scratch built Mazzer roadster

Thank you but most of us are good at some things and awful at other things. Me too.

Each door has only one hinge but otherwise they're fairly conventional. They just swing forward in the horizontal plane to open. The doors are fairly light since they're made of sheet aluminum with minimal steel tube bracing and the single hinge on each door is about 7 inches wide. I don't think there is much sag when they open.

 

Here's the flack. I own a car with wire wheels and they're a pain in the arse to maintain and they carry pathetic skinny tires. I'll be happy to build a car for you with a set of Borranis on it though. This car is not a replica of an old car but rather a new car with retro styling features. It has modern tires, modern brakes, an all synchro transmission with integral over-drive, power steering, modern race seats & belts and a comfortable MOMO steering wheel that allows me to place my hands at 3 o'clock and 9 o'clock, the way I like.

I had the wheels custom made by HRE to hold some beefy modern rubber and chose the spoke design I did because to me it's at least representational of traditional cross-laced wire wheels. The HREs cost a bundle so I'm a little sensitive about the criticism (you're not alone).

 

If you saw the pictures of my son Alex driving it, you would assume the car was running but it's not. The blue roadster was being towed back to the trailer on a skinny rope by me in my 308. We just ran out of time before the show, which was our self imposed deadline. Two nights before the show we got the engine installed and one night before the show we had the drive-shaft made and installed. Last night I was making a heater hose fitting so we can put coolant in the engine. I still have to hook up all the wiring, hoses and gauges to the engine, make up a throttle cable, etc, etc. I'm going to get nickel & dimed by all the details but hopefully she'll be drivable soon.

 

Thank you. Your vote for blue and the votes of a few others definitely closed the deal. I already had blue racing seats and blue leather for the interior so I decided we might as well go with the blue theme whole-hog. All the various blue parts don't really match but it doesn't matter. The exterior and interior paint is all the same blue but doesn't seem to match in photos.

Yes, I'm looking forward to driving the car and I will certainly post about it.

 

Thank you for the compliment and for the interest. I will post pictures when it's running. Unfortunately I've been pulled away from the project momentarily by the realities of the real world (work, family, etc) hopefully I'll be back hot and heavy on the car soon to put it on the road.

 

Thanks guys. Still working on it. Last night I got the front turn signals and parking lights wired and working. The headlights aren't wired yet but I have no plans to drive the car at night. Too many deer around here. I've hit over a dozen through the years.

Tomorrow I'm driving the car to a show for the first time. This morning I was busy installing a fire extinguisher. Funny, I never thought about an extinguisher until the first road test and we started smelling burning paint and chemicals. That's normal on a "new" car but it did make me think "Oh sh-t, I have no extinguisher with me if something happens!".

I've been so busy trying to get this car on the road before winter hits, in the little free time I have, that I didn't really get around to posting here. I'll put up some photos soon.

The car still needs tuning and what the British call fettling but "right out of the box" the car ran pretty well and it went down the road nice and straight. We weighed the car and with a half tank of fuel and all other fluids filled to spec, the car weighs 2630 lbs. I had hoped to keep it closer to 2,000 lbs but I added insulation and upholstery, interior door panels, fiberglass lining inside the fenders (wings) to protect the aluminum skin from rocks thrown up from the tires, etc, etc, and it all added up.

Speaking of weight: I don't have the notes with me but the front to rear weight distribution in within a few percent with a slight front weight bias and the corner weights were very close, side to side, with a driver in the car. We didn't bother making any adjustments.

The clutch pedal is pretty stiff. I should change to a smaller master cylinder but it's OK for now. The car stops fairly well at legal speeds. We need to play with brake bias, which is adjustable front to rear, and I should probably reduce the brake master cylinder sizes.

There are some strange noises coming from the car (pulsing singing noises) while driving that may be coming from Tremec-5-speed. The trans was bought new about 15 years ago and for all I know it got rusty inside, sitting on the shelf. It could be the diff too. I'll have to monitor the situation.

Wind turbulence inside the cockpit, at legal speeds is, amazingly, not bad at all. I have a lot of living with and finding out to do with this car.

We've already dragged my old E-Type Jaguar out of storage and cleaned out the spider webs and mouse nests in preparation for putting it back on the road but I can't tell that story here.

 

Here's a better look at the finished product: http://youtu.be/eh74X-EX05s

 

Thanks for the nice feed-back guys and for all the encouragement over the course of this long project. I'll post some photos soon.