Driver’s side floor pan almost done

This afternoon I went out into the COLD garage to try and get some work done on the drivers side floor pan.  I discussed in an earlier post that I decided to go with steel floor pans instead of the plywood/fiberglass sandwich approach.  This will give me more room for the seats to slide and also provide passenger protection from any kind of driveshaft failure.

The steel that I’m using is really overkill, but 1/8 plate is all I currently have to work with.  I’ll end up ordering some 1/16 steel for the new year to do some other work.

As seen in the top photo, I welded in the plate onto the 1″ tube basket that was there to hold the old floor pans and act as a anchor for the seats.  This gave the seat mounting tubes some support for the next step which was cutting away the existing bottom tube that was going along the driveshaft and connected to the seat mounting tubes.

Dash Panel Templates Finished!!

Finally!! I think I have the dash panel templates completed.  There are still a couple panels that go behind your head and on the drivers armrest, but I want to get those areas mocked up in the car before I create the panels to fit.

One of the last panels to complete was the one that houses the PlayBook.  I received my PlayBook for the BatBerry mid last week so I wanted to get the panel ready to rock.  Tricky part is giving enough room for the active bezel to be touched and then also allowing space around the edges for the switches.

Adventures in Shifting

A couple of tasks were on the schedule for Tuesday.  First was doing some more clean-up on the wiring harness for the engine by cutting out wires that I won’t be using and doing some general cleanup on the electrical taping and labeling.

Second was working on the shifting linkage for the automatic transmission. I had purchased a B&M shift cable before, but it ended up being a foot too short.  So the new 4 foot cable came in on the weekend and I got started.

The picture at the top of this post shows the bracket that attaches to the transmission pan and the arm that you attach to the gear selector.  The cable is then fished through, and secured to, the bracket and threaded into the attachment on the gear selector arm.

New Grill Inserts Have Arrived

A couple of nice items came in the mail the other day from Doug at Gotham Cruisers.  I now have a nice set of laser cut grills for the area in front of the canopy.

I’ll have to make a little indent to slide these into so that they sit flush like the movie car and provide a bit of depth below the grills.

Test Fitting the Dash

I started off today with the goal of hooking up my shifter linkage, but the shift cable that I bought turned out to be about a foot short.  So I’ll have to return it and get a four foot cable instead.  The shift bracket is actually pretty simple and bolts onto the transmission pan.  More on that when I get the new cable 🙂

After my plans for the day were foiled I decided to start test fitting my dash panels that I’ve been working on and also building some supports for the dash.

I had been worried about the gauges hitting the cross beam that’s holding up my steering column, but it “looks” like I may not need to change it.  We’ll see once we get the gauges in there.

Tinkering with Electronics

My daughter and I decided we would do a little bit of experimenting with the electronics of the BatBerry tonight.  To provide the 12 volt power supply I took a trick from those over on mp3car.com.

We picked up a power supply for a PC at the local Tiger Direct.  It provides a 12 volt DC supply and will handle up to a 45 amp draw.  Nothing I have will even come close to that level of amps so we were good to go.  This provides a very nice cheap and reliable source of 12 volts.

We thought we would have some fun and try out the infrared cameras and 3.5″ LCD monitors that I’ll be using.  I have three monitors and three cameras.  Two cameras for my blind spots that will look out the port holes, and one pointing straight out the rear.  The LCD monitors will be attached to the ceiling of the canopy so that it’s in the same position as a review mirror.

Dash Panel Templates – Revision Two

I had the day off today and wanted to get some work done on the dash panel templates.  I’ve actually been able to find someone who will be able to create the panels for me complete with laser etching of the text as well as illuminating the text when I turn on my interior lights 🙂

But before I can get the panels made, I need to make sure I have all my templates created to an accurate scale.

If you’re interested in checking out the full scale image (which should print out to scale on your regular home printer) simply click here.  I even created the panels that will raise up the bottom two gauges to look like the actual movie car dash.

I just print out the pictures and then cut the edges and tape them together like what was seen in my first panel templates post.

Still lots to do, but I was able to make some pretty good progress today!