Thread: I couldn't build it for $3 K either!

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Well folks I'm back. Spent the weekend visiting friends in Mississippi and taking in the Super Chevy show in Memphis. Put almost 1000 miles on the 46 and had a great time! The nitro coupes, top fueler and jet cars were awsome! The swap meet was pretty big and there were a few good venders there. Bought a few things for the T, even though most of the stuff was geared toward muscle cars.

I'm recharged and ready to get some more done on the T. Just a little piece of unsolicited advice for everybody either working on or planning their first build. Don't get so wrapped up in your project that you forget to have some fun. Building or restoring cars is hard and sometimes frustrating work. It always costs more and takes longer than you think it will. No matter how much you enjoy it, sooner or later you're gonna get tired and fed up with the whole thing. Take a break and go enjoy yourself. It'll usually look a lot better when you get back. I wasn't burnt out yet, but I try to stop before I get that way now. I spend so much time in the shop, sometimes it feels like a second job. Having some fun was what this weekend was all about!

Tonight I'm going to post some more on the windshield frame and mounts.

I finished the second windshield post just like the first and figured I would move on to mounting the bases. I'm using a cross bar and mounting plates similar to Don's setup(Project $3K) under the dash. My bar isn't quite as big. Two bolts through the back of the mounts will be OK there, but I wanted to hide the front bolt.

First, I set the bases in place on the cowl and marked their position with a sharpie. Then I ground up a couple of 3/8" nuts and tacked them to the front inside corners of the bases. I held the bases up to the cowl, lined up my marks and marked where the nut contacted the cowl. I used a step drill and die grinder to make a hole in the cowl to just fit the nuts. A short piece of all-thread was used for a stud. My intention is to fit reinforceing plates inside the cowl for these studs. The plates will be "glued" to the inside of the cowl with fiberglass "kitty hair".

The windshield frame was made from 1/2' black pipe. I cut a 5/16" slot to mount the glass and I'm going to glue the glass in with silicone so I hope 5/16 will be enough. The glass is 1/4" thick. If it's not I'll have to build another frame since making the slot wider after it's put together would be pretty hard.

My first frame was made from 4 pieces as it was a "full frame". It was 14" tall and 40 1/2" wide. The top was removable so the glass could be installed. The problem was that the top bar was right in my line of sight. Not cool! Talk about annoying. I decided to go with an open top frame.

Fabbing the frame was pretty straight forward. I used corner magnets to anchor it to the table and a 5/16" lathe bit to keep the slots aligned. Keeping it all square was the hard part as it trys to "draw" as it cools. I had to "cheat" a little by tacking it slighly out of square so that it would be square when it cooled. I could have built a jig to hold everything, but didn't want to take the time. The top was held on with screws through the side and the frame is mounted on 3/8 x 24 bolts welded to the side of the frame. These are covered by the swivels.

The final open top frame was made by cutting the first frame down. I cut 5" out of the width and 1 1/2" out of the height, making it 35 1/2" X 12 1/2". I think the narrower frame looks more in proportion. It looks like I'm going to be looking just over the top of the windshield. That's exactly how I like my motorcycle windshield to be. I can "slump" a little for protection if needed, but most of the time I look over the top. Since this thing will be a four-wheeled motorcycle, that ought to be about right.

I still have to fab the inside reinforcing plates and finish weld everything, but for the most part the posts and windshield frame is finished. Now I can move on to mounting the steering column and finishing up the door. I'm trying to get most of the fab work done to the body so that I can glue the interior piece in. Got a lot of reinforcing to do though and that means fiberglass. Man I hate that stuff.