back down anyway.

A good visual way of finding out if bump-steer in your car is at least minimal, is to check that the tie-rods are parallel with the lower control arms and of similar length. If they don't match like that, the tie rods and lower control arms will travel in different arcs and cause the wheels to change direction on their own.

The suspension geometry on the rear of this car will, by design, not have any serious bump-steer issues (or adjustments for it) but every car is different. Bump steer can happen on the rear suspension of some cars and the condition can be much worse, since you can't manually steer the rear end of the car. I've experienced body roll induced over-steer (roll over-steer) and it's not funny. When it first happens, and you spin the car repeatedly, you think you forgot how to drive fast.

some machine work

2009-03-08T07:14:00.000-07:00

photo 1) New nuts for the rear suspension inner fulcrum shafts machined from 7/8" (22 mm) stainless hex rod and new stainless spacers for the upper mounts on the rear sub-frame cut from stainless tubing.

Photo 2) Front sub-fame bolted in place ready to accept the flip-up nose section. The whole nose pivots around the bolts at the front corners which carry bronze bushings and nylon washers. The aluminum panels mate to other panels in the nose to duct air to the engine air filters and the radiator which rides, almost horizontal, on the front sub-frame.

photo 3) Pip-pin latch at left rear corner of nose section (bonnet).

photos 4 and 5) Since the car is a spare time project, it's jammed, out of the way, into a back corner of the shop. It's time to get the rear body-work mounted but I'm sort of stuck until I can get some help turning the car around. In the mean time I needed something else to do so I machined these two pieces out of aluminum bar stock (6061 T6) to hold a boot around the U-joint in the steering shaft where it passes through the fire-wall. One piece (with the larger center hole and mounting screws) will bolt to the fire-wall and the other piece will ride on the lower steering shaft - the shaft will turn inside the center hole. The boot will be right over the left exhaust header pipes so I'm making it out of foil backed, fiber-glass insulation cloth. That's the plan anyway.

chassis alignment, camber/caster/toe angles

2009-03-08T07:11:00.000-07:00

Photos 1 and 2
It's time to bolt the bigger body sections to the chassis but first I had to do some prep work like make sure the chassis and suspension are square (It would be a lot more difficult with the full body in place). One very important part of that was to make sure that the detachable rear sub-frame, which carries the differential, rear brakes and rear suspension was perfectly aligned with the center-line of the car.

The first step was to measure between the pick-up points of the front and rear suspension systems to find the exact center-line of the car. I had already done a lot of the preliminary work to establish the center-line while building the chassis. Plum-bobs were hung from the front and rear center points of the chassis and a string was stretched along the shop floor directly under the points of those 2 plum-bobs, establishing the chassis center-line just above the floor.

When the chassis was built, I made up 2 detachable lateral bars, with adjustable ends, that attach to the front and rear of the chassis. A String was run along each side of the car, between the afore mentioned removable bars. These 2 strings were adjusted to be parallel with each other and the center-line string via a plumb-bob at each bar end (each corner) to form a perfect box which was aligned with the chassis. Measurements were made from the string sides of the box and adjustments were made to the rear sub-frame and suspension to make it all nice and square to hopefully eliminate a lot of potential handling problems.

Photo 3
I also set the camber, caster and toe angles. The Quattroporte (Jaguar style) rear suspension uses the half-shafts as the upper control arms. Camber is adjusted by stacking shims behind the inboard U-joints. I still need to adjust bump-steer.

Photo 4
I got a little ahead of myself when I made the roll-bar braces earlier and forgot that I still needed to adjust the rear sub-frame, which the braces anchor to. After adjusting the sub-frame I had to cut the braces apart, cut new bolt eye tubes for the ends and prep the joints for re-welding.

2009-02-24T07:02:00.000-08:00

The foam board insulation panel installation is basically done at this point. I just finished cutting and installing foam panels along the sides of the car where the exhaust pipes will run and inside the transmission tunnel where I imagine it will get pretty hot also. I received a PM from one of you guys expressing concern about the flammability of the foam insulation. It doesn't burn like gasoline but it's not fire proof either. All the exposed foam insulation will be covered with aerospace, foil backed fiberglass insulation cloth for one more layer of protection against heat but also because the fiberglass is fire proof. Yes, fiberglass car bodies burn but that is because the glass fibers are only reinforcement for plastic resin which burns.
Fiberglass cloth is just spun and woven glass fibers. It's an open car and it will get a Halon fire system so fire shouldn't be any more of an issue than with most other cars.

Now I'm installing some (8) small aluminum panels (3003 "alloy" .037"-1mm thick ) here and there on the chassis to either hide the insulation or to block off remaining openings that could be sources of hot air into the passenger compartment. Some of the panels in the photo still have the protective paper on them others were cut from scrap that no longer had paper on it. These still need to be fitted, trimmed, filed, punched, etc before installing them. A couple of panels on the chassis had to be made in several pieces, with stepped lapping flanges, to allow installation in confined areas. The copper colored bullet shaped devices are Cleco temporary panel fasteners. They are very quickly installed and removed with special pliers and really aid in test fitting and assembly work.

springs

2009-02-18T07:01:00.000-08:00

I can tell you guys are really thrilled about insulation (which I'm still working on). The GAZ rear shocks with springs I ordered came in the other day with the UPS man, or at least I though they did. I ordered single adjustable shocks with adjustable ride height but when I opened the box I didn't see any threads on the shock bodies and knew right away I was in trouble. Called the supplier, straighted out the mistake (theirs), packed the shocks back up and waited for a call tag to arrive to ship them back. Of course the shocks I wanted they only had 2 of, so I have to wait about 2 weeks to get 4 correct rear GAZ shocks.

Today was better. The front Varishocks I ordered came in and, to my relief, were correct and so were the 250 lb springs. These shocks are have a single adjustment knob to adjust compression and rebound simultaneously. Twin adjusting knobs are available also but it's a street car. Single adjustable is good enough. Same with the urethane bushings. Spherical bearings are available but - it's a street car. I installed the springs on the shocks, along with a set of Energy Suspension bump stops, but installation on the car will have to wait a bit. I still need to do a preliminary suspension alignment before I put springs on the car. Right now ride height is perfectly maintained with the solid struts.

insulating panels

2009-02-16T06:53:00.000-08:00

This weekend I concentrated on sealing up small openings between aluminum panels and the chassis, bracing corners around the inspection openings at the tops of the foot boxes and insulating around the fire-wall area.

Some brief photo descriptions:

1) A partial sheet of 1" foil backed foam insulation board with a bunch of panel shapes laid out. I cut these out on a band saw. Lots of triangles on this car - I cut a lot more than seen here.

2) Some of the insulating panels have been glued into place here. In the upper most triangle space is the gas pedal shaft support that needed a seal against hot air blowing in. I made the seal out of two layers of foil backed fiberglass insulation cloth. A foam panel was glued over the top of that.

3,4) The upper portions of the foot boxes were insulated on the inside. I have aluminum corner braces flush riveted into the corners here and the heater hose end fitting screwed in place.

5) The upper portion of the fire wall and the front wall of the right foot well received insulation on the insides. The "no glue" labels are there since these insulating panels may still need to come out for component installations like windshield wipers, a dash support, etc.

6) The top of the right foot box. Measuring for and installing the insulation panels in here wasn't easy. There are more that are hidden from the camera so you can imagine what fun they were.

interior panels

2009-02-12T06:50:00.000-08:00

Tonight I finished riveting and sealing panels in place that form the air box, for the engine induction, at the front of the chassis. Pressurized "cold" air coming in through the front grille will pass under the radiator and into this box which will contain two K&N conical air filters on the ends of two aluminum pipes going to the plenum on top of the engine. The in and out coolant pipes for the radiator will also pass through the box.

I also sealed up some seams where moisture might collect between where steel chassis tubes and aluminum interior panels mate.

Earlier today, I purchased two 4 X 8 sheets of 1", foil backed, foam insulation board. If it's dry outside this weekend and not too windy, I plan to cut all the geometric shaped insulation panels to fit between the chassis tubes and glue them in place on the backs of the aluminum interior panels. It's better to cut the foam board outside since it makes such a mess. It gets all sticky with static electricity too, a pain in the arse. The plan is to cover the foam board with foil-backed fiberglass insulation cloth later.

