The Buchka 242 Daily Driver

[Ginger Ninja]

I was wondering what the plan was for the engine. Epic.

[Tuff240]

Whiteblock...

[VQ]

What are the strut tubes from? What thread and pitch for the insert nut?

[towerymt]

Dibs on the M46!

[Autocockerking]

I'm going to crush my GT now.
This build is amazing.

[Alex Buchka]

Originally Posted by VQ

What are the strut tubes from? What thread and pitch for the insert nut?

The strut tubes are just pieces of cold drawn seamless 4130 tubing. I single point turned the M48x1 thread into the ends.

Originally Posted by towerymt

Dibs on the M46!

Haha sure. I can see how you became smitten when you drove the car earlier

[blkaplan]

Originally Posted by Tuff240

Curious to see how the Delrin bushings do.

I have some in my car as well. They seem to be holding up fine and are fairly quiet.

[Duder]

Originally Posted by towerymt

Dibs on the M46!

You could easily use it to make gravel - take off the top cover, spin the input shaft with a redblock, feed rocks into M46, let the gravel poo out of an open drain plug hole.

[MadDog_945]

As always I am totally amazed what you guys get done while others are thinking: "wow.. look what they have done.."

[mopar318]

Originally Posted by Alex Buchka

The strut tubes are just pieces of cold drawn seamless 4130 tubing. I single point turned the M48x1 thread into the ends.



Haha sure. I can see how you became smitten when you drove the car earlier

Do you have a manual or cnc lathe? My 1960's LeBlonde only has English pitch for threading.

[Alex Buchka]

Originally Posted by mopar318

Do you have a manual or cnc lathe? My 1960's LeBlonde only has English pitch for threading.

It's a manual machine. 24tpi has a 1.05mm pitch, might be just close enough to work. Alternatively you could just make a new imperial threaded gland nut to match whatever you put into the strut tube.

[Speedshop]

Really like the conversion of the rims.

I have had the same idea for some other rims.
But lack of tools has stopped me so far.

Bra jobbat

[crogthomas]

Originally Posted by Alex Buchka

The panhard rod is completely straight. I massaged the diff cover with a hammer to get some clearance. It was very close but just worked. Once I shortened the lower trailing arms it got a lot better.

Interesting, have you got any pictures of the diff cover? And when you say 'lower' trailing arms' you mean the pressed steel arm that mounts the springs and dampers? How did you do that?
Thanks

[Alex Buchka]

Originally Posted by Speedshop

Really like the conversion of the rims.

I have had the same idea for some other rims.
But lack of tools has stopped me so far.

Bra jobbat

It was a ton of work, not sure it was worth it. Around 3-4 hours of welding per wheel.

Tack!

Originally Posted by crogthomas

Interesting, have you got any pictures of the diff cover? And when you say 'lower' trailing arms' you mean the pressed steel arm that mounts the springs and dampers? How did you do that?
Thanks

Not much to see on the diff cover; I beat it with a hammer. I shortened the stamped steel trailing arms by cutting them in half with a bandsaw and welding them back together. I recall cutting slightly forward of the damper mount holes, it is only slightly tapered there and the halves line up reasonably well.

[crogthomas]

Thanks. Denting the diff cover certainly makes making a panhard rod a easier task. Do you think it's possible with a LH2.4 speed sensor in place?

[Alex Buchka]

Originally Posted by crogthomas

Do you think it's possible with a LH2.4 speed sensor in place?

I don't know about that. I have a G80 and aluminum diff cover with a sensor for the car but I haven't bolted them on yet.

Progress continues on the swap. Most of the work has been things that don't really make for good updates; buying parts, making wiring schematics, and planning out all the work.

The clutch and flywheel are now bolted on. Installing them turned into a giant headache due to numerous unforeseen issues with fastener clearance and stack height cock-ups. I got the proper prevailing torque lock nuts on there for peace of mind (and silver plated for extra opulence).



The Megasquirt 2 I'm using to run this heap has been mounted in a nicer box with proper connectors. The engraving on the box is a reference to the ECU used in a friend's internet-famous 240SX time attack car. His ECU is known as the Megatron Blackbox (reference to the "brain boxes" used to control Megatron branded BMW turbo F1 engines of the 80's). The jam nuts are complete with Safe-T-Cable for the proper aerospace look.



Homer kindly found me a later model whiteblock thermostat housing that comes with a much more megasuirt-friendly coolant temp sensor and an extra threaded boss that Karl and I re-purposed to accept a temp sensor from a late model CBR1000RR.



The spare sensor boss is at a really weird angle. Drilling and tapping it to M12x1.5 required some creative workholding on the mill and also needed a smidge of weld on the back of the boss to make up for the much deeper CBR sensor element.





This is the last photo I took of the original engine before ripping it out. As you can see the engine bay of this car never got much love.



Later that day the whiteblock found its way into the bay, sitting comfortably on a set of Homer's whiteblock swap engine mounts. It's hard to believe how well the engine fits in a 240. Everything clears as if it was designed to be there. The only close call was the 25mm IPD swaybar that sat about 1mm from the oil pan. We added about 6mm of shims to the swaybar mounts to take care of that issue.





The W58 also found its way into the car. The transmission mount is visible in the corner of the photo. It's just some .125" steel sheet welded to the crossmember, very simple and sturdy enough for the application. The shifter didn't line up as well as I had hoped and needs to be moved back about 60-70mm. Some chopping and welding will tune that up right quick.




That's it for now. The engine is getting pulled back out sometime this week so we can clean the engine bay thoroughly and finish the last little bits of work on the engine. Also going to be drilling some holes in the firewall for a few bulkhead connectors.

[Tuff240]

You going to paint the bay or just clean it for now?

[Alex Buchka]

Originally Posted by Tuff240

You going to paint the bay or just clean it for now?

Just clean it for now and do a little touch up on spots where the paint is rubbed through. Ideally I would love to paint the bay since the area around the battery has yellowed pretty badly for some reason. This isn't a show car though and I've set a goal to get the car back on the road within a month.

Really, the entire car needs a re-spray. The paint has been buffed through in a few spots and there are quite a few chipped areas. The drivers door has some pretty ugly touch up done by a previous owner with some nasty runs. It's definitely a 15ft car at best at this stage.

[Tuff240]

Painted is nice, but makes it hard to change anything as you work the bugs out. Much better to sort them all out then dis-assemble and make them pretty anyways. Finished project will be much nicer that way.

[740atl]

Looks awesome!

[Duder]

Same day, same car. Different engine, alternate Buchka.

[Quin]

all of the sudden this car is interesting.

[Hank Scorpio]

Awesome!!!

[volvobrage]

Originally Posted by Quin

all of the sudden this car is interesting.

This car was interesting from the moment the thread had Buchka in it.

[Tuff240]

Originally Posted by Quin

all of the sudden this car is interesting.

Funny, I was thinking the opposite.

I'm sure it'll be cool with these crazies working on it regardless of my hate for whiteblocks.