Triumph Sports Cars

Frank,

What size aluminum radiator are you using?? Griffin or? I'm right there with the rad....I want to here the ls1 run soon :-) and so does my wife.

Calvin I am going to use an aluminum radiator i bought off Ebay...it mesures 19"tallat the cap x 29 wide at the tanks. The radiator has two one inch rows for a core. The whole radiator is tig welded and appears to be of good quality and the best part is it was only $180 shipped to my front door.

Jim the way I am doing the crossmember is how I have done them in the past on much heavier street rods ie:1946 Packard Clipper, with great success. I dont like to notch the tubing for obious reasons, like the strength of the tubing is comprimised,and it worps during welding process if not clamped to a very secure table. I build gussets with the proper 4* angle cut into them. the gussets go between the square mounting plate bolted to the third member and the crossmember.. This method does several
things, it keeps the crossmember uncomprimised and straight, it raises the crosmember above the brakes and puts the proper geometrical angle in the third member. The gussets are all made of 3/8 inch plate as is the mounting plate. The crossmember will be reinforced with two strut rods going from the front bottom LCA inner stud mounts to a location on the frame abaove the level of the pinion nut. It s a two fold system. In other words both supports and braces have to fail to be a serious problem. It is a very simpole approach that has been proven on my previous experience and is actually a very common method for mounting these rear ends.

Sounds good Frank, can't wait to see the finished car. Where are you located btw?

Jim

Down near San Antonio, Texas in the hill country.....Thanks for the tips.

FG,

I may just have to come visit you as I have big time family around your back door. Family in New Braunfels, went to college at SWT and UT, worked at TV-4 KMOL in SA, son has a practice in Austin, and cousin works in a Jag resto shop in Austin.

Don't worry, I'm in WV, so It won't be soon. I get down there once a year. (you just dodged a bullet on that one)

PS Calvin, I have family in CA also. (another bullet dodged)

FG, I can't wait to see your ride develop, and maybe some day ride shot gun with you.

This weekend I finished the rear cross member. I used a piece of 2 ¾ x 2 ¾ x ¼ square tubing because that’s what I had in the shop at the time. I still plan on using 1 /12x 3x .120 rectangular tubing for the frame stub. I also used 2” long left over pieces of the lower control arm tubing to make my bushing mount. I had a set of 1969 Camaro Poly rear spring bushings that fit the tubing perfectly, so I used them for the main cross member isolators. I will use the Chevy truck bushings for the lower control arm mount struts instead. I used 3/8” plate for the gussets and the third member plate as well as the lower control arm “wishbone” braces. The gussets between the third member and cross member already have the 4 degree angle in them that these jag rear ends have built into the tops of the thirdmember. Here are some picks......

It looks very strong Frank, nice dogbones btw. Good access to the diff mounting bolts too. Do you think you'll use both sets of springs? Seems I heard Cobras only used one set because they were so much lighter than the donor car. We were planning to run coil-overs on the Roadmaster but haven't bought them yet. Here's the link if you're interested in seeing how we're doing on that: [forum.britishv8.org] bottom of the page.

Jim

Jim, I will try all four shocks and if they turn out to be too heavy I will try just two...I am on a tight budget for this project and after market coil overs are not an option............I read the article posted on your page about the axles turning while welding. I first spot welded the tubes to the axlestubs and then clamped them down to a surface plate on the machined sufaces of the u-joint retainers. They did not move and were perfectly straight after welding.