Upgraded: Corsa Coupe 2.0

[ncwitte]

Part 3: Burial of the Ninety Eight.

January 4, 2013

Ok, I haven't been working on the Vair much lately. My excuse is that I was distracted by my Suburban replacement program. I had to get rid of my 2000 Suburban so that I could get a 2000 Suburban. It's a long story, but the truck is coming around nicely. It's not a Vair but it is a Chevy, so I will post a picture of it. Mine is the 2500 on the left; the one on the right is my brother's 2003 Z71. These are our Zombiepocalypse escape vehicles:



Those of you who know your Chevy trucks might notice that my truck sports the 2001-2002 2500HD pickup style hood. The first one I bought got damaged in shipping, so I have an extra that will go on my brother's truck. It's leaning up against my '63 Olds Ninety-Eight, along with the original hood from the 'Burb.

Ok, enough about trucks. Let's get to the Corvair.

Still haven't done a lot of work lately, but I have been spending money. The seats have been reupholstered in leather. I picked them up today, and that gave me more stuff to bury the Olds with. Here's a picture of the two halves of the rear seat:



Here's one of the front seats; I haven't put all the parts back on them yet.



And the other:



As you can see, my Olds is getting completely lost in the garage. Who woulda thought you could hide a car that big?

I also received this box in the mail:



So that is going to be fun!

Probably not too much going on for awhile, since I don't have a heated garage....

[Bobby65]

Nice to see you're still around! You haven't been on the forum in a while. Glad to see you're still on track with this project!

[ncwitte]

Bobby, I just got sidetracked with the 'Burb. I kinda come and go that way.... Something about ADD, I suppose. :)

[Rick Calcitrant]

Hey Norm,
The interior mods are looking terrific, can't beat leather. BTW, I seem to recall reading somewhere in the Forum that you were considering a wheel change. Just curious as to the outcome of your pondering...
Cheers,
Ted

[Scott H]

The Interior looks great and I am looking forward to following the install of your EFI when it warms up :)

[Hal]

Good to see that you received your efi kit. I have been waiting for mine for several weeks and can't wait to get the conversion underway. The snow (and salt) will be off the streets by mid March and I can't wait to get my 69 back in circulation.

Wade Halsey
Southern Ohio

[County98]

Ahhh! I was completely engrossed in the package shelf re-do and then it ended!!!! Ahhhhh!!!!!!

Nice job so far by the way!

-Shayne

[SyntheticBlnkerFluid]

What type of wheels do you have on your Corsa?

[ncwitte]

Ok, first, to answer a question from nearly a year ago, Motor Wheel Spyders.

Second, it looks like I got a little off track. I can't even remember the last time I posted on this forum. Here's my excuse.

First, I bought a '68 Imperial in the spring of 2013. My grandfather had one and when the opportunity came up I couldn't resist. So I didn't.



I spent most of that summer working on the Imperial, which is a great car, but not the topic of this forum, obviously.

So that accounts for 2013. Ah, but it's 2015, now. What, Norm, is your excuse for 2014?

Well, it's like this. We rented this house in North Carolina for spring break and I found this car in the garage that I just couldn't pass up. So I spent my summer working on a Euro model 1985 Mercedes 280SL with a five-speed.



Another great car, another summer spent not working on the Vair. I did get my motor rebuilt on the convertible, and the turbo car is running great now. But now my barn is completely full. I mean, completely.

And it's winter in Michigan so not much is happening. But here's the plan. I am going to build another barn, finish and heat the existing one, and then the Corvair project is moving back up to the top of the list. I've been giving it a lot of thought lately and buying parts.

I have figured out how I am going to do the transition from the package shelf to the carpeted panel behind the back seat.

I'm going to make a piece of wood that will screw to the package shelf. It will have metal trim that will cover the edge of both panels. That trim will be wrapped with a thin piece of foam and factory vinyl. It should look very much like the trim in my '63 Olds, which is the inspiration for my package shelf design. I plan on taking the wood parts for the package shelf up north some time in the coming months where I can use the wood shop at my mom's house to do a bunch of this.

Here are some not-to-scale renders of the package shelf transition trim I created in SketchUp:







Still thinking through some other ideas, which should be showing up in posts as we progress.

Happy New Year.

[bbodie52]

Welcome back, Norm, to the Forum! I had seen you rooting around Facebook from time to time, but also noted your absence on the Corvair Forum. I thought you were losing interest, but now I see why... congratulations on your "new" vehicle acquisitions. I'll bet you are looking forward to those garage enhancements!

[ncwitte]

Brad, I am really excited at the prospect. I hope to end up with a well lit, heated and air conditioned space with a two-post vehicle lift and plumbed in compressed air. The two big cars will go over in the other barn and with only three small cars (the two Corvairs and the Mercedes) in a 30x42 barn I should have plenty of room to work.

[ncwitte]

Part 5: Reload.

Wow. I've finally accomplished something again!

Since it's winter in Michigan and the heated garage is still another year away, nothing can happen right now but this weekend I am up north at my mom's house using the woodshop to make some progress on the package shelf.

