Louis' R82s Build

[louis]

I finally cut the first tube on the R82s today and am nearly ready to tack weld the bottom layer. Here are a few pictures of the progress so far.

Lower frame


Front of the lower frame


Rear of lower frame


Bender with air jack

[Bugpac]

Looking good, have you used the bender yet, i was under the presumption you could not lay that type of cylinder on its side...

[louis]

I have made a few bends and so far the cylinder is working great. There are some other guys that have been using them like this for a while so I don't expect to have any issues.

Louis

[TutTech]

Looking good and looks like your off to a great start.
Keep us posted as we all would love to see how this turns out.

Good idea with the bender and ya let us know if you start
to have any troubles with it during the build.
I would also like to know as I need to do something like this
to my bender as my arms are getting tired man!


Thanks for sharing your build its great to see other people building
cars.

[louis]

Hello,

* I finally got more time in the garage and got the lower layer tack welded together. It has been easy so far, just need to keep finding time in the garage. This was the first time I used the horizontal/vertical band saw in the upright position for more then a simple cut. The table seems to be a little flimsy, has anyone built a replacement table for a Jet 7x12 band saw? I am thinking a 1/4 plate table that has a 2' sq tube that holds it by being clamped in the vise. Any ideas?

Here is a picture of the lower frame leaning on the garage door.

Louis

[louis]

I have been planning the bends for the next layer and trying to figure out the right way to measure them. The plans call for a 100mm radius bend and my dies set is 116.7mm. I was worried that the overall size of the part would not match the print unless I resized the drawing to match the die set that I have. The drawing gave the length of the straight part of the tube between bends and the angle of the bend. By going to a different radius die set I would gain a little length with each bend. I got the formula to determine the length from the start of the bend to the intersect point of the two tubes and drew the tubes using BendTech Pro. Here is the drawing of the next layer to be built.



Once I got the drawing done I discovered that I need a 24' piece of 1.25 DOM and the longest I have is 21' so no bending today.

I also started to draw the two layers connected together:



I want to thank Rorty for putting up will all of my questions to make sure I understand what I am doing before I start to bend.

Louis

[Rorty]

Louis, If you haven't got a single length of tube that's long enough, make the layer in two identical parts and weld them together at centre rear. You can clamp a piece of steel angle to the two parts prior to welding them to ensure they remain straight and flat.

I don't mind answering emails - that's all part of the service. I would be more concerned if you had a query and didn't ask me! *

[dunerocket]

I'm curious why the bottom layer is made of square tubing. *I thought it was more prone to denting from debris impacting it. *Is it mostly due to it being easier to get the base square for the other layers to build onto it?

[Rorty]

Originally Posted by dunerocket\";p=\&quot

I'm curious why the bottom layer is made of square tubing. *I thought it was more prone to denting from debris impacting it. *Is it mostly due to it being easier to get the base square for the other layers to build onto it?

What sort of debris have you been encountering? Yes, the idea is to make it easier for newbs who hadn't previously cut/welded steel to get started and also the floor mounts and seals better against the square tube with body seal tape. Some experienced builders have substituted round tube in the bottom layer.

I use all round tube with newer models after getting feedback that the square tube was fugly. I like to keep people happy - within reason. *

[dunerocket]

Debris such as rocks, logs, occasional boulder when the ground clearance isn't quite enough but you think it is... *I mostly ride with guys on bikes and they tend to forget that I cannot take the same lines they do when we are running fire roads.