Chassis Build Up & Design

what's the calculated corner frequencies between those two spring rates?

I'd have to dig a bit to see if I saved any of my calculations from before, but I probably did them on paper. That's long gone if so.  My memory tells me 600 (aka ~ZQ8 rate) was spot on for the same corner frequencies as a Vette.

I finished welding the exhaust last week and got it all bolted back on.  Really happy with my progress on TIG welding even if the welds don't look as good as I'd like. Definitely don't look bad and I'm glad to have that tool and skill in my pocket. Exhaust and fuel system are ready for a test fire now. Exhaust hangers turned out awesome.









No pictures of laying out the harness, but got that on with the starter. Found a few connectors I tore off the last time I removed it, so those got fixed. Also worked out some ideas for heat shielding the fuel lines and harness near the exhaust on the transmission. Could have a video of the first start up next week.  Only need a handful of small parts from the junkyard, oil, and gas to fire up.

Went ahead and purchased the 650lb springs, so that won't be holding me back once the suspension and chassis is going together. Ordered them on Christmas day and Summit already delivered them out to the shop yesterday.

yay progresss!!

is that enough room to bend over the rear end?

Should be. The rear of the muffler is within an inch or so of the factory muffler.

Nice!

It looks even cleaner in person.

The rate of progress lately has been awesome!

Al and I rearranged the barn yesterday. Nothing was left untouched. Frame is at the hoist and ready for tear down. I put together a few things to test fire the engine without the rest of the truck, but it wouldn't build oil pressure. It was running when I bought it, so I'm guessing it's something with the oil pickup or pan. I'll drop the pan when I pull it off the frame.

Borrowed Al's GoPro and made a timelapse of the day. Engine starting is at 8:20. Enjoy!  https://youtu.be/66eHYVscGy4

Also stopped at the junkyard this morning. They had an RSX and brought home a very nice pair of cloth seats. Was hoping for leather, but surprised with the quality of the cloth; mostly suede, not terribly dirty, and no tears. Thanks for the idea Rentedmule!



Now that I've made so much progress I'll be travelling for a few, but looking forward to getting back to it.

The cloth looks great and will probably be better than the leather for hard driving. I may have to go back to using kitchen cupboard liner on my seats once I get them installed.

I definitely used that reasoning when I found them in the yard. That and I don't want to be hunting for the perfect seat and end up with no seat. I found a pair at a yard in Chicago last week, but the leather was completely trashed. Of course the same yard I found the cloth pair in dropped another RSX later that same day.

seats look nice! will you try to retain the flip forwards function?

what color oring is on your pickup tube?

holy crap did the fiero drive itself out?

test setup looks great!

Fiero took some coaxing but did cooperate. It wants more attention than its getting.

Al didn't mention the Fiero would only move under electric power. Go go electric vehicles.

I'll have to check the o ring once I pull the pan, but I do remember reading a discussion somewhere about the importance of the color.

My plan with the seats is to maintain the Honda mechanisms and somehow merge the lower rails of the Blazer and Honda together. Honda has a mount at each corner attached with some kind of weld rivet thing. I was thinking of drilling it out and replicating the layout with pieces from the Blazer rails. Once the body is on I'll explore it more.

I already started grinding off the tabs on the rsx seats - there seems to be a weld in addition to the rivet (or maybe mine are just rusted in place). Without the tabs, the sliders look almost identical to the universal ones I have on the race seats in the truck so it should be easy to adapt them to s-series mounts if you go that direction. Do yours have side airbags?

i like what you guys are doing, figure it out, perfect it, and then ill go find some of the same seats

Sweet. That means we're heading in the right direction.

Mine have the side airbags. I got them out of a 2004 car, but was thinking they all had airbags. I'm planning to take the bag out and leave the cover. The first RSX I found had the bag deployed and the cover appeared separate from the rest of it.

I considered removing the bag as well but wasn't sure if the seat needed it for support. I may give that a try as well but I still need to drop mine off at the upholsterer to get a seam fixed before I go too far.

I hadn't considered the airbag would be structural. Will find out soon enough. No tears in the cloth definitely sold me on this pair. I think I put off the Si seats so long because they needed upholstery and cushion repairs.

Do you have any pictures or information on how you mounted up your universal mounts?

I modified a set of manual bucket seat tracks from a second gen - I cut the upper slider section off and then widened the mounting section on the lower brackets by welding a 1" strip of steel onto the outsides (this was my first welding job, be kind!).



It ended up that the tracks were from an earlier second gen so I need to drill one hole in the floor to mount them in the truck. I used the female seat belt end from an earlier second gen and bolted it to the factory seat mount where I knew it would be strong enough.



It was a bit of a PITA to get the sliders bolted to the brackets without bolt heads interfering with the mechanism or nuts interfering with the brackets but it just took some trial and error - it'll be easier for someone with mechanical skill.

The stock floor trim pieces from the donor truck fit fine to cover up the nuts/studs (until I broke them taking the seats out and was too lazy to find replacements...)

is there any way to remove the plastic caps over the studs without destroying them?