Another Mopar Off My Bucket List - Barracuda Fastback

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I kept at it until about 1 a.m. It's all welded inside & out. After grinding and sanding it almost appears as if it could have been stamped out of a press instead of welded together from so many pieces. When I boxed it I left a lip sticking out the one side similar to the way the factory ones were. There are a few small divots in it from hammer blows but they're no worse than some of the tooling marks on the originals.

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69_340_GTS said:
That's some nice work!
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Thanks GTS but I'm afraid I've got a new problem. Before final welding I'd test fit the cross-member to make sure it fit OK. Then I cut my tack welds so I could access the inside for more welds. After I was done putting it back together I ground & sanded it. It hadn't occurred to me that I should have tried fitting it one more time before spritzing on some black.

Well... - apparently the welding process sucked the ends of the cross-member closer together by over 1/4". I can still bolt through the frame on one side but I'll have to tweak it to get the width correct.
:wtf:

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Can't you just elongate the mounting holes? Only 1/8" per side seems very feasible.

I remember at a machine shop I once worked , we had some 4" gas pipe manifolds to weld together, had to allow a lot of extra material for shrinkage. It was a real trial & error process but once we figured it out you could very accurately predict the shrinkage factor.

Good luck with however you decide to fix it!
 
69_340_GTS said:
Can't you just elongate the mounting holes? Only 1/8" per side seems very feasible.
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69_340_GTS said:

I remember at a machine shop I once worked , we had some 4" gas pipe manifolds to weld together, had to allow a lot of extra material for shrinkage. It was a real trial & error process but once we figured it out you could very accurately predict the shrinkage factor.

Good luck with however you decide to fix it!
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I appreciate the suggestion GTS. I could elongate those holes but I've got a little less meat on those ends than the factory had. Spence was already pointing that out as a flaw. If I did elongate the holes it'd put them even closer to the ends and I suspect he'll have me re-doing it again. He's sort of picky. I guess I've been letting him make the final decisions on things because it's his car. - Now if he'd just start paying me for the labor...
 
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Well... - it's in. I went ahead and sliced the cross-member where I'd planned and spread the gap about 3/8" which moved the distance between the outside holes further apart about 1/4". Then I fried it back up and ground it again. The outside was easy to grind back down to a smooth finish and you can't tell it's been cut again. However, now that it's all assembled I didn't have room to get to the inside.

Even though it measured pretty close I did have to egg-shape one hole a bit as per GTS's suggestion. Now the transmission lines up with the mounting holes and the outside two frame bolts are in. I still have to drill the inner two frame holes but I think I'll wait until I pull the transmission. There isn't a lot of room working under the car especially with that Tremec in the way.

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While I was working on that cross-member a guy from Columbus, Ne pulled up in a nice '69 Camaro. He'd noticed the cars here a long time ago and said he likes to drive by to see what's new in the driveway.

Despite the fact he's been a Chebby guy he's well aware of the value the old Chargers have and he bought one a few months ago himself. He showed me the pics on his phone. It's a '70 Charger 500 with a 383, column shift torqueflite. I guess the car was sitting inside for the last 20 years and is almost perfectly rust free and the interior is near perfect. The biggest flaw it had was that someone had run fenderwell headers and chopped up the engine bay for clearance.

- Get this. He only gave $2300 for the car! After seeing the pics I'd say he could easily quadruple his money and whoever he'd sell it to would still be getting a bargain. His plan is to keep and restore it. Maybe we've converted another one of them Chebby boys over to the dark side.
 
SNKEBIT said:
Awwwwwe, shucks. :thankyou:
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I'm sort of proud of the way the cross-member has turned out but it pales in comparison to the work so many of you guys have done on your cars. I've opted to replace sheet metal with replacement panels while I see others making their own. I feel as though I need to step up my game quite a bit before I can ever count myself in the same league.
 
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Trans mount looks great from here.
I'm watching you and your funny car John.
It sure was hard to look at cracked up and caved in.
Glad you get to spend some time with it.
 
ssba said:
Trans mount looks great from here.
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ssba said:
I'm watching you and your funny car John.
It sure was hard to look at cracked up and caved in.
Glad you get to spend some time with it.
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Thanksabunch SSBA.

I think the design of this cross-member comes closer to the original than any others I've seen fabbed so far. One of the things I've always liked to see were the mods that go unnoticed because they blend in with the factory pieces.

I was truly heart broke when the funnycar got vandalized. It may have sat untouched for years but I always had the intent to finish it. When they trashed it, I almost gave up on ever bringing it back. With all the damage it became an eyesore.

Of all the projects I've ever had I'd always wanted to do the funny the most. It's SO impractical. It's SO outlandish. I can't imagine anything else that would say I'm nuts more than having it sitting (finished) in my garage.

I'm happy to hear that you like the updates on it. Spending as much time in the garage as I do it often feels as if I'm wasting my time on stuff that no one else here has an interest in. This build thread started out documenting what I'm doing to my Barracuda and eventually encompassed all the rest of the projects around here. I've often thought about dropping references to the cars that aren't truly A-bodies. - After all, - this is FABO. Sometimes I've wondered if the moderators cringe when they see so many non- A-bodies on their site.

The Charger, Roadrunner, 'Lil Red, '74 'Cuda, and dually obviously belong elsewhere. The funny isn't actually a real Duster and maybe it belongs on another site too. I'm not computer illiterate and could've posted those builds on various other sites. - I did at first. It's just a lot more work jumping from one site to another.
 
