J the Human Brake

Brake in the metal working sense. The current FX came to me with the spare tire well filled in with a sub woofer tub. The hold down spindle was chopped out and the tub hammered out. The plan to restore the brackets for the spare has been idle in my brain for a long time, then working on J’s door handles inspired me and I finally decided to tackle the job. My plan was also to properly relocate the battery in the well, instead of the hacked cracked plastic box bolted to the speaker board (which is no longer there). Just after noon, J got to my house just as I got home from picking up some supplies. I explained what I had in mind to him and we started taking a close look and making measurements. J suggested instead of my idea of cutting out a large piece of the bottom of the well, to just take the center spindle bracket and weld it into the existing FX’s well and leave the bashed out well as it is. Less work. That’s the nice thing about having more than one brain looking at a problem, alternate views and ideas. The idea looks like it will work, and instead of trying to find space to relocate the jack bracket, if I flip the spare over, there’s a nice spice within the spare that I could just use a strap. We now look at how to fit the battery in. One of my early thoughts was to mount a sturdy box firmly to a board that was bolted to the floor of the rear deck, somewhat like the previous hack job, but done much more securely. But when my toughts had turned to cutting and welding, I figured might as well get ambitious and do the full custom job and sink it into the well. So now we set about moving things around and eyeball placement and tape measuring spaces. Looks like we can tuck it into the corner. But before we do any cutting or welding into the car, we decide we should fabricate the battery box. That way we can fit it in, then see exactly where we can put the spare tire.

A good plan, but we need material. I could go get some City Mill sheet metal, or there’s those computer cases that Derek had brought over years ago when I had delusions of fixing the FJ-55 ‘Cruiser. We dig the case out, and as J pulls it out, he comments that it looks almost the right size. No way! It really amazingly is so close that it will work quite well! Three sides of the box is already made for us, complete with lip, shoots! We cut the rest to size and get to work forming the last side of the box. J is the human sheet metal brake and with just an aluminum roof rack spar, CMU block, C-clamps, dead blow and ball peen hammers, he forms the box, two lips, and folds back two edges on the top. And this is some good gauge metal, they don’t make PC cases like these anymore! This stuff is way heavier than what the car is made of! Of course what takes minutes on all those “shade tree” and mechanics shows on TV with garages fitted with actual shears and brakes takes us hours and more decibels of hearing loss.

Inspired by Chucky’s welding skills (after a rough start) on J’s ride, I have myself a little welding session. After the first weld and adjustment to the welder, every successive bead improved. I learn to keep the tip in close, figure out the rate to push the puddle and how to watch it, and with this wire feed MIG learn that I can start with the wire in contact with the piece. That makes starting in correct place easier, especially with this mask. I also relearned and was reminded how annoying my stove pipe robot head welding mask is. My next purchase is going to be a modern auto darkening helmet. I can only imagine how much easier and better its going to be after learning and suffering with this old mask. Although I suppose there is the benefit of if ever I had to go back to old school helmet, I’d have the experience.

I’m pretty satisfied with the finished welds, or perhaps it’s the welders madness setting in. I’m sure the vaporizing plating of whatever is on this case is not good for you. It’s taken us about three hours, but we finally have a box. A solid box. A hefty solid box. Actually fitting this into the car is going to be a project for another day, but now that we spent so much time on this, it should provide motivation to complete the project.  Look out ‘Chuck’ Foose, there’s a new name in town!