Thread: Bad Ast Astro Van Build

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Nice work, Mark! Worst thing about a polished panel is having to keep it polished!!!!

i would never seal a alum tank there is no need . if you seal it you can never weld it . the sealer in steel tanks are a pain in the ass. i have fixed many and put sump s in some as well. you never know if any more sealer will come loose . alum has to be clean on both sides if you fix tank with a tig you have a hell of a time with alum. stuff looks good

Thanks alot guys! I really appreciate the comments and the interest you are taking in the project!
ETA for driving? Probably not till next year. I would like to have the engine and trans set in the chassis and actually running by the end of September. Finishing the chassis work and getting the suspensions bolted in are high on the list after we get the interior usable. Note I said "uasable" not finished...

We are well on our way with that. We have seat frames! Got all of the laser cut pieces fit in and tack weled today. We sure were digging that A/C unit this afternoon! Made it bearable to work out there.
Here is the seat frame all clamped up and ready for welding.
Side view.
http://images54.fotki.com/v77/photos...MVC001F-vi.jpg
Front view'
http://images51.fotki.com/v303/photo...MVC002F-vi.jpg
Everything went together great!
We decided to tack the frames up while they were bolted into the seat... I had an issue with that but Mel assured me he would keep the seats safe from spatter...
http://images56.fotki.com/v702/photo...MVC007F-vi.jpg
He did..
http://images50.fotki.com/v1570/phot...MVC011F-vi.jpg
All tacked up.
http://images46.fotki.com/v1483/phot...MVC016F-vi.jpg
Sitting in thr van. They are very sturdy just tacked. I sat in this and jimmied around a bit. No movement at all.
http://images50.fotki.com/v1527/phot...MVC018F-vi.jpg
http://images16.fotki.com/v368/photo...MVC019F-vi.jpg
Both seat frames tack welded. We were pretty well wiped out by this time. Called it a day. I needed a shower.
http://images42.fotki.com/v664/photo...MVC004F-vi.jpg
http://images51.fotki.com/v282/photo...MVC008F-vi.jpg
Tomorrow. Final welding and we put in that stupid left front wheel well!
Mark

Haven't done an update for a while. Didn't have a lot to post until this past weekend. McCarthy performance completed the engine build last week and I went up there Saturday morning to pick it up... Quite a story there... Just a hint. I had a ride in a 606 HP CTS-V. I can reiterate if anyone is interested... Pat, your secret is safe with me...
The 509 is home and ready to rock! It looks a little different too. It's not Chevy engine orange anymore.
After Pat had the short block together I went up and painted it. Used a self-etching primer then layed on a couple of coats of hammer tone silver. Kept the coats light to limit the "hammer" effect.
http://images9.fotki.com/v120/photos...MVC017F-vi.jpg
http://images61.fotki.com/v665/photo...MVC016F-vi.jpg
http://images51.fotki.com/v628/photo...00_1514-vi.jpg
http://images54.fotki.com/v461/photo...00_1513-vi.jpg

Pat did a lot of work to this dude. I bought the engine assembled and was uncomfortable just firing it up without knowing what "exactly" I had. Pat told me to bring it up, he would check it out.
The engine was purchased with a set of rectangular port 124cc heads on it that had been ported and were WAY to big for what I wanted this motor to do. It also had a solid roller cam and a set of Crane stud girdles. I did not want to be adjusting valves two or three times a year and I wanted the motor to be drivable.
SO, we pulled off all of the "race" stuff we didn't want and I sold it all on eBay. I made enough to get a set of Brodix 270 Race Rites and a new intake. The issue with the new heads was the biggest chamber available was a CNC'd 119cc. Pat calculated the compression with the old heads was around 11:1. The smaller chamber head would put us at 12:1 or more. To much, which he fixed by milling the domes on the pistons.
Some of the things he fixed were not show stoppers but he didn't like the way they were done. The biggest thing was an oil leak he found in one of the main journal feeds. It got nicked when the engine was bored in a previous life.
Here is a list of things he did. Make any corrections you see fit Pat.

