Vorshlag Build Thread - 69 Camaro Pro Touring/Track Car

[4*4]

Awesome build and your writing skills are top drawer. Keep up the good work and mooooor updates please!

[Fair]

Project Update April 19th, 2016: I've been pretty buried with other work but I'm finally doing some catch-up posts on various build threads and will try to cover the work we completed on the tube framed 69 Camaro track car for November through early December 2015 in today's update.



The work shown this time includes finishing the steering shaft in the engine bay to the Woodward rack, mounting power steering and oil coolers, completing the front anti-roll bar "splined arm" and end link fabrication, fitting the front body panels better to finalize body mounts, a lengthy discussion of hood and duct choices (including flat hood vs using the existing aluminum cowl hood), making a new front steering arm that bolts to the C6 spindles, then making new tie rods to finish the steering, planning out the wiper motors, making room for the driveshaft at the rear of the frame, as well as some exploratory work on hood hinges and some more front splitter and valance work.

STEERING SHAFT FABRICATION



The 2-piece steering shaft has been "mocked up" in the chassis for a while - necessary during the exhaust header fabrication. We had a temporary u-joint at the firewall (above) made for a 3/4" DD shaft, which came with a bunch of other parts when the Camaro made it to our shop last year.



We had been waiting on the splined lower steering U-joint, which finally arrived long after the headers were built.



We have been making multi-piece steering shafts for many years for the BMW crowd, for use in our LS1 swap kits as well as for racers looking to remove the slop in the factory "rag joint". The final "real" steering u-joints for the custom 2-piece collapsible shaft were ordered and the shaft was built. This unit uses both 1" DD (hollow) and 3/4" DD (solid) steel shaft material.



Not too glamorous but its in there and the steering rack was steerable in November. It was so buried by the motor and header that you can't really see it once installed.

POWER STEERING & OIL COOLER MOUNTING



To ensure the steering stays cool on track we have a power steering cooler spec'd, purchased, and mounted.



A properly sized Mocal heat exchanger was mounted into the Left Front corner of the lower grill with brackets fabricated from small gauge tubing. One more small tube (not shown yet) will connect this structure to the removable front tubular section.



These tubular structures later had sheet aluminum ducting attaching to the inlets. The coolers receive cooling air from above the splitter and the opening at the left side of the lower grill.



On the other side of the lower grill, another Mocal heat exchanger was sized and purchased for engine oil cooling.



This one is mounted in the Right Front corner of the car, also receiving cooling air from atop the splitter, with a similar custom bracket.



Both oil coolers + the radiator will exhaust out of the hood ducting, which I cover below.



HEADLIGHT MOUNT FABRICATION



I showed some of the detail work involved in mounting the headlight buckets in an earlier teaser post. Lots of little custom bits needed to make the buckets install with the tubular front end.



Ryan installed some temporary halogen bulbs in the Camaro while we awaited the LED headlight assemblies. We just wanted to see the front end together with lights to see if the aiming was in the right ballpark.

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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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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.



The car owner had noticed some of the other vented and ducted hoods we had built in the past and understood aero enough to know how advantageous this setup would be for making front downforce, proper cooling, and a better layout. He also sent us 20+ pictures of other modern race car hoods and splitters, for styling and functional examples.




We struggled to lay out some appropriately sized and placed hood ducts on the existing aluminum 2" raised cowl hood, but just could not make something that fit within the geometric confines of the raised cowl. As good as this hood looked on this chassis, it just wasn't conducive to proper placement of the rather large vent holes we felt were needed to exhaust the airflow from the radiator, oil cooler and power steering cooler.



The car owner was reluctant to lose this raised cowl hood, which was understandable, but we didn't want to start cutting on it without trying something else first. So we found a stock 69 Camaro flat steel hood and I piked it up for $150 locally. We fitted this hood to the car on our dime and then started mocking up hood duct vents to show the customer how they could look on a flat hood.



After a few tape mock-ups Ryan started cutting the expendable steel hood so he could show real, 3D duct layouts. The locations of the coolers, the placement of the engine, and the low pressure zones on this hood (in our imaginary wind tunnel) dictated where the vent holes and duct routing should end up. Our engineer Jason wanted these large vent sizes and Ryan made this first cut and then the cardboard ducting mockup, above. I then photoshopped this mirror image to show what the final hood would look like with these vents. Not quite what the customer wanted, but we were getting closer.


