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The Buchka 242 Daily Driver

Thanks for the kind words dudes, really means a lot!

I like this. A lot.
You have strange friends. Mine would have filled the interior with balloons and silly string.

Is it my imagination or is that Panhard rod straight? How does it clear the differential housing?

The panhard rod is completely straight. I massaged the diff cover with a hammer to get some clearance. It was very close but just worked. Once I shortened the lower trailing arms it got a lot better.

That must be a joy to drive. You've got me wondering how/where to source those widened spherical bearings. They look ideal.

I turned spacers/adapters to fit 5/8" rod ends into the stock mounting locations. The spacer ID was reamed to 12mm for a tight fit with the standard M12 fasteners.

Neat. Any plans to make this smog excempt?

It is already registered out of state where smog is not a concern.

Oh yeah, make some center caps please.

I have center caps, just been too lazy to refinish them. I would also need new lug nuts, the shiny chrome ones I got from Homer don't work with the center caps

Curious to see how the Delrin bushings do.

I have put over 10k miles on the car so far and the bushings are holding up great. I greased them on assembly and they haven't started squeaking. The bushings have grease zerks on them in case I ever need to lube them up.

Adjustable torque rods and trailing rods (arms?). If so would you make your favorite Sacramento friend a set too? :)

I don't have any stuff to make more. All the bits are available on www.midwestcontrol.com for very short money. They even make threaded aluminum hex rod in different lengths, you could put together a set that doesn't require any welding at all.


The next evolution for the car is a six cylinder whiteblock swap. I got the engine out of Chris Wiita's 960 wagon. It was rebuilt no more than 5k miles ago and is an ideal specimen. Chris also never hooked up the EGR or smog pump so the engine is really clean inside.

The transmission is a five speed Toyota W58 out of an MK3 turbo supra, clutch is a twin-disc Quartermaster Rally-V mounted to a steel flywheel I got from AndyEG several years ago. Coincidentally the automatic transmission in a 960 has the same bolt pattern as the trans used in 1UZ-FE powered lexus cars. This meant I could take a commonly available lexus v8 to W58 adapter plate and bolt the manual transmission to the volvo bellhousing. Some minor clearancing on the bellhousing was required.

For clutch release I'm using a 260 master cylinder and a concentric release bearing for some roundy-round application. The pilot bearing was made with a mish mash of a ball bearing and an oilite flanged bushing from McMaster.

I got most of the driveline parts came from my good friend Justin, the hookup on parts was a massive help so huge props to him for that.

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Getting the stack-height correct for the hydraulic release bearing was interesting. Karl and I had to mill down the input shaft bearing retainer and make a backplate to take the thrust load. The bearing floats on the input shaft sleeve and the moment is reacted by a shoulder bolt I modified for proper thread engagement. The hydraulic feed and bleed lines are plumbed to some AN4 bulkhead fittings bolted to the bellhousing.

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The strut tubes are just pieces of cold drawn seamless 4130 tubing. I single point turned the M48x1 thread into the ends.



Haha sure. I can see how you became smitten when you drove the car earlier

Do you have a manual or cnc lathe? My 1960's LeBlonde only has English pitch for threading.:-(
 
Do you have a manual or cnc lathe? My 1960's LeBlonde only has English pitch for threading.:-(

It's a manual machine. 24tpi has a 1.05mm pitch, might be just close enough to work. Alternatively you could just make a new imperial threaded gland nut to match whatever you put into the strut tube.
 
The panhard rod is completely straight. I massaged the diff cover with a hammer to get some clearance. It was very close but just worked. Once I shortened the lower trailing arms it got a lot better.

Interesting, have you got any pictures of the diff cover? And when you say 'lower' trailing arms' you mean the pressed steel arm that mounts the springs and dampers? How did you do that?
Thanks
 
Really like the conversion of the rims.

I have had the same idea for some other rims.
But lack of tools has stopped me so far.

Bra jobbat :)

It was a ton of work, not sure it was worth it. Around 3-4 hours of welding per wheel.

Tack!

Interesting, have you got any pictures of the diff cover? And when you say 'lower' trailing arms' you mean the pressed steel arm that mounts the springs and dampers? How did you do that?
Thanks

Not much to see on the diff cover; I beat it with a hammer. I shortened the stamped steel trailing arms by cutting them in half with a bandsaw and welding them back together. I recall cutting slightly forward of the damper mount holes, it is only slightly tapered there and the halves line up reasonably well.
 
Thanks. Denting the diff cover certainly makes making a panhard rod a easier task. Do you think it's possible with a LH2.4 speed sensor in place?
 
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