While working with the fiberglass cloth, I want to make and install boots around the steering column and accelerator pedal shaft to keep hot air out of the driver's foot well.

Haven't seen the new shocks and springs arrive yet with the UPS man - dying to get my hands on them.

more panels

2009-02-07T06:49:00.000-08:00

1) The rocker panels (outer sills) are a bit complicated so that the side exhaust pipes can tuck under there. The perforated stainless steel heat shield, when installed over the side pipes, is pretty much flush with the bodywork.

2, 3) Test fitting the left inner fender panel. The big cut-out at the bottom is for the exhaust header. The louvers were individually made in form blocks and then welded into the panel. To get some mileage out of the form blocks, I used them to make the louvers for the rear quarter panels and trunk lid also. Since the bottom of the car will be almost completely closed off with panels, a lot of hot engine air will blow back through the trans tunnel into the trunk area so lots of louvers are needed back there.

2009-02-07T06:47:00.000-08:00

1) The top of the passenger foot well gets similar treatment.

2, 3) The high sills now have covers on them as does the rear bulkhead with little slots for shoulder belts.

4, 5) The red handle on the trans tunnel is for the battery kill switch.

closing in the interior

2009-02-07T06:43:00.000-08:00

I've been riveting minor body panels to the chassis to begin closing in the interior (at least as closed in as a car with no roof can get).

1) I riveted the upper and lower panels for the passenger footwell in place after installing the heater and fuse panel. The heater is the only real amenity - nice to at least have warm feet on a late fall drive. It's a light weight hot rod unit from Vintage Air, I believe.

2) The heater hangs above the passenger's feet. I still have to figure out how to duct some of that heat over to the driver's foot well.

3) Installing the aluminum interior panels has closed off the transmission tunnel. I'll be stuffing insulation against the backsides of the panels inside the trans tunnel to try and keep from baking.

4) On the driver's side, the footwell has been closed off too. The little access panel comes off with Dzus, quarter-turn fasteners. The whole top panel comes off by removing some 4mm machine screws for more serious servicing on the pedals and master cylinders. The box with rounded corners on the right is the door hinge access cover. It's mainly there to keep engine compartment heat from blowing into the door area.

2009-02-01T15:47:00.000-08:00

The skeleton (chassis) is slowly disappearing under its skin again, only this time a lot of panels are being riveted (semi-permanently) in place. I think I installed about 500 rivets yesterday.

The cowl section was the first piece of body work made originally so it was the first to go back on. It's the only exterior body panel that gets riveted semi-permanently to the chassis. All the other exterior body pieces (sub-assemblies) will be attached with bolts, screws, quarter turn fasteners, etc, so they can come off (at varying degrees of ease) for cleaning and servicing the chassis and other mechanical parts of the car.

The transmission tunnel is kind of large and square for a reason. I wanted a really stiff chassis AND I wanted the engine as far back in the chassis as I could get it (The front of the engine sits well behind the front axle center-line and the driver's and passenger's feet are up alongside the engine). Riveting panels directly to the chassis tubes, rather than making a more organically shaped console, saves a little space. I plan to cover the tunnel, sills and rear bulkhead with diamond stitched, pleated leather or vinyl and hopefully that will dress it up a little. The engine is also offset about 2 inches to the right in the chassis, for two reasons. It gives the driver more foot room to operate the pedals comfortably and this way the drive-shaft, which is only about a foot long, has a straight run to the offset pinion shaft in the differential. This worked out rather conveniently. If I had built a right hand drive car, the pinion offset would have worked against me and that's funny because the Salisbury diff is made in England.

No I'm not preparing to run over the remaining panels in the photos. It was just a convenient place to temporarily spread them out without having to worry about someone (like me) stepping on one while I installed one panel at a time.

Assembling parts on the chassis

2009-01-28T15:42:00.000-08:00

Been throwing parts on the chassis as I found them hanging from pipes and lying on shelves. It's nice to have the feeling at least, that these parts are going on for the last time.

