What Have You Made Yourself?
6th Gear Member
Joined: Feb 2007
Posts: 7,635
From: state of confusion
Over the years with various cars . . .
Made/modified transmission crossmembers for complete powertrain or just transmission swaps. Modified floorpans for same. Re-mounted a spare tire once, becaiuse its well had been taken over with EFI fuel pumps, filters, and a surge tank that I fabricated from scratch.
Fabricated leaf spring shackles, stabilizer bar brackets, and other odds and ends.
Painted hoods a couple of times, whole cars 3 or 4 times. If I told you how, you might not believe. Here's the latest full car paint job, several years after painting.
Nonstandard extra frame crossmember.
Adapt bucket seats from different cars into mine (twice). A real PITA sometimes, but my lower back greatly appreciated it both times.
A little bit of body sheetmetal work with patch panels.
Every single complete or partial replacement exhaust system in the last 45 years or so.
Built my own bead-breaker so I could at least mount my own tires. Made a few other specific-use tools over the years, and adapted an engine harmonic balancer puller so it could also be used as a balancer installer.
Made up a few tools for doing wheel alignment.
Other stuff that I've forgotten about.
Growing up (in southeastern Massachusetts
), I had at least three outstanding examples of self-reliance to follow right there in the neighborhood. My Dad (now 92), my uncle, and my best friend's Dad. There wasn't much that those guys wouldn't tackle or couldn't figure out how to do.
Norm
Made/modified transmission crossmembers for complete powertrain or just transmission swaps. Modified floorpans for same. Re-mounted a spare tire once, becaiuse its well had been taken over with EFI fuel pumps, filters, and a surge tank that I fabricated from scratch.
Fabricated leaf spring shackles, stabilizer bar brackets, and other odds and ends.
Painted hoods a couple of times, whole cars 3 or 4 times. If I told you how, you might not believe. Here's the latest full car paint job, several years after painting.
Nonstandard extra frame crossmember.
Adapt bucket seats from different cars into mine (twice). A real PITA sometimes, but my lower back greatly appreciated it both times.
A little bit of body sheetmetal work with patch panels.
Every single complete or partial replacement exhaust system in the last 45 years or so.
Built my own bead-breaker so I could at least mount my own tires. Made a few other specific-use tools over the years, and adapted an engine harmonic balancer puller so it could also be used as a balancer installer.
Made up a few tools for doing wheel alignment.
Other stuff that I've forgotten about.
Growing up (in southeastern Massachusetts
), I had at least three outstanding examples of self-reliance to follow right there in the neighborhood. My Dad (now 92), my uncle, and my best friend's Dad. There wasn't much that those guys wouldn't tackle or couldn't figure out how to do.Norm
Last edited by Norm Peterson; Nov 5, 2011 at 08:32 AM. Reason: added picture
2nd Gear Member
Joined: Oct 2011
Posts: 445
From: MD
Also....my friend designed, programmed and builds compression testers designed for rotory engines. (He's an RX-7 guy.) They work very well on piston engines as well. He is also in development of a 8 cyl EGT system that can monitor all 8 cylinders for EGT, give an average for either and both banks, and an overall average. All in a package about the size of a standard radar detector. I'll be protyping the EGT system on my Powerstroke when it is all complete. (Buying the 8 EGT probes is all on me though...and he hasn't figured which ones he'll use just yet.) www.twistedrotors.com
5th Gear Member
Joined: Oct 2009
Posts: 4,752
From: Maui
I custom fit catch cans for my motor and my trans, not difficult but I like how they turned out. Repainted all my emblems black. Installed all my mods with buddies helping cept my gears. Doing it yourself always feels good. At my track it seems everybody does their own work. Speed shops are not plentiful here. LOL
5th Gear Member
Joined: Oct 2008
Posts: 2,071
From: CA
Yeah, ylu take your stock antenna, remove the ball, cut the antenna down to the height you want, grind down the end so the ball will fit, loctite the ball back on, paint and mount. It's much better than the shorties you buy because they don't seem to have the "anti-whistle" twist, and they whistle above 70.
Thread Starter
4th Gear Member
Joined: Oct 2010
Posts: 1,744
From: Indiana
Ditto.
Yeah, ylu take your stock antenna, remove the ball, cut the antenna down to the height you want, grind down the end so the ball will fit, loctite the ball back on, paint and mount. It's much better than the shorties you buy because they don't seem to have the "anti-whistle" twist, and they whistle above 70.
Yeah, ylu take your stock antenna, remove the ball, cut the antenna down to the height you want, grind down the end so the ball will fit, loctite the ball back on, paint and mount. It's much better than the shorties you buy because they don't seem to have the "anti-whistle" twist, and they whistle above 70.
Some idiot (previous owner) tried to raise it by putting this flimsy adapter below the normal one.
It moves around and crap.
Last edited by Young_Gun; Nov 5, 2011 at 03:41 PM.
2nd Gear Member
Joined: May 2009
Posts: 476
From: New York
Painted my new throttle body and plenum "Ford Blue", painted the pony black and dremmeled (sp) most of the honeycomb out behind the new billet grille. Also new LEDS all around (dash, dome lights, license lights) and wired the blue footwell lights to turn on and off with the dome lights.
Last edited by Syracuse315; Nov 5, 2011 at 04:13 PM.
2nd Gear Member
Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 160
From: Texas
Well, its not the car, but I figure everyone likes to see pictures, so this is when I cut off a bunch of ridiculous plastic from the back of my motorcycle...had to rewire the LED taillight...etc, etc...
BEFORE:
BEFORE:
