Restoration/Prep of Luigi CSL

lafngrvy

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Racecraft has made some excellent progress on the restoration/preparation of the Luigi Chassis #001.

The motor is out and on its way to Terry Tinney for a freshening. We had concerns that some parts, valve springs, rings, etc., may have suffered fatigue from sitting for 13 years.

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Then the car was lifted on a hoist and the Group 5 fenders were removed.

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While these were being removed we discovered some of the original black paint from the 1976 Castrol livery.

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In other places we found all the past liveries represented. Here you can see the red it was before 1995, the blue and white it ran in the 80's, and even some of the red and green from the Castrol stripes.
 

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lafngrvy

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Front Valence Repair

As we all know old race cars always have issues. This car is no different. We could find nothing in its history that indicated that it had ever suffered a major accident, but racing still causes damage.

The front valance had suffered some damage, and since we want to be able to mount the new front air dam in such a way that it can be easily removed for loading and unloading from a trailer, we felt that replacing the damaged front valance was necessary to provide a solid mounting base.

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Here's the old and the new showing where the old had been cut out to provide more airflow to the oil cooler.

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The old valance was cut out.

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The new valance has been welded in place, ready for the front air dam fitment.

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shanon

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You are having way too much fun already!

Are those Girling brakes? Looks like the same set up that was on 'TBL" (the IMSA car) with the 'spin on' hubs.

Tinney is the man ;-)

Look fwd to the updates.
 

lafngrvy

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Jim visited the Luigi CSL yesterday at the painter's shop. Not too much progress to report except that they have stripped all the paint and filler from both sides of the car and it's in amazingly good condition underneath all that mess that was there. No rust and only the slightest indication of contact at each front corner.

The fiberglass parts are a real disappointment, they are nowhere near close to fitting. The rear flares are about 2" narrower than the fronts but the shape is okay so making them a little wider will be easy.

The front flares are just wrong in every way. The good news is that the fiberglass guy we have on the job can make anything so we are confident it will look right in the end it was just a hurdle we didn't expect.

The main reason for Jim's visit was to get really detailed about how the flares need to look, how much gap to allow around the tires, how far they need to protrude from the fenders, how they need to be attached, etc.

They reviewed a whole bunch of photos, made a bunch of notes and measurements and they now have some clear guidance on how to proceed. More importantly they are still confident that our schedule is realistic and promise to meet our date.

We have allowed a month after painting to reassemble everything and maybe even get it out to a track day before we head south with it for the Sonoma Historics in May.

On the engine side of things. The injection pump and injectors are out to the specialist that will thoroughly clean them out and make sure they are flowing properly. Terry Tinney should have the motor disassembled and inspected early next week so we'll have more information on any issues there might be there.

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alanmcg

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my 2 cents

lafngrvy - i applaud your gentlemanly behavior, but i also think we owe it to our fellow coupsters to sound a note of warning if we have a poor experience with a coupe-related business/vendor. the approp place for this is in the 'vendor - buyer, seller feedback' section - i hope you will take the time to post your experience there.
 

lafngrvy

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Those il-fitting parts are being beaten into submission. The rears are about done. The fronts are still in process, then the front air dam will be fitted.

I think they are going to work fine, provided we don't have to add too much bondo. It's a little like watching sausage being made- as the old saying goes.

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lafngrvy

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More sausage!

The fender flares are fitted, and now it is time to fit the front air dam.

image (10).jpg

It has been test mounted and modified to fit properly. We also want to be able to remove it during transport, so that is making it a bit more difficult.

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Once the shape has been established the gaps are filled in with fiberglass.

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While all this has been going on the doors and lids have been smoothed and primed as well.

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On the engine front, I spoke with Terry Tinney yesterday and everything is going well there. It turns out the motor is about 3490cc so should make good power. We are going to have to replace the flywheel since the ring gear was loose and only being held on by 3 screws. Clutch will be all new as well as the oil pan.