Installed original Quattroporte front sway bay. I think it might be just the right size for this car but we'll see. The rubber isolators attached to the sway-bar mounts are supports for the rear of the radiator (which lies almost flat). I managed to mount only one Brembo caliper - didn't have enough bolts for the second. The extra nuts on the forward A-arm bolts are there for attaching the front sub-frame which supports the radiator and clam-shell nose.

I didn't buy shocks and springs yet so that rusty bar is holding the chassis in ride height position for now. The castle nuts came with the new ball joints and tie-rod ends. I'll replace these with nylocs at some point but for now everything comes apart without wrenches. The right side of the sway-bar was left disconnected to keep the suspension free moving in case I need to disassemble anything on the front suspension and for alignment.

Tilton brake and clutch master cylinders and pedals (one MC is actually a Wilwood and is completely interchangeable with the Tiltons) This set-up comes with adjustable brake bias. I have similar pedals and MCs in my 308 and they're very nice for fine tuning the brakes. I sprayed chip-guard on the forward floor panel since it'll be getting plenty of wear and tear.

The elegant accelerator came out of the donor car. I just removed the rubber pad, drilled some holes in it and painted it silver to sort of match the other pedals. The steering column came from came from the donor car too. The steering wheel is temporary.

It's a little lost here between all the black chassis tubes but I installed the parking brake lever, shortened linkage and cables (also from the donor car). The intermediate lever was mounted horizontally under the donor car but works well here in the vertical (sort of) position.

I made the fuel surge tank out of a section cut from an aluminum drive-shaft. The aluminum fuel tank sits just above the differential, once installed. The spacer tubes on the old Konis maintain ride height until the new coil-overs go on. The brackets on top of the rear sub-frame, near the ends, are for the roll-bar braces.

The paint on the suspension doesn't really look this sparkly. The photo flash did that.

I also installed brake hydraulic pipes in the back. The rear suspension sub-frame is attached to the chassis with the upper shock bolts and the lower control-arm, inner fulcrum shafts.

I'll probably attach a few more mechanical parts but the next step is to rivet the aluminum interior panels in place and then to install the exterior body panels. The engine and trans will not be going in for a while since I need to do some work on them yet.

Front suspension

2009-01-25T15:39:00.000-08:00

When I assembled the suspension on the chassis I basically threw the front suspension on there just so the chassis could be mobile. Since then I've been spending a little spare time here and there to set it up a little better. Early on in the project I bought a set of urethane bushing for the front control arms. I didn't really like the way they were engineered though. The Energy Suspension brand urethane bushings sold for Ferraris have a steel sleeve in the center that the urethane bushing rotates on with a little silicone grease and that seems to work OK. These bushings here came with coaxial steel center sleeves. An inner sleeve that the bolt passes through and another sleeve around that, which fits tightly in the center of the bushing. Basically it was steel rubbing on steel which didn't seem like a good idea. I wanted longer inner sleeves anyway so I machined a set from drill rod and bought a set of bronze bushings to ride on the inner sleeves. Except for having to cut the bushings to length, they fit perfectly. The sleeves were a bit more complicated since the outside diameter of each one had to fit in a 5/8" bushing and the insides had to fit a 12mm bolt. Each length had to be custom sized to fit the mounting forks on the chassis and they all vary a little bit. A lot of futzing around for a seemingly simple job but it's coming along. I'm looking forward to attaching larger pieces to the chassis so I can see it grow again.

More nose photos

2009-01-18T15:07:00.000-08:00

Nose

2009-01-18T15:05:00.000-08:00

Did some more work on the aluminum nose yesterday. It's close to being ready for a skin coat of filler to hide minor imperfections, then primer and paint. The nose still needed some baffles inside to help stiffen it and direct hot air from the radiator out so that's one of the jobs I did. I still need to add some stiffening members in the area behind the front tires but that needs to wait until the nose can be fitted to the car again. The two baffles were made from .048" (1.2mm) aluminum sheet (3003 H14). Most of the body is made of 3003 sheet It's basically pure aluminum and is easy to form. Higher strength alloys were used in other parts but only where radical bending and forming wasn't required. For example, 6061, a popular alloy for a lot of parts, will crack if bent at a sharp
90* angle.