The gap in the middle of the hood between the two vents was there to clear the engine's intake tube, of course. The angles of the ducting underneath were constrained by several things - the placement of the coolers, the upper chassis braces (including two forward pieces not installed yet), the best low pressure location on the hood, and the tires themselves.



There were also some placement constraints from some styling lines in even the flat hood. The ducts really needed to be outside of the lines (see above) that the flat hood had, so we went on a search for a truly flat 69 Camaro hood.




We took a lot of pictures trying to show the owner the constraints that dictated the placement of the vents. This is just a sample of the mockup designs we did. The 315mm tires at full bump travel were a constraint. So were the frame rails and upper tubing placement. And the location of the radiators. Plus we had to make it look "right".



Not only are the vent placements critical for function but these will be the single most critical cosmetic item on the car. The hood vents and ducting could make or break the look of this car, and getting rid of some useless styling lines in the stock flat hood opens up even more possibilities for the vent hole shapes and placements (see below).



Long story short: so we ordered a custom composite flat hood without the two styling lines normally found on an OEM 69 Camaro flat hood. We will address this design feature further in a future post, after this hood arrives...

HOOD HINGES AND WIPER MOTORS

Another constraint on the hood design was the customer's wish to keep functional windshield wiper arms as well as a traditional hinged hood (not just a pin-on). It does rain in Texas, so the wipers make sense. Pin-on hoods are a pain to extract quickly, especially with one person. You also have to worry about a hood that is removed getting stepped on, driven over, or flying away in the paddock. All sensible requests. We began our research by shooting images of the cowl section of the car with both hoods, then hitting the interwebs looking for options.



Our first question we had was do we use an aftermarket strut-equipped hood hinge kit or just refinish the factory spring-style hinges (shown above). Turns out: neither.

There are many aftermarket options for these cars with varying degrees of detail, finishes and price. After some research and from recommendations from our friends at Dusold Designs, there were only two billet hood hinge kits we felt appropriate for this 69 Camaro build: The Ring Brothers billet hinge kit or the Billet Specialties version. Both are well-respected companies and have various finishes and CNC work to choose from as well as varying weights of gas-struts to accommodate an aluminum or composite hood.



I was hoping we could use a single pivot, simpler hood hinge for the Camaro. As you can see, with the cowl hood design (still in play at this point) the hinge needed to be a multi-pivot design - to come up and tilt back at the same time, or the rear section of the raised cowl hood will crash into the fixed portion of the cowl panel, ahead of the windshield. The wiper arms are mounted under this cowl panel, so that panel needed to stay in place. Some of the composite hoods we found incorporated this cowl panel section into the hood itself, which don't work with wiper arms.

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After the Billet Specialties hood hinges came in we realized they are MASSIVE. This video shows the action of these things - very smooth. We mocked them up on the car and they were going to run into the front tires at full bump. That 315mm tire stuffed under stock outer fender contours takes up a LOT of room under the hood, unfortunately. At this point we had figured out that the flat hood was the way to go for venting, so we could go with a simpler, lighter, and easier to mount single-pivot hood hinge... so the Billet Specialties hinges went back. Oh well, they sure were slick to see in person.



Our second question here related to the windshield wiper system. Because the factory firewall has been moved significantly, it would be an extreme amount of work to use any of the OEM wiper system components. After researching various options, we felt that a synchronized, direct mount wiper motor system is the best option. This eliminates any linkages that would need to be designed, and instead mounts the wiper arm directly onto a degreed sweep style wiper motor. The industries these style of motors are used in are either motorsports or marine applications. We contacted Bosch to receive more information on their programmable Motorsport WDA and found there are currently only 3 available in the U.S. with an asking price of $890 each, and the car would need two.



The second option we found was a very reasonable wiper motor sold by Marinco. These models have sweeps ranging from 45° to 110° and come in a very compact size. Our plan was to use a three-position switch, giving the driver control of "park", low, and high wiper speed options. With an average price per unit of $150, we could get two of these for less than a third of the price of a single Bosch WDA. Mounting would be straightforward with only one bracket being fabricated for each motor and no linkages needed. Will show more of this after we get a chance to install these parts - we need a windshield and a cowl panel back in the car to design around.

