The Epic an electric tri car.

1969 Jeep Commando convertible. One of a few hundred true convertibles made each year. Having a lot of body work done to it. A previous owner was in love with trips to Moab and the results weren't impressive.

I picked it up for my brother in Colorado when I was coming back from bike camp in 2013. My nephew is doing the work on it.

Somewhere along it's life it got to close to a Bondo sculpture artist or as we called it when I was young, fender in a can. Work resumes in a while when the weather gets better. At least two gallons of filler lighter.

Steve.
 
Some good news Steve the fins should be finished this week if the material is available. I'm hoping that he has enough steel on hand to complete yours. I'm certain there's not enough to do my job as well, but I'm not ready to start anyway. I'll be using 10 ga. steel, for both your build and for my L head as well it really looks better and welds sweet. Please p.m. shipping details.

I'm glad you're making good progress on the motor, I'm sure it will be an enjoyable project.

Rick C.
 
Thank you, Rick. I'm just trying to get the angle for the cylinders correct at moment. Bottom cross bar on the frame is in the way so there is a lot of moving the rear one back and forth to find the sweet spot. Always surprises me how much a 1/2" matters.

Steve.
 
fasteddy said:
Thank you, Rick. I'm just trying to get the angle for the cylinders correct at moment. Bottom cross bar on the frame is in the way so there is a lot of moving the rear one back and forth to find the sweet spot. Always surprises me how much a 1/2" matters.

Steve.
Click to expand...

Steve I'm just passing on some observations of my case build for what they are worth. My first thoughts were to have a case size diameter of 8" to 9" & total motor height of 20" & the main crank case section, not including any case side plates or covers, 5" wide. Much smaller would have been much easier and look just as good, as it was I stuck with total height & width metrics, but settled on 7" diameter case. The 5" fin diameter is fine but may influence your choice of cylinder angles if you run fins closer to the base plate. I used 45 degrees as cylinder angles.

To utilize my dimensions required a huge amount of frame space thus the custom loop dimensions and channeling the crank case itself to set over the loop. It's working out fine but I'd not do it the same way again, even if using Pat's super frame. I'd say going smaller or altering the cylinder angles a bit wouldn't at all detract from the finished look and might even improve it...if proportions are kept in line some serious inches can be shaved off and not be noticed. Putting ten pounds of corn in a sack designed to hold 5 lbs. is problematical.

1/2" did matter, not to looks but to function, to my case & I ended up rebuilding the entire case and then altering the rebuilt one to make it work. It happens.

You'll figure it out Steve.

Rick C.
 
Hi Rick,
The formerly round crankcase looks a lot like your does. Mine is now a bowl shape with a low tent on top where the cylinders will go but a lot lower that it was. I didn't think to take the camera with me today so I'll take photos tomorrow.

I bent the top to shape in the vise with angle iron acting as the jaws. Bent the V shape then figured out where it needed to be bent down to meet the bottom of the crankcase. Looked like a pup tent with walls then I trimmed the walls off at the right place. Just enough left for the crankcase to meet behind the sides of the top. I'll probably spot weld it together and see how strong it is.

Second time I used our new plasma cutter and it was well worth the money we spent. About $480 Canadian. Take 30% off that for an U.S. price. It's 110 and 220 running on 110. Cut 3/16 plate with no effort.

I want to get the crankcase as far as I can then I'll work on the bike frame smoothing out the welds with body fill. By then hopefully the head gasket for the Indian tri car will be here and I can finish it.

Steve.
 
Steve the "tent" top, as you found, is required. I chose not to lower very much into the case covers, but saving space is important and both look great. I also bent the metal in a vise but first scored the metal enough to easily bend to proper angle & then welded the score. This makes for a really sharp, seamless bend viewed from the top.

As the fins are stacked they grow closer at the bottom of the V, That's one reason the fins weren't stacked all the way to the base plate unless the fin diameter is progressively reduced from top to bottom. These things you've probably already noticed.

I know you're ready to hear the tri-car sound to life, though it's good to have other projects working.

Rick C.
 
Hi Rick,

Never thought about scoring the metal first. Excellent idea of course and a tough job made easier. I just bent it and as you'll see it doesn't have a sharp crease.

I did make some fins of the proper size out of cardboard to make sure they would clear. That worked out well.

Steve.
 
The crankcase is together and I have the ends for it started. The plates for the bottom end of the cylinders that will bolt onto the crankcase are done. I'll bolt them on tomorrow and set the motor in the frame so we can see how it looks.

Nothing will be welded up as yet.

This new server sucks. I can load two photos then it says the file is to large for the rest of the photos.

Steve.
 

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Tom from Rubicon said:
You are lucky Steve to be able to load two photos. It won't let load anything I have tried in the last couple of days.
Tom
Click to expand...

Though I'm not experiencing any problems it may be because I downsize quite a bit prior to posting. Multiple photo posts are going through ok.

I checked and the reduction percentage is 40 which works out to 391x521 size.

Rick C.
 
fasteddy said:
I can load two photos then it says the file is to large for the rest of the photos.
Click to expand...
You should be able to upload files up to 10MB now. That should be enough room for images. After the move, the setting was set back to the default of 2MB. I believe it was 10MB before, and I don't think we had any issues.

Let me know if you all come across this again.
 
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