Paper (thin cardboard) templates were made, traced out on aluminum sheet, cut and bent. The tops of both baffles required an arched flange to conform to the curves of the outer skin. These were hammered over a piece of 3/4" (19mm) plywood with the correct curve cut into it. The baffles were then riveted in place (flush rivets in the outer skin) on iether side of the radiator outlet duct in the top of the nose. You can see a lot of seams on the back side of the nose. This is due to me chopping it up several times and changing it earlier in the project. I'm still not totally happy with it but it's time to just get it done.

sub-frame and headers

2009-01-17T15:02:00.000-08:00

Rear sub-frame before final disassembly for media blasting, primer and paint. I also rebuilt the brake calipers. The differential was gone over with a cursory inspection, new out-put shaft bearings and seals, new pinion seal and a finned aluminum rear cover with a new gasket. The half-shafts received new U-joints. The hubs received new bearings and seals. The shocks are a set of old Konis with temporary ride-height maintaining spacers. They'll be replaced soon. Most likely with a set of externally adjustable VariShocks with new springs. I'm still waiting to see how much heavier the car will get before chosing a spring rate. Right now the car weighs about 2,000 lbs assembled. The brackets on top of the sub-frame anchor the roll-bar braces. The new, longer inner fulcrum shafts for the lower control arms also anchor the bottom of the sub-frame to the chassis. The upper shock bolts also connect to the chassis.

Modified Quattroporte header after media blasting in preparation for JetHot coating.

Exhaust header primary pipe extensions after media blasting in preparation for JetHot coating.

2009-01-17T14:58:00.000-08:00

Clyde, cutting a sheet of .080" #6061 aluminum to make the cover panel for under the transmission and drive-shaft on a band saw.

Aluminum panels to cover the center, bottom of the car (under trans and engine) for streamlining and chassis rigidity. They're being held in place here by temporary quick release fasteners called clecos. The panels were more permanently with flat-head stainless machine screws.

Front lower A-arms in preparation for disassembly, media blasting, primer, paint, new ball joints and hardware.

Chassis in rotisserie after media blasting in preparation for primer and paint.

Bell housing

2009-01-16T14:47:00.000-08:00

1) This is the bell housing that was sawed off (with a Saws-all) of the Chrysler 727 Torqueflite transmission that came with the Quattroporte. The hacked up back end is being squared off in the milling machine here.

2) Bell housing fitted to back of engine after machining and media blasting. The new flywheel is for a Chrysler Hemi to keep the ring gear the same for the starter motor.. The bolt circle was changed to fit the Maserati crankshaft and an adapter was machined and installed to locate the clutch pilot bearing. A heavy duty 10" Mcleod/Borg&Beck clutch, for a Chrysler Hemi, bolts to the fly-wheel. The big Chrysler starter motor that came with the Quattroporte can be seen mounted down on the lower right. That has been replaced by a later Dodge light-weight, gear-reduction starter as used on newer Dodge Ram pick-up trucks.

3) Adapter plate, to fit the Tremec to the bell housing, machined from 6061aluminum plate, ready to be TIG welded in place.

4) Final boring the locating hole for the transmission after checking it for concentric mounting with a dial indicator mounted to the crankshaft. The plate, which became the rear face of the bell-housing, was milled square with the front face, that mates with the engine, after the boring operation.

My plan is to post occasional updates with fresh photos as the Mazzer hot rod project moves to completion. Wish me luck.

Engine

2009-01-16T14:43:00.000-08:00

1) Front view of the Quattroporte engine after revising the accessory mounts to narrow everything before drawing the chassis on paper (no CAD here but the old way works too). This engine should make over 300 HP for now with some cam timing changes and a much more efficient exhaust system. Plans for a significant power increase are in place. Right now I just want to get this thing running. I'm retaining the power steering pump (tired of "arm-strong steering") and left the air pump optional. For now I'm using the awful OEM style poly-belts which make snapping noises when cold, due to the "memory" of the material. The noise goes away as the belts warm up but it's annoying. When I finally supercharge this thing, all these pulleys and V-belts will have to be replaced with a multi-ribbed serpentine belt and pulleys and that should kill two birds with one stone.