COILOVER SHOCK DISCUSSIONS

After doing some research into the coilover shocks that had previously been purchased we determined that they wouldn't work for a variety of reasons. The springs were sized with giant coilover springs that wouldn't clear the front control arms, the shock brand and model were not something ever seen on road race cars, and the hose lengths for the remote reservoirs were too short. Now that the steering system components were fabricated and the geometry was checked and rechecked, and we would be taking the Camaro off the fab table in the coming weeks, it was time to look at dampers that would be more appropriate for this build.



During this coilover discussion Ryan sorted out the eye-to-eye style shock mounts at both ends.



Ryan fabricated double-sheer mounts for both the front and rear shocks (the final shock brand was yet to be determined). The solid "mock-up shocks" were then able to support the suspension at both ends and the car. We were all eager to set this Camaro back on its wheels for the first time in 10 months.

There were some lengthy discussions about shock brands, number of adjustments, remote reservoirs, dyno plots, spring sizes and the like. We are known to be shock snobs here at Vorshlag but we have gotten that way after working with 1000+ shock sales and installs over the past dozen years. I will discuss more about the final shocks when they are installed.

REAR SEAT AREA CROSSMEMBER WORK

The original rectangular rear crossmember behind the driver needed clearance for the driveshaft and exhaust. Now that the driveshaft had arrived it was time to make the U-shaped clearance section and add some tubing to the top to tie into the 3rd link mount cross bar.



Ryan laid out the shape he wanted, marked center points for some holes, then hole-sawed two massive holes shown above for the corner radii...



He then cut out the parts in between....



Used some flat stock to make the curved section...



Ground everything smooth and flat....



Then clamped his pre-bent curved section in place and spot welded it along the edges.



Then the custom aluminum driveshaft was installed. After that the curved tubes closed the box around the U-shaped section and tied into the rear upper 3rd link mount cross bar. Then the 3-rd link mount on the chassis end was modified.



The upper bracketry was changed to add multiple pick-up points for the upper control arm, just like you can see on the lower arms at the chassis side, for additional rear suspension geometry adjustability. The 3 rear control arms are all adjustable for length as well.

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ADDITIONAL SPLITTER & SUPPORT WORK



This is a big section of this build that started back in September, went through November, and was mostly wrapped up in December. Another major visual and functional piece that will be a signature part of this build.



There were several aspects of the splitter, lower valance and front wheel flare sections that were finalized, modified, smoothed and welded in November.



Above you can see the lower section of the valance/splitter structure, which we're calling the "air dam" here. It was more upright on the first go around (see images above), but the customer wanted something sleeker. Here is version 2.0, where so Ryan re-made this lower section and parts of the splitter stricture to have a more flowing, receding line that matches the factory lower valance shape. Making this somewhat simple change involved considerable rework of existing structures and panels, but it does look better this way.



The wheel spats or forward flare sections were also finalized in this round of work and they are looking pretty nice at this point.



As the final shape was taking form Ryan could go ahead and make the splitter strut mounts, most of which will be hidden behind the aluminum front OEM style bumper.



Once the look was pleasing to the customer and still had the airflow shapes and openings we needed to cool and duct airflow, Ryan started finalizing some ducting. Here are the 4" front brake duct inlets, which fit inside the dual plane splitter structure.



Lots of trimming, shaping, TIG welding, sanding, and blending went into the final splitter design late in November.



Some of this is creeping into December work so I will stop there...



WHAT'S NEXT?

I will show the final stages of the dual plane splitter in the December work update, including the canards and the modified lower valance work. The custom ordered ATL fuel cell finally arrived in January and I will show that work as well.



As I'm writing this on April 19th, 2016, the Camaro chassis just arrived here after our painter sprayed the upper portion of the cage and the lower frame rails - which are about to be hidden under parts of the body - which arrived last week after the inside of the unibody was painted. I'll get to the "chassis comes off the frame table" steps and more caught up with real time on this forum build thread soon.

Until next time, thanks for reading.

[98ssnova]

Man awesome build

[Flash68]

Now that's an update. Thanks Terry.

[Nine Ball]

This is one of the best build threads I've seen. Excellent photos, and detailed explanation. Thanks for sharing.

Tony

[fleet]

Originally Posted by Nine Ball

This is one of the best build threads I've seen. Excellent photos, and detailed explanation. Thanks for sharing.

Tony

X2.

Kept scrollng and scrollng thru it thinking...'There's more?'