1) He smoothed off the bottoms of the cylinders which were left sharp after the bore.
2) We decided to put in new ARP rod bolts because the torque was low when he checked the rods. Didn't know how many times these bolts had been torqued so, replacing them was a no brainer.
3) Resized the rods to get them back within tolerance. New bearings of course.
4) Fixed that oil leak.
5) Milled the tops of the pistons to bring compression down to 10.5:1 with the new 119cc chambered Race Rites.
6) Assembled the heads with all new valves and springs and did some work to those when the factory work wasn't done right.
7) Hot tanked the block TWICE! Once after he smoothed down the bore bottoms and again after he fixed the oil leak.
8) Assembled the short block. I went up to his shop and painted the block when this was done.
9) Stuck in the new Erson hydraulic roller cam.
10) Finished up the motor build. Sprayed the RPM Airgap with Aluma-Blast and was going to install the distributor but saw the bronze gear was worn. I ordered a new steel gear and will replace that and stab in the distributor before I fire it up.
We are expecting 550 horse and around 650 LB/FT out of this guy. Should be plenty to get Bad Ast moving. I can always add some spray down the road if I need more.
Mark
I want to thank Pat for the work he did. A lot of it was above and beyond, but he is meticulous and I recommend his shop to everyone.
We will be starting a build on a Pontiac 455 next year.
Can you see the HUJAZZ smile on my face?
Mark

Wiring is always fun. If someone come by I quit till there gone

Originally Posted by cffisher

Wiring is always fun. If someone come by I quit till there gone

I do the same thing! On all those important jobs...

Coming along nicely, Mark!!! The wiring part is always soooooooo time consuming!!!!!

yep sounds about right mark . showed mark one customers shops and some of his toys .then one of the body shop i worked at on and off from the early 80s till the late 90s next to my customers shop. yesterday it burn down lucky for the guy he did not burn up .next time you come up .we can take the blue machine for a ride working one that right now. i will show you how i run threw the gears if your a willing passenger. mark had some cool sticker made for me

Originally Posted by pat mccarthy

yep sounds about right mark . showed mark one customers shops and some of his toys .then one of the body shop i worked at on and off from the early 80s till the late 90s next to my customers shop. yesterday it burn down lucky for the guy he did not burn up .next time you come up .we can take the blue machine for a ride working one that right now. i will show you how i run threw the gears if your a willing passenger. mark had some cool sticker made for me

Are you serious? The place burned? Geez, are you sure you want me to come back up there??? Seems I have a bad mojo...

next time you come up .we can take the blue machine for a ride working one that right now. i will show you how i run threw the gears if your a willing passenger
You don't have to ask twice! I'll definetly have the camera in my grubby hands for that!

mark had some cool sticker made for me
Yes sir! I think they look pretty good!
http://images108.fotki.com/v1623/pho...00_5119-vi.jpg
http://images55.fotki.com/v1603/phot...00_5120-vi.jpg

Thanks for all of the good comments guys! I will keep at it.
Mark

Very cool, Mark. You're doing some really nice work.

I got the Gauge cluster wired up tonight. I put 12v's to the lites and they lit up without any arcing or explosions so I was happy!
They are kind of dim. I was running them off my cheapo battery charger so they probably aren't getting a full 12.
http://images52.fotki.com/v733/photo...MVC003F-vi.jpg
Full view
http://images52.fotki.com/v733/photo...MVC001F-vi.jpg
The back. I will get to the final bundling after I get the shrink tube finished. It's kind of sloopy looking right now but it'll look nice once it's all cable tied.
http://images16.fotki.com/v383/photo...MVC015F-vi.jpg
I finally got myself a good Molex style terminal crimper. This one came from Jegs.
http://images15.fotki.com/v587/photo...MVC007F-vi.jpg
I did all six wire and insulation crimps with zero defects. These crimpers make this a no brainer, really.
First, strip the wire.
http://images57.fotki.com/v300/photo...MVC008F-vi.jpg
Crimp the wire side.
http://images49.fotki.com/v566/photo...MVC009F-vi.jpg
Then move to the next bigger crimp and crimp on the insulation. These are strong crimps, they aren't coming apart.
http://images9.fotki.com/v114/photos...MVC011F-vi.jpg
I then shoved the connectors into the housing. You can see how I labeled the connector with the wire color. Probably not necessary but it helps when planning the connections.
http://images56.fotki.com/v168/photo...MVC012F-vi.jpg
All done..
http://images49.fotki.com/v570/photo...MVC014F-vi.jpg
I have done a lot of wiring before so I am very comfortable doing it. I know a lot of people are intimidated by the "spaghetti"... If you want to learn more I would suggest picking up two books. Both of them are by Tony Candela and are very well written.
He touches base on all of the basics in his first book
http://img2.imagesbn.com/images/39880000/39882075.JPG
and covers some fairly in-depth projects in his second.
http://img2.imagesbn.com/images/101430000/101439313.JPG
I have read through both of them a few times and everything I am doing here on the van I have either picked up through Tony's books or had my knowledge reinforced or changed for the better by him. The other thing I can tell you is, if you want to learn to do your own wiring, get out and do it. It's not that difficult and, with these books as reference, I think anybody could re-wire a car with little difficulty. Or just start small by tiding up all of those loose wires!
Thanks for looking
Mark

Got a lot done today. We finished closing in the fuel tank. Made the rear filler panel out of a piece of 18ga. Bent a 1/2" lip on the front side, punched a bunch of holes in it and spot welded that and the two end panels into the van.
This is the driver's side before spot welding.
http://images55.fotki.com/v1604/phot...MVC003F-vi.jpg
The passenger side.
http://images54.fotki.com/v514/photo...MVC004F-vi.jpg
After welding. This closes out the rear tank opening and, after finish paint, a strip of rubber will go between the tank and body to seal everything up
http://images56.fotki.com/v1600/phot...MVC007F-vi.jpg
http://images54.fotki.com/v880/photo...MVC008F-vi.jpg
After some cleanup and primer.
http://images20.fotki.com/v503/photo...MVC014F-vi.jpg
Here you can see the verticle spot welds on the end panels.
http://images16.fotki.com/v378/photo...MVC015F-vi.jpg
These will get buried in seam sealer to smooth things out. After the body comes off the frame I will seam seal on the back side also.
http://images59.fotki.com/v111/photo...MVC016F-vi.jpg
Here's a shot with the tank in place. Everything fit up great! I will work on the seam sealer stuff tomorrow night.
http://images18.fotki.com/v270/photo...MVC020F-vi.jpg
http://images14.fotki.com/v384/photo...MVC021F-vi.jpg
I got the engine compartment inner wheel wells cut out today also. Fired up the plasma cutter and did some trimming.
http://images57.fotki.com/v1614/phot...MVC001F-vi.jpg
There isn't much left! I will be rolling some 18ga to rebuild these guys. The drivers side will see mounts for the relay box build into it.
This is the pass side. Won't be much of this visible once the HVAC box goes back in.
http://images45.fotki.com/v148/photo...MVC002F-vi.jpg
Got something done today!
Thanks for looking!
Mark

Back end around the tank came out great Mark! Neat and clean installation.

Thanks Dave! For what room there is, neat and clean was about our only option. All of this will get enclosed in another box for fire safety which will make a short deck right above the tank. Some shag carpet and a disco ball and it'll be good!

As I have been pulling together the wiring I have found some excellant suppliers with high quality products. The wiring books were a couple and here is another.
If anyone is in need of automotive wire give Nate Garland at Welcome to Wire Barn - Your Trusted Wire and Supply Source a look. He sells a number of different types with GXL cross-linked polyethelene being one of them. This stuff is a far cry from your basic PVC covered junk.
He sells it in 25' lengths in multi-packs of six or eight colors. This is perfect for a home builder like myself as I don't need 100' spools of wire laying around. It's also a helluva lot cheaper... I just bought 1 ea. of the 18ga, 16ga and 14ga 8 color packs from him and paid about what I would have for four 100' spools of 16ga. This is more then enough wire to finish up the van and probably a couple more projects down the road. With 8 colors and three ga sizes I am pretty well set for wire for a while. He also has 12 ga and I'll be picking up a selction of that this week.
Here are some pics of the wire he sent me. It is very nice stuff. And it is made in the USA!!!
http://images60.fotki.com/v224/photo...MVC017F-vi.jpg
http://images107.fotki.com/v159/phot...MVC018F-vi.jpg
Mark

His prices aren't bad at all...Let us know when you find that shag carpet wearhouse