2) Top view of Quattroporte engine with the Tremec 5 speed hanging off the back. The stainless braided hoses poking out of the bell-housing are for the hydraulic clutch release bearing. One reason for picking the Tremec TR - 3550 was the two extra optional shifter locations. It came stock with a rear mounted shifter but either of the two gold colored covers can be taken off to relocate the shifter forward. This was very desirable since I wanted to move the engine far back in the chassis. It's basically a front-mid-engine design and at the moment I have almost perfect 50/50 weight distribution front to rear.

3) Side view of the engine. That is the original (but modified) right exhaust header mounted on the left side. That allowed the engine to slide back further in the chassis and still leave room for a driver and passenger. The rest of the primary pipes were cut off and a flange welded in place. The parts that were cut off were replaced by a "nest of snakes" style bundle of primary pipes, on each side of the car, which wrap around the foot-wells. By varying the lower primary pipe lengths to compensate for the un-even length original primaries, the end result was, true equal length headers with 31" primaries. A lot of manufacturers claim they make "equal length" headers but if you actually measure them you'll often find significant differences in primary pipe length. The Tremec 5 speed is hanging off of the customized bell housing.

1/14/09: Here are some photos taken over the weekend:

2009-01-14T07:35:00.000-08:00

Some history: This hot rod is Maserati based. It started out as a very shabby 1980 Quattroporte I found at an auction in the DC area. It had a $500.00 "resale red" respray, lots of rust and about a quart of water in the glove box due to a leaking windshield. It was just what I was looking for. I always kind of liked this series 4-porte (quattro tank) because it had cool parts underneath what looked like Italian Detroit iron. The engine is an aluminum 4.9 liter, 4 cam V8 with four 2bbl Weber DCNF carburetors. The Euro version came with a ZF 5 speed manual trans but the US versions came with a Chrysler 727 three speed automatic (good for station wagons and police cruisers but I would have preferred the "Zed Ef"). It had sports-car type front suspension (components similar to Detomasso Pantera) with coil-over shocks (which the 4-porte is too heavy for). Rear suspension was basically a copy of the famous Jaguar IRS with a heavy duty Salisburry differential and vented inboard disk brakes. Steering components include a ZF power rack & pinion and an adjustable Saginaw steering column. Except for the trans, the car had heavy duty sportscar type parts at a very attractive price. These cars were popular with high-rollers in the eighties for their luxury and exclusivity but there isn't much enthusiasm for them today.

I took the donor 4-porte back to New Jersey and proceeded to remove all the mechanical components like the engine, trans, steering, suspension, brakes, instruments, door latches.... much of the remainder was parted out or went to the scrap yard.

After removing a lot of grease and dirt I designed and built a sports car chassis and body to go around all the components. Because the engine is a close cousin of the original V8 designed for the mighty Maserati 450S sports racing car of the mid 1950s, I designed the body of my sportscar to vaguely resemble the 450S in silhouette. I say vaguely because I didn't want to build a replicar.

One problem with the US spec 4-porte engine is that the back end was reconfigured to mate to the Chrysler 727 trans. It's virtually useless in any other Maserati for that reason and makes adapting the Tremec 5 speed over-drive trans I bought, difficult to adapt to it. Today, there might be a used Dodge Viper bell housing to fit it, I don't know, but when I started this project used Viper parts weren't to be had. After messing with a steel aftermarket Chrysler bell housing unsuccessfully I sawed the bell housing off of the 727 automatic trans, welded a plate to the back end and machined it to fit the Tremec.

The engine itself seems to be in pretty good shape and I'm not planning on rebuilding it for now. It's been thoroughly cleaned and it's getting a valve job and a major tune-up for now. Later down the road I'd like to build a monster masserati V8 with a supercharger. I've got an extra 2 liter Lysholm, screw type compressor (like new) on the shelf which will be perfect for it.

11/15/08 Here is the frame in fresh
primer, yesterday we painted it black.

