Rear Strut Brace, Part the Third
I’m definitely coming down the home stretch here. In fact, in less than 48 hours, I should have the whole setup installed. At this point I have the strut braces entirely done. I shall pick up where I left off…
After bending the poles, I ground the standoffs to equal lengths and beveled the edges so that there would be no burs to get in the way of either my fingers or proper alignment of the brace parts. I marked the center of each brace and lined them up with each other, placing one of the three standoffs in the center. I placed the other two equidistant from the middle one. I then tack-welded the standoffs to one bent piece, and then the other.
Once the brace was tack-welded together, I made sure everything was how I wanted it. This is an important step, as tack-welds are easy to break, so if I mess up I can always break it apart, grind down the welds, and do it over. Everything was how I wanted it, so I simply welded all the standoffs together. It was a pretty tight space for welding, but the welds came out clean. Once I was done with that, I put my template against it, lined it up with the center, and marked the ends. I used a small, portable bandsaw to cut off the excess on each end, and then taped the mounting plates to the brace to check the fit in my trunk.
It took three tries total to get it to fit. The first fit was just plain too tight to go anywhere. So I cut about 1/8″ off one side of the brace and tried again. This time I was able to force the brace into place, but it was definitely still too tight. So I cut another 1/8″ off the other side, and then welded it up. Technically, I never tried to fit it again, but if it went in before, it’ll go in when it’s even shorter, right?
Yeah, probably should have tested it, but oh well. I’m confident it will work, though I will probably need to sand the paint between the mounting plates as thin as I can.
Once I had the rear brace welded up, I took the front brace off my car so that I could clean it up and re-prime it. Man, it makes a difference not having that brace on. Suddenly, the car feels VERY unstable going around turns. It’s amazing how much of a different it makes.
Today I painted the braces with bright red engine enamel. Think the red you see on the Coca-Cola logo. They look fantastic. Unfortunately, you’ll have to imagine it for now because while I brought my camera to work, I forgot my memory card. I used an entire can on the two braces and the mounting plates. They are drying at work until tomorrow, and I will be taking them home after work. The front brace will be very easy to install, but I will be waiting until Saturday to install the rear brace as drilling will be required.
