Winter Project – Converting Front Axle Drum to Disc

[Indycars]

You about ready?

Depends on my nephew. He has a lathe large enough that he can open up the inside of the SS tube to accept the threaded tube ends. But he has not gotten back with me to say when we can do it. I'm not going to wait too long before I try something on my own.

 

[old round fart]

How much do you need to take out? Can you drill the tube or put the adapter in the drill press and grind the adapter?

 

[Indycars]

I need to remove about .010" of the tubing wall. Yes I can drill and have the drill bit, but it really needs to be held straight like in a lathe. Or I could put the threaded tube end in a drill press and use a file to remove the material, but not nearly as accurate. All things I can try if he doesn't come thru.

Bring your spindles when you come. Can you leave them for 3-4 weeks?

 

[Indycars]

Got with my nephew that has a lathe large enough to spin my SS 29" radius rods and bore the inside for a .001" to .0015" interference fit of the threaded tube ends(TTE). I must say this is largely a ,measure both , then trial fit and then put our heads together until we both are saying yes kinda thing. The lathe was new to him, so it's accuracy was an unknown. The TTE had a .001" variation in their diameter.

I put the TTE in the freeze and used the MAP torch to heat the SS tubes to about 400° F and then put them together and used the 2 lb hammer to drive the TTE into the tube. So far, so good!!! Two more radius rods to go.

Not shown are the thread bolts in the TTE for driving them into the tube. I did not hit the TTE directly!





The TTE with the hex nuts have a left hand thread and those without are right hand thread. Unfortunately they didn't make a 7/8" OD with a .095" wall, therefore I had to make the .083" wall work.

1/2” LH Threaded Tube End for 7/8" X .083 Wall Tubing ⋆ S&W Race Cars
1/2” RH Threaded Tube End for 7/8" X .083 Wall Tubing ⋆ S&W Race Cars
.

 

[Indycars]

I thought I was ready to start polishing, but then I found some deep scratches on both sides (shown below, 2nd pic). I had to start over at 400 grit, 800 and 1500. This cost me many hours of re-work. Probably caused by my use of a flat file to remove all the marks left by bending the 3/8" plate steel to form the two ears for bolting the arms to the spindles.



When the polishing wheel hits the edge of a hole it strips the compound off and at the same time it wants to grab the part and try to take it out of your hands. So I only marked where I wanted to add some ~ 1/2" holes, shown below.



Below is the finished products except for the 4 holes I need to drill and chamfer.




If you are this close to my car looking, I might have to ask what your intentions are ??? LOL !


.

 

[T-Test]

I thought I was ready to start polishing, but then I found some deep scratches on both sides (shown below, 2nd pic). I had to start over at 400 grit, 800 and 1500. This cost me many hours of re-work. Probably caused by my use of a flat file to remove all the marks left by bending the 3/8" plate steel to form the two ears for bolting the arms to the spindles.

View attachment 23939

When the polishing wheel hits the edge of a hole it strips the compound off and at the same time it wants to grab the part and try to take it out of your hands. So I only marked where I wanted to add some ~ 1/2" holes, shown below.

View attachment 23940
View attachment 23937
Below is the finished products except for the 4 holes I need to drill and chamfer.

View attachment 23936
View attachment 23938

If you are this close to my car looking, I might have to ask what your intentions are ??? LOL !

View attachment 23935
.

Find a hole!!
What intentions?
Shiny stuff, there.

 

[Indycars]

Clamped the two steering arms together and drilled the first hole thru both arms, then I took them apart and finished drilling them. Since they were already polished, I used masking tape to protect the surfaces.


I made a big mistake by using a ceramic wax on the adapters wanting to marvel at my polishing work before shooting them with Cerakote. Even thou I thought I used Acetone and I'm certain I used Hot water and Dawn dish soap and washed them, I still had trouble.

Since there is NO chemical that will take Cerakote off, I had to sand it off. Which gave me another opportunity to do an even better job this time. I didn't spin them with the drill press, but did it the old fashion way .... by hand!!!

Yes that's right .... Brake Kleen, Acetone, Alcohol and Brake Fluid will not touch Cerakote MC-5100 once it's cured, this means you have about 10 minutes at best.



My hanger for the steering arm was some 12 gauge solid wire with insulation ..... another mistake I made. Previous paint flaked off while I was handling it during shooting and fell into the Cerakote so I had to do one of those over also.

The one steering arm and two brake adapters turned out to be my best parts !!!



No matter how hard I try you can still see scratches ...... oh well !

I still have to polish the hubs, not totally sure how I'm going to go about this shape. My only thoughts are using cross buffs to get into all those dead end corners, mainly on the back side. Cross Buffs are not cheap.

Or I could just take it to my guy in Blanchard Oklahoma, he did my gas tank (Coors Beer Keg). Now there's a thought!!!


Cross Buff Link:
www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07H42ZHMD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1
.

 

[Indycars]

The above cross buff is not available now. But the link below is. You will also need the arbor, the 2nd link below. Sorry the links are so long, but if I post the entire link, then it's a big big white space line you see at the very bottom of this post.

www.amazon.com/Standard-Abrasives-37186-case-Blend-265024/dp/B07H3YGFYB/ref=pd_bxgy_vft_none_img_sccl_1/142-0363553-9570621?pd_rd_w=Wc4Ql&content-id=amzn1.sym.26a5c67f-1a30-486b-bb90-b523ad38d5a0&pf_rd_p=26a5c67f-1a30-486b-bb90-b523ad38d5a0&pf_rd_r=F80XV3P7PKP1DFNF7FS2&pd_rd_wg=M6cwO&pd_rd_r=8bd04216-aaa6-4b47-bc9e-951372f235c1&pd_rd_i=B07H3YGFYB&psc=1

www.amazon.com/Benchmark-Abrasives-Square-Mandrel-External/dp/B08WCF8567/ref=d_mr_sccl_1_4/142-0363553-9570621?pd_rd_w=p6e1P&content-id=amzn1.sym.e399e936-3445-4c80-a318-1f1424abfb7f&pf_rd_p=e399e936-3445-4c80-a318-1f1424abfb7f&pf_rd_r=1HCAARKV643TCZ5YVN7G&pd_rd_wg=mu6Zu&pd_rd_r=eeaf7f75-7dcc-48b8-92de-b04f571ac694&pd_rd_i=B08WCF8567&psc=1

 

[old round fart]

Does the Cerscote dull the shine a little? The arms seem to reflect better than the rotor brackets. Your polishing is very impressive. As much as I hate the mess I’m thinking about doing it too!

 

[Indycars]

Does the Cerscote dull the shine a little? The arms seem to reflect better than the rotor brackets. Your polishing is very impressive. As much as I hate the mess I’m thinking about doing it too!

I can't tell there is any difference. It's only about .001" to .0015" thick.

Thanks, appreciate the nice comment!