The oil pan on the motor was just a stock wet sump pan with baffles welded in so it won't work effectively as a dry sump pan and you can't clean it properly because of the permanent baffles. We are going to use the same one that we used on the Jaggermeister car which came from VAC. The only difference will be that we will get it anodized black so it doesn't look like a nascar deal. We'll keep the old pan for historical purposes.
 

lafngrvy

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Guess you should have used the 635 air dam. Folks seem to really like those!

Ed,

We are trying to maintain the historical accuracy of what was used on the car back in the day. These are 'pretty' faithful reproductions of what was used by Luigi. Unfortunately they just don't fit as well as we would have liked.

The best fiberglass parts I have seen come from ZAP Racing in England:

http://www.zaprace.com

The time constraints we are under prevented us from using theirs.
 

Ed G

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Yup, I get it. A misdirection not appreciated by all. Thanks!

Does that mean you couldn't be persuaded to devote space to e9coupe(dot)com sponsor sticker?
 

coupeguy

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Ed,

We are trying to maintain the historical accuracy of what was used on the car back in the day. These are 'pretty' faithful reproductions of what was used by Luigi. Unfortunately they just don't fit as well as we would have liked.

The best fiberglass parts I have seen come from ZAP Racing in England:

http://www.zaprace.com

The time constraints we are under prevented us from using theirs.

Guess where the originals came from that molds were made from -- that's right, Chris Randall at Zaprace in the UK. I would be surprised if your research did not show there were variations on the same theme generally referred to under the overall heading of Luigi. Scanning different period photos shows a lot of subtle variations, Luigi seems to be a generic term for a style I would call the easy race car "pop rivet and race" style.

The fabricator who made the flares and airdam busted his butt to get you the parts in what was record time for him, hardly more than a week. I did the same to get them packaged and shipped. Sorry you were less than happy with the resulting parts, but I don't make them myself and have little control over his quality control since my very limited sales of period E9 race parts doesn't exactly make me his best customer, nor anything close to it. If you would like to discuss your problems further I hope you will contact me at [email protected].

So go ahead and throw me under the bus, everyone else has. Lots of people after my scalp lately, you may as well pile it on. Tune in at 11 for my crucifixion.

Despite your negative comments I wish you well racing your historic "Luigi" race car.
 
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lafngrvy

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CoupeGuy,

I do appreciate the speedy fabrication and shipping of the parts. It saved our bacon. Thank you.

I think the problem is that the Group 2 fenders have to fit the contours of the fenders much more closely than the Group 5 fenders which cover the wheel openings and only need to fit at the belt line and the rocker areas.

My coupe is one of the un-numbered chassis built from thinner sheet metal expressly for motor sports. There may be some differences because of that as compared to a regular E9 chassis.

When you pulled molds from the Zap parts did you try them on any motorsports chassis?

We have been able to make them fit, and actually the body guy said that he has seen much worse.
 

coupeguy

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I have never had access to a Motorsport chassis to try them. I am glad the extra effort from my fabricator helped you out. The Luigi flares were used on so many different chassis I would actually be surprised if one size fit all. Good luck with your race car, It's great you are keeping the marque alive on the track after all these years.
 

coupeguy

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If you would like to have your people make molds from the modified flares I can have as many parts as you might need made to use for repair or replacement. Just offering.
 

lafngrvy

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Jim went by the paint shop today and found the car progressing very nicely. As you can see from the photos the fender flairs and front air dam are about done. Just a bit of smoothing is all that is left. Things turned out pretty good after all. What do you think?

Thanks Coupeguy for the your kind offer. I will see if that is practical given our time constraints. We are still hoping to make the Sonoma Historics in May!

The body is being prepped for primer, and they are still promising us the car in the first week of April.

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lafngrvy

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The car spent the weekend in the spray booth. Here is the result:

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This body shop does things a bit differently. They spray the accent stripes first, then the main color:

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Jim is headed up there this morning to pick the car up and bring it back to their shop. I will post more photos tomorrow of the finished product.
 
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