Sometimes you let go and sometimes…..

Sometimes you need a change ! ? 

On and off mostly on you need to transport stuff around and what is more suitable than a Pick up

Some year ago (5 - 10 years) we sold below Chevy 1500 Ext short bed.

It was one of the best cars we have had OK it used some fuel but it was more than offset by it's low maintenance cost. 5 could travel in rather good comfort and you could, as said before move your stuff around.

And best of all, you could have a tailgate party (or Pick Nick / Fika)

I bought it in Phoenix (a story in itself from an old man in a senior trailer camp) 1999 cleaned it up and lowered it. 

Nice and rather low ground clearance, around 3 inches which is rather low for such a long vehicle.

Looks good.

Why did we sell it ? Even my wife agrees it was one of the better cars.

Now my son has started to talk about pick up's which can be a sign