10/15/08 The Maserati based sports car I started building a number of years ago is back on track. The project has been interrupted numerous times, including a couple of years I spent partially restoring and hot- rodding my 1978 Ferrari 308GTB, but we're back on it now and I hope to push it to completion without interruption now. Pictured is the aluminum nose which is now receiving final metal finishing work before prepping it for paint. I made the stand for it out of some surplus exhaust tubing so it will be rock steady during the bumping, filing, sanding while it's off the car and to have it at a comfortable height. While Bob, our body man, gets the nose ready, I'm prepping the chassis for media blasting and paint. First I need to weld the new roll bar hoops in place.

The car had roll hoops already but I didn't like them anymore and cut them off. I did the same with the nose at least 3 times. I would have it all together on the car, decide I didn't like it anymore and cut it apart. That's the reason for the multiple seams in the nose.

The big bulge in the center of the nose wraps around the carburetors on top of the engine and comes to a rounded point down in the radiator exhaust opening.

Speaking of carburetors: The 1980 Maserati Quattroporte 4 cam V8 will go into the car with the carburetors rebuilt and set up but the stock out-put is only about 300 HP. We have an almost new Lysholm type supercharger sitting on the shelf which, at some point after the car has been on the road, is destined for this car along with electronic fuel injection and ignition for a fairly painless 450 HP. Since the car only weighs about 2000 lbs dry at the moment, so it should scoot right along.

Also pictured are the new Wilwood front brake rotors and brembo calipers I just adapted to the front spindles. The original iron Girling brakes and hubs from the Quattroporte would have stopped this car just fine but they weighed a ton and had to go.

Chassis in paint

2009-01-13T11:56:00.000-08:00

An earlier version

2008-10-01T14:39:00.000-07:00

1) An earlier version of the incomplete nose section. This might be the second version. I cut it up and changed the design at least 3 times. After looking at it for a few days I would cut it up and start over, much to my wife's chagrin. That's why it looks a little lumpy here and there. Initially the panels would come out of the English-wheel, the green machine in the back-ground, all smooth but when I started changing things I would get impatient and start beating panels into submission. The metal is all nice and smooth now after a lot of slapper & dolly and file work. The tape lines show where I was about to cut the middle out and change the design again.

2) Front view of the same experimental nose design. Apparently, and unfortunately, I didn't take many photos while building the body because I don't seem to have too many.

3) Rear sub-frame from the Quattroporte, which carries the differential, rear brakes and rear suspension in one package . Jaguar enthusiasts will see a resemblance to the E-Type IRS sub-frame, which I assume it was copied from. The chalk lines indicate where I was about to cut off the ends of the sub-frame. I rigidly mounted the sub-frame to the back of the new chassis, so I didn't need the ends of the sub-frame with the flexible mounts (mostly hidden from view here) and decided to eliminate them and save a little weight.

4) The posi-lock Salisbury differential with inboard brakes as removed from the Quattroporte rear sub-frame. It's basically the same diff used in several Jaguar models for many years and loved by many hot rod builders. The brakes are larger than what came on the jags and the ring & pinion gears are Gleason type. It's got a 3.54 ratio. I haven't sat down to figure out my theoretic top speed with the Tremec over-drive transmission coupled to it. We'll see what happens and if it needs to be changed I'll address that later. Making a rough guess though, It should go at least 150 MPH for now (about 250 KPH). That's good enough for a street hot rod.

Chassis construction

2008-10-01T14:37:00.000-07:00

1-3) Chassis construction nearing completion. I guess I never took any pictures of the early stages of the chassis growing on the assembly jig because I don't seem to have any.

4) Completed chassis, with drive-train, suspension and wheels installed, parked in front of the plywood station buck. At this point I was ready to start Forming the aluminum body (the two guys in the photo are my first and second sons).

Photos of the mold

2008-10-01T14:34:00.000-07:00

5) Three urethane foam plugs, which were cast in the plaster mold, sitting next to the ERCO sheet metal-shrinker (one of the machines used to form the aluminum body panels).

6) Two of the 1/4 scale urethane plugs were precision sawed into one inch slices, like loaves of bread. The front plug in the photo was cut laterally and the back plug was sawed in a longitudinal direction. Each urethane foam section was numbered and traced on paper and then each paper profile was increased 4X to make full scale profiles on 3/4" (19mm) plywood. The plywood profiles were sawed out and fit together "egg crate" style, like a Ferrari grille, to make the station buck. This is an old fashioned way of doing it but still quite effective. Sheet aluminum panels were shaped, away from the buck, with hammers and machines, until they fit the buck and were then welded together to form the body. Many people think the aluminum is hammered over the buck but the buck is only used for fitting and stitching pieces together, just like a tailor.

