FWD Pontiac Grand Prix donor

[HarmalloyX]

its been awhile since i updated but work continues on the FWD square. a day off from work today and i put on the back wall of the passenger area, two horizontal cross braces, made the top of the spring cradles extra strong, and almost finished mounting the rear arms to some pedestals. or whatever they are called. - once it was sitting on the wheels i jumped on the rear structure and my butt jiggled longer than the car did! haha

[HarmalloyX]

its been awhile but work continues. i work full time and have two young chidren. i got the back in fully attached, very rigid. a back passenger wall, spring cradles were made more rigid, and the back end whatever those are called almost have mounts ready. next i start the front wheels. yikes

[HarmalloyX]

well the rear end is now 1/4" lower than when i started, which isnt good, one of the springs is touching the tire now. i should be able to adjust that out.
started putting the steering rack and front wheels on.

[HarmalloyX]

working on the front end. its starting to look really awesome! (that height issue fixed itself when i tightened up the strut bolting.)

[HarmalloyX]

got the front suspension cradles fab'd and welded

[HarmalloyX]

running into some issues today. The steering column is a PITA to position just right. i finally get it and i see its king of sticking out the side of the car a bit. and theres much less room for the seat than i had factored, i think i forgot to account for that fact that it angles back.
ill probably get different seats and try to convince the steering column to point more inwards

[HarmalloyX]

I put the engine in today! and wow, this thing look awesome, its so light i can definitly delete the power steering. the height came out almost pefectly even though i had to estimate the engine/transmission weight when doing the spring constant calc. the camber was pretty negative but thankfully i didnt go cheap on the coil overs and was able to adjust them out a good ways. now i can start actually building the car!

[HarmalloyX]

wow i havent posted in awhile. or i did and it didnt save. the website seems to crash a lot.
anyways, i got the steering in, the exhaust, drive axles, gast tank, fuel lines, and most of the brake lines.
big no duh moment: i should have put the fuel and brake lines in before i put the engine in!

[anduril3018]

Looking good! Those are the kind of lessons you wish you could learn earlier, but you won't forget it now!

[HarmalloyX]

Looking good! Those are the kind of lessons you wish you could learn earlier, but you won't forget it now!

amen! theres been a lot of those lessons learned.

[HarmalloyX]

i think the website was down for a bit, glad its back. in the meantime i got it running! technically drove too (about 2 inches). and i got the wiring harness mostly and somewhat neatly installed. i need to decide if i should shorten and splice those wires or leave them as they are.

[HarmalloyX]

we have seats and seat belts!
theyre just welded to the car, so hopefully i dont ever have to take them out.

the fuel gauge is still reading beyond full. theres an open circuit somewhere i cant find.

[HarmalloyX]

i got the rear end framed out and installed my modified fuel filler. for the fuel like i just cut the steel tube at the top and bottom at 45 degrees and welded them together.
lots of other little things getting done: shifter installed, seats, headrests, front end wheel alignment,

[HarmalloyX]

spent most of today cutting out panels: driver side side and all around the back end. I think this is my least favorite task, its very tedious and unpleasant to cut out a paper or cardboard pattern that fits just right and get it cut out of the steel. i also realized that i almost certainly will need to buy another sheet metal to finish

[HarmalloyX]

i noticed today that the upper suspension mount structure has bent inwards. i expected it might, thats why there is a horizontal cross bar over the engine. The cross bar is still straight so the bending should stop and be ok. the bending is worse on the driver side which explains why i had such wildly different camber angle adjustments on each wheel.