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INITIAL HOOD DUCTING TESTS
With the aluminum front bodywork panels fitting better it was time to choose the hood venting. The whole front end - splitter, various coolers, radiator angle - were all going to be built around a vented/ducted hood, from the very first conversations we had with the car owner. The actual design decision was a long process.
STEERING ARM REDESIGN
The old steering arms were made to bolt to a modified C5/C6 front upright (where you cut off the integral C6/C6 steering arm). The fabricated parts that came with the car were made for a different steering rack, a different ride height, different tie rods, and a different subframe. These old arms were made without any Akerman and the bumpsteer was pretty bad, plus the tie rods were connected in a single-sheer, bolt-thru mounting design.
To correct these suspension geometry issues, Ryan did the suspension software calculations as part of the entire front end redesign which required a new pair of steering arms with new lengths, angles, heights, and geometry to work with the C6 bits and new ride height.
He built the new pair of steering arms using box sections, reducing weight by nearly 12 pounds for the pair. The end was made to mount the tie rod end in a double sheer mount.
The new steering arms were installed and the bump steer and Ackerman numbers were verified.
The spherical-end tie rods were also custom built during this time, finally wrapping up the steering system components - the car can now steer.
FRONT ANTI ROLL BAR FABRICATION
I believe I showed the front swaybar being mounted in an earlier post. This is a straight, splined shaft with pillow ball mounts on the frame. Now was the time to make the splined arms and endlinks to complete this component.
Various aluminum swaybar "arms" are made for these straight splined swaybar shafts and they can be purchased in a number of lengths, thicknesses, and even some are pre-bent. We started with straight arms that were then bent to fit in the 20 ton hydraulic press.
In these pictures above and below you can see the completed swaybar assembly. The arms are bent - both for tire clearance (inboard) and to line up with the C6 Corvette control arm's endlink mounting hole. The arms were drilled for multiple adjustment holes as well. Some of the items shown are only tack welded at this point as some final checks still needed to be done once the car was off the frame table, sitting on the wheels and tires at ride height, and rolled onto a 4 wheel alignment rack.
Ryan built a pair of adjustable length swaybar end links out of threaded rod ends, threaded weld bungs, straight tubing and some misalignment spacers for the bolted ends.
The front tie rods that connect the Woodward steering rack to the steering arms that bolt to the C6 uprights are also visible here. Everything is fairly robustly made - it never hurts to over build things a bit when you aren't striving to save every ounce. This car is not built around any minimum weight or racing class, and the owner wanted a little extra reliability and durability.
BODY PANEL FITTING
The car owner had sourced some pretty slick aluminum bodywork for the forward section of this chassis. This
Norwood kit was made by Auto Metal Direct for the 69 Camaro and included all aluminum sheetmetal forward of the doors and cowl. These pieces had been bolted in place (with several custom mounts) earlier but now it was time to fit the hood and try to get the panels to align better.
The only problem with these aluminum bits is they bend easily and it looked like a number of the parts were bent somewhere along the way, possibly in transit, especially the 2" raised cowl hood.
One corner of the hood was bent down and the culprit was a popped set of spot welds in the corner of some under structure. Easily bent back and fixed.
After fitting, massaging, and reinstalling the ADM panels they were looking much better and ready for the painter - who would get the panel gaps and fit-up perfected just prior to paint.
Maybe in retrospect an entire composite front end would have been a better choice. Heck, a fiberglass unibody might have been better. Hind sight is 20/20, and we suggested a new body at the very start. It wasn't until we put in the hours of tweaking and rust fixes that the car owner saw that, too. Its cool that it still is a real tub with a real VIN, though.
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