More photos of the original clay model

2008-10-01T14:31:00.000-07:00

1-3) Other views of the original 1/4 scale half-model against a mirror. The surface of the model was made with a thin layer of modeling clay, from an art supply, covering a skeleton which was made by gluing Styrofoam blocks together and shaping them with a "cheese grater". The outlines for the body came from 1/4 scale drawings of the chassis and body. The wooden wheels/tires were made on the lathe. The windshield, roll bars and exhaust pipe were fabricated from bits of sheet-metal, rod and tubing, just to get an idea of how the whole package might look. The full scale tube-chassis can be seen in the back-ground.

4) The plaster mold, which was cast in sections, inside of a plywood box, so it could come apart without serious damage to the clay model.

2008-10-01T14:05:00.000-07:00

Chassis during body removal in preparation for media blasting and painting and disposing of the donor car after parting out.

More older photos

2008-10-01T11:48:00.000-07:00

1st picture: Rear quarter view with rough body. Oval openings in rear are for tail lights.

2nd picture: Fitting the aluminum radiator. It's covered with cardboard here to protect the fins. The Proportionated front brakes are visible here. I've since replaced those rotors with larger Wilwoods on Wilwood aluminum hats and replaced the cast iron Girling calipers with aluminum Brembos.

3rd picture: Bare interior. The steering wheel is an old temporary.

4th picture: Right front wheel with newer brake parts peeking through. At upper right is the beginnings of a mold for a Lexan headlight cover.

more history of the project

2008-10-01T11:30:00.000-07:00

1st picture: Original quarter scale clay model of the body. Its actually a half model against a mirror. The design was changed several times since then but the basic shape was there.

2nd picture: A plaster mold was made from the clay model and several polyurethane plugs were cast from that mold. This photo shows one of the plugs being trimmed on the milling machine.

3rd picture: Plywood station buck (full scale) made using dimensions from the plugs which were increased X 4.

4th picture: Front quarter view of aluminum body mounted on chassis. The body still needed a lot of metal finishing work and the car still has the bigger roll bars here. The entire nose tilts forward for engine access. The windshield is from a 55 Ford but cut down. A Lexan replacement is in the plans.

Some history of this project

2008-10-01T11:00:00.000-07:00

1st picture: The nearly complete chassis hanging sideways to finish tack-welding the floor panels in place. The center of the chassis has removable aluminum panels so that the bottom of the car is completely flat and fairly smooth. The wheels, 19" in front and 18" in back, were custom made by HRE.

2nd picture: Test fitting the engine and trans. The chassis still had the earlier roll bars here. After a while I didn't like them any more and cut them off to install smaller, more discreet roll bars.

3rd picture: Complete but unpainted chassis with drive-train, suspension, etc, fitted.

4th picture: Chassis in rotisserie just after priming it.

a study in cryonetics

2007-12-29T09:14:00.000-08:00

Wil's hand built sports car has been on a lift in storage for...how many years? 3? 4? Time to complete the job and get it on road. Before those tires on the fancy custom HRE wheels age and crack.

The car body and under hood mechanicals are complete. We just need to finish off the interior and paint the exterior which is still a bare aluminum shell.

Life kept getting in the way of finishing this project which has been in the works for as long as our oldest child has been alive. (He's 11 now). Little did I know when I met Wil, the idea of building a car from scratch has been in his head since HE was an 11 year old boy. It's time to breathe in life and make that passionate dream a reality. (photos: top, NNO; lower, Laura Billingham)

More pressing life events kept dragging Wil off his pet project: a house addition, a shop addition, an ailing parent, a tree to cut down, his Ferrari to paint and supercharge. We're dragging the car back into the body shop this month with an eye to having it on the road this summer. Stay tuned. If you visit our shop in the coming months, ask to see the car and feel free to post a progress report comment here ).

(posted by Sandy;