DragStuff

Made another piece for the inlet side of the intercooler tonight.

Got the inlet side roughed in today.



And got a panel installed.







I roughed up the back of the panel & the chassis tubes with 80 grit on the angle grinder, then glued it in with fusion body panel adhesive.

Cool... Hey I want to borrow your shrinker! I need to make me some dzus rails... Which model you have?

John_Heard wrote:Cool... Hey I want to borrow your shrinker! I need to make me some dzus rails... Which model you have?

I'm not sure. I bought it from a booth at a car show a few years ago. I think it's about the same deal as H.F. sells. It works good for what I use it for, although it marks up the metal some. From what I've been told the higher quality shrinker/stretchers don't do that?

Added a couple more pieces to the puzzle this afternoon.

Everybody (but me) had to work this weekend, we celebrated Father's day Thursday, so I had the weekend to work on the firewall. Got a fair amount done.

Since this WILL be a street legal car, I found a new spot to display the trim code tag.







I stuffed it between the strut tube & the inlet side of the intercooler.
Also made paper patterns for a couple more pieces of the puzzle.

I decided to stamp a "Camaro: logo in the driver's side panel









The press and bead rolling oil canned the panel a little but I think it will straighten out when I put the 7/8" tabs on the top & bottom with the brake.

It came out fairly clean, even the little piece in the top of the "o" stamped. That part was about 1/2 the size of a pencil eraser. When I paint the firewall I'll paint the logo over this, the stamping will give it a little extra "pop".

I'm sure I've said it before, but you have some great skills.
That panel with "Camaro" in it is flawless.

That is pretty cool, nice job..

pro70z28 wrote:I decided to stamp a "Camaro: logo in the driver's side panel









The press and bead rolling oil canned the panel a little but I think it will straighten out when I put the 7/8" tabs on the top & bottom with the brake.

It came out fairly clean, even the little piece in the top of the "o" stamped. That part was about 1/2 the size of a pencil eraser. When I paint the firewall I'll paint the logo over this, the stamping will give it a little extra "pop".

So help me understand how you're doing that:

You're using what looks like 3/16" aluminum on your CNC mill to create the Camaro pattern, then using it in some fashion in your press. Do you apply force to a heavy flat plate on top of the aluminum pattern, forming the pattern on sheet metal underneath which sits on a wooden panel ? Thats the only way I know of you could get the results you're getting, which btw, are fantastic.

What sort of press are you using, and how much force ? It would have to be pretty extreme I would suspect. Do you have pix of the pattern / piece / work setup arrangement ?

I would love to try this myself, though I certainly don't have your talent.

Thanks everybody for the positive comments. I didn't take any pics. of this stamping but I did awhile back when I stamped out the sheet metal for the intercooler flanges.

The dies are CNC cut out of aluma-panel, a signboard that has a solid PVC core and is laminated on both sides with aluminum. (I used 3/4" MDF for the intercooler parts) Altogether the aluma-panel is just under 1/8" thick. I just use a H.F. 20 ton press & sandwich everything between some plate steel I got from the scrap yard. The aluma-panel dies are from scraps around the sign shop.

pro70z28 wrote:Thanks everybody for the positive comments. I didn't take any pics. of this stamping but I did awhile back when I stamped out the sheet metal for the intercooler flanges.

The dies are CNC cut out of aluma-panel, a signboard that has a solid PVC core and is laminated on both sides with aluminum. (I used 3/4" MDF for the intercooler parts) Altogether the aluma-panel is just under 1/8" thick. I just use a H.F. 20 ton press & sandwich everything between some plate steel I got from the scrap yard. The aluma-panel dies are from scraps around the sign shop.

I would guess the aluma-panel is soft enough that it naturally provides the nice smooth edge radius / transition for the pressed shapes outline, height wise. Very clever and very clean.

The aluma panel looks the same when I take it out as before I used it . I would have thought the edges would have rounded off a little but not so. I leave an 1/8" space between dies so the aluminum naturally bevels at about a 45° angle.

pro70z28 wrote:The aluma panel looks the same when I take it out as before I used it . I would have thought the edges would have rounded off a little but not so. I leave an 1/8" space between dies so the aluminum naturally bevels at about a 45° angle.

Your top press plate looks to be right at 1" thick - is it thick enough to evenly spread the pressure or do you need to do multiple presses to get what you want ?

Works in one stamp as long as I keep it under the plate about 8"x8".