Some time ago we roughed out the shelf in MDF. Installing the speakers turned out to be far less simple than I had hoped. I bought a pair of Polk 6x9s and a pair of vintage metal grilles that came out of a Malibu or something like that. The studs on the grilles line up with the holes in the speaker frames, which you would think would be a good thing, and in the end it turned out to be. But there were a few other problems with using these grilles. First, they hole that they covered was a little smaller than a 6" x 9" oval. Second, the speakers I chose were designed for surface mount and the center-mounted mid/tweeter assembly sticks up above the mounting plane quite a bit. Finally, the studs on the grilles weren't long enough to go through the MDF and capture the speakers if a spacer was used to keep the mid/tweeter from hitting the grille.

So, some thinking was required.

I bought a couple of MDF 6x9 spacers I found on eBay. These were too thick for what I wanted, but they at least moved me in the right direction. So I used a sander to mill them down so that they would just keep the tweeter from hitting the speaker grille.



Once that was done, I glued these to the package shelf.



Another view of the clamping. You can also see the grille and speakers.



As you can see, the opening on the package shelf doesn't match the spacer because it fits within the edges of the grille. The spacer also gives room for the speaker cone to travel without interference.

While the grille rings were clamped for gluing I worked on the trim that will go on the front edge of the shelf. The previous post showed the design for this part. The metal edge will probably be a piece of door threshold. I will cover this with thin foam and then cover that with stock vinyl. Instead of making it out of one piece of wood, I decided to use two pieces of plywood. The next picture shows the two pieces of plywood glued to together and clamped. The top piece had to be shaved down a bit in the sander. Hopefully I didn't shave it too far.



Next I worked on the supports for the shelf. These need to be tall enough to provide just a little clearance for the speaker magnets. They have to be inset from the front to allow for the transition piece and also have to be offset in back for the piece that will eventually be used to mount the Masonite panel I will use for the vertical panel that covers the space from the shelf to the bottom of the rear window.



I drilled nine countersunk holes to attach the standoffs. I will probably add a pair of outboard standoffs once I finish the part for the vertical panel.



With the standoffs attached, the shelf stands quite solidly. I deliberately sunk the holes below the surface of the panel. These holes will then be filled with bondo and sanded smooth before the panel is finished. I'll eventually glue heavy-duty window screen to the panel and spray paint the whole thing semi-flat black. When done it should look very much like the package shelf in my '63 Olds Ninety-Eight.

I solved the problem of how to attach the speakers by not using the original mounting holes. Instead I drilled four holes in the speaker frame next to the mounting holes and screwed them to the spacers.



The speaker grilles will stay in place fairly firmly just by friction.



A view of the other speaker:



Here's the whole shelf:



This photo shows how the speaker will clear the metal shelf below.



I will have to take the speakers off again to spray paint the inside of the openings and glue on the screen.

[ncwitte]

Part 6: Later that same day....
February 28, 2015

To make up for the paucity of posts, here's a second one on the same day. The next step on the package shelf project was to attach the parts that will manage the transition areas.

I screwed the front piece to the shelf first. Before doing that I layered up some duct tape on the front of the shelf so that there would be a gap for the screen to roll down the front of the shelf.

Next I started on the part that will hold the Masonite trim in the back. This picture shows how I marked out the piece on some scrap plywood.



I used the jigsaw to cut it out.

Next, I screwed it to the package shelf. The plan is to attach the Masonite to it, take it off of the package shelf, add the vinyl trim, and then reattach the assembly to the shelf after the screen has been applied.



Here's a picture with both pieces installed and the speakers in place:



From the bottom:



Here are a couple more shots. I am a little concerned that the trim in the front has made the shelf too deep but I have a Plan B if that's the case. Unfortunately the car is 100 miles away at home so I can't really test-fit it right now. It's solid enough with the two pieces of trim installed on the bottom that I don't think there's any need for standoffs on the ends.

[cad-kid]

Nice update

[sailadams]

Norm, Great thread! Also, I couldn't miss the '63 Olds 98 in the background of one of the earlier posts. I had one like it, 4-door hardtop, same color, way back when. Loved that car. Replaced it with an MGB, also loads of fun but in a different way. Couldn't afford more than one car in high school. Now I have a '69 MGB, a '66 Corvair and a '67 Buick.

[ncwitte]

Part 7: The Moment of Truth

March 1, 2015

It's been a long Sunday. We got up, loaded the Suburban and drove back to Lansing, picked up Joy and went to church. From there we went to the MSUFCU Art Contest Awards ceremony, since one of our exchange students had two pieces in the contest. Then out to mom's place to drop her off and finally home.

Then out to the garage to see whether my creation actually fits in the car. I was pretty apprehensive, because there were a couple of things I just guessed on, such as the height of the deck. I also was concerned that it might be too deep.

So, here's pictures. I shot these with my wide angle lens and it does distort a little bit at the edges at 16mm. Also, I was taking pictures in a car under a tarp in below freezing temperatures. But I digress. Pictures.



It fit in there as if it was made to fit. There's enough friction with it in place that I'm not sure I am even going to need to screw it down. It is exactly as tall as the crease in the inner panel, you know, where those stupid little cardboard flaps used to go. That was my target. The Masonite front panel seems to line up just right. More pictures:



Another one:



That one was a bit repetitive. Here's a different angle:



You can see where the little vertical panel will end. I found some self-adhesive 1/4" foam in a 5" roll six feet long. I think that will work perfectly under the vinyl to give the close out panel behind the shelf a little cush. I'm worried that the shelf may stick out a little bit too far, and that the lip at the top of the seat might hit it. I think the next step will be to reassemble the rear seat and test fit it. But as you can see in this picture, it fits the space perfectly.