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Today I dropped the transmission and drilled out those last two holes for the cross-member. That plastic block has really come in handy but it's so much lighter than the transmission that it makes it difficult to balance the assembly. (I guess I needed to go in and out with the tail down anyway)

The re-installation was fairly easy. Other than the usual fight to align the motor mount bolts everything else lined right up. I still want to eliminate the old torsion bar mounts.

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I tried to take more photos to show the reason for the odd shape of the cross-member and how it clears the transmission.

VIEW FROM BENEATH:

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PASSENGER SIDE:

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DRIVERS SIDE:

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Other designs that I've seen move the bottom cross-member back behind the top half. While it does work to support the transmission I've questioned whether or not those are as strong as a design that forms a complete single unit that circles the transmission. Maybe it makes little difference but I keep reminding myself about the HP goal and don't want a weak point that allows twist.

When I had both cross-members on the shop floor I tried comparing how much flex I could create in each. The one we fabbed seems a lot more rigid. I'm sure that boxing it has a lot to do with that.

Before I weld in the upper cross-member I think I'll scope it out one more time. There may be enough room to add more reinforcement without limiting access to necessary areas.

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I always buy some poster board paper for mocking up panels so I can use them as patterns for the steel. I assume everybody does it this way. It was awfully hot out today so I wasn't very productive. - That plus my sinuses were acting up. - And my dog ate my homework...

I think I'll be able to form the metal out of two pieces. It'll be rounded towards the front and square off around the shifter. If I mark reference points on the paper I should be able to transfer those onto the metal so that I align correctly with the sharper bends when it goes in.

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The tunnel seems awfully tall to me. I'm hoping we haven't positioned the transmission too high. If I drop the plate down that goes over the shifter I'd be lower but I wanted enough clearance that the transmission would have wiggle room for installation and didn't want it knocking on the floor.

I don't see much problem with the tunnel other than I still think we'll have to have custom carpet made.
 
- Still working on the tunnel. After transferring the templates onto the metal I went ahead and cut the two pieces. It wasn't difficult to get the paper to conform to the floor. The steel is fighting me. I did my best to bend it in the general shape and have been tweaking it further as I tack it in place. In some areas I intentionally left excess material to allow for stretch and to give me places to clamp.

Without a brake, an English wheel, a sheet metal roller or even a decent anvil, I've been relying on a section of train rail and hammers. It's all looking pretty crude so far but after I get it fitting the floor the way I want - I'll cut my tacks, remove the pieces. and and smooth the metal out as best I can.

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I kept fighting the sheet metal for the tunnel until after the sun set. Things are shaping up pretty well. After tacking it all down I was able to trim the excess off and the fit looks good.

After removing the drivetrain again I finished welding the upper half of the cross-member. The sheet metal is clamped in place and if nothing goes wrong I should have it welded tomorrow.

The only real problem I ran into was that one of the bolt inserts in that plastic block started spinning so I was unable to remove the motor mount on the passenger side. :( Those blocks are pretty cheesy but we wouldn't be able to get much done without it.
 
Parents of autistic 3-year-olds probably have things hanging on their refrigerators that more closely resemble works of art - but it's in.

I spent the last 7 hours welding, trimming, and grinding to get it this far. Surface rust will start forming by tomorrow if I don't get some paint on it so I'll try to clean up the rest of the floor yet today.

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I ran out of paint before I could do the bottom side but at least I got the inside done.

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69_340_GTS said:
It'll be fine once covered by carpet. Looks pretty good to me!
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I hope so. When my son saw a picture of it he said it looked about as big as a console.

It dawned on me that the driveshaft loop we bought from U.S. Cartool wouldn't bolt up to our modified cross-member. - Looks like I'll have to make a wider mounting plate for it.

DRIVESHAFT LOOP:

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NEXT TO CUT OUT SECTION OF UPPER CROSS-MEMBER:

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LINED UP NEXT TO OUR WIDENED CROSS-MEMBER:

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I need to buy one of those loops. Every time I see them I drool
Floors looking good, lots a hours doing that, I'm a welder so I know all about it haha
 
THEWHITEZOMBIE said:
I need to buy one of those loops. Every time I see them I drool
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THEWHITEZOMBIE said:
Floors looking good, lots a hours doing that, I'm a welder so I know all about it haha
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I like those loops for several reasons. They don't require any welding. There's no drilling. They can be unbolted. - And they're more compact than ones that tie all the way across the bottom of the car. The only thing that might be a negative is that the loop portion is a continuous circle that doesn't split. That would mean that the driveshaft needs to be fed through it instead of going straight up.

My eyes seem to need more light than they used to in order for me to see what I'm welding. I run the lightest lenses I can get. The cross-member was a piece of cake because it was heavier and I did it standing up under the lights. Laying down on the floor inside the car welding that thin stuff wasn't any fun at all.
 
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4.7Light said:
Your doing a a great job! Dont beat yourself up to much its impressive work Young man! ;)
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Young man? Young man?? I think the last time I was called that was about 100 years ago. At one time time I checked and dirt was 2 months younger than me.

Thanks for the kind words 4.7. I still think the tunnel looks odd. I like the idea of having a little room around the transmission but wish the tunnel didn't seem so big. The sharp drop behind the shifter contributes to the similarity with a console. - Maybe I should have made that more of a gradual blend.
 
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