The mazak salesman speaks highly. I'm planning on a Mazak Variaxis for my next machine.

Awesome, thanks for the photos.

Chassisworks has several different brands in house. Most people know that one of those brands is VariShock. Chris has been involved with building custom shocks/dampers since the earth cooled. When you design suspension you don't necessarily want to use an off-the-shelf component so for a long time we had shocks that were custom built for us. As anyone who has worked with a supplier or wholesaler knows, sometimes things are changed without notice. Eventually Chris got so fed up with one of our suppliers that he said some choice and extremely colorful words and finished with 'I'll build them myself!'

Thirteen years, and several thousand shocks later, VariShock (And VariStrut) is still made in house at our Sacramento California factory. They are on cars all over the world whether they be 5-second Pro Mods, swingarm dragsters, land speed racers, bracket cars, NASA racers, or daily drivers. Right before SEMA this year, we launched the VariShock Builder Shock Program. Basically this takes the hassle out of designing your own suspension around an existing shock. There are thousands of possible combinations ensuring we have a shock for almost everyone.

In honor of all that, here's some details on how VariShocks are made!

Here, one of our self loading Mazak CNC machining stations stacks finished double-adjustable VariShock QS2 bases while billet aluminum blanks await their turn. Chris Alston, Jr. usually programs this machine. Yes, it has laser beams. Each blank is cut to the exact same length using a CNC saw which I'll show another time.
https://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/hphoto...2d&oe=55729BEC

We just finished a production run of upper spring seats. How many? 1140 of them! Here's what the blanks look like, then the raw, then fresh from anodizing.
https://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/hphoto...61&oe=5589ED90

Here's a bunch of shock bases waiting to be cleaned up and sent to anodizing. I took this with my phone so I apologize for the low quality. It was difficult because they were still covered in machining lubricant. The bases in the foreground will receive Com-8 bearings, the background bases will receive a pair of polyurethane bushings.
https://fbcdn-sphotos-g-a.akamaihd.n...445b9b9b32f2e2

And finally, this cart has 13.5 pairs of VariShock Quickset 1, single adjustable, coil-over bodies. The missing shock was getting it's COM-8 bearings pressed into the mounting eyes.
https://fbcdn-sphotos-b-a.akamaihd.n...5423bc1bdc7c7d

I love seeing this stuff. Sorry I missed the start of the thread. Please keep posting as you have time. Thanks!

Sweet!

Great stuff Carl, the scope and scale of Chassisworks is more impressive than I and probably many others imagined. The first-hand insight is very much appreciated. :thumbsup:

Thanks guys, I am having fun with it so far!

Yeah, it seems that some assume that because every Camaro on Lat-G isn't running our parts that we're a small company. We're smaller than some but our facility is huge and our customers drive and drive and drive. I took some pics of an LS '69 Camaro yesterday with our clip and a gBar that has 10k miles of daily driving so far and talked to a customer today who has over 100k on his Chevy II front end!

These pics were taken just last week. Anyone who went to SEMA this year knows that we are hard at work on the second application for our gStreet Ultimate Pro-Touring Chassis. I'll be making a separate post about the car and project eventually, but here are two pictures that detail how seriously we take new product development and how these projects are undertaken.

Since the 90s we have used FARO systems to create computer models of suspension mounting points. That's how we were able to be the first to develop a bolt-on front clip for the Chevy II that fit awesome, reduced weight, and added strength to the entire car. Right now, we have a bunch of products up our sleeve for the early Mustang crowd.

Below you will see our Engineering Manager, Scott Rieger, scanning the front end of the '67 Fastback that we are building for Gearhead Garage and their customer. This car is the testbed for the new gStreet chassis and the same car we took to SEMA. But this isn't about the specific project, it's about the process.

Our company tagline is 'The Home Of Higher Technology'. In this photo Scott Rieger begins the arduous task of scanning an entire car using a Faro Arm laser scanner. This will give us more than just specific points, it will give us data on every surface the laser registers. The glossy black painted body has been sprayed with a fine adhesive-infused powder. This allows the laser to register every tiny detail.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-f-a.akamaihd.n...ba0f3c2f85863b

Fun to watch...for about two minutes. Scott said 'It's like painting a car with a 3-inch sponge.' Not very exciting to watch, but very rewarding in the end.

When he is finished scanning all the data is rendered and we have a complete 3D model of the entire car. This computer model will be used in conjunction with our CAD software to develop and test fit new components for a variety of current projects. The different colors indicate different passes with the laser.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-h-a.akamaihd.n...3b39a257abd40b

When we build new chassis kits and components it doesn't look like anything is happening for a while. Then one day you walk out and there is a massive pile of parts that 'magically' all fit perfectly in the car. It's pretty cool!

And in case anyone was wondering, the Mustang body is being held in place by our unique new fixture that Chris Alston Sr. designed specifically for the gStreet builds. It will work with several different bodies and allows easy access to the entire car. No more welding bars across the inside of the body that you have to work around.
https://www.cachassisworks.com/site_...mustang_AT.jpg

I'm trying to weasel a screen capture of the entire Mustang scan out of Engineering. I'll post it here if they get it to me.

Being in engineering, that would be fun to watch.

Gearhead built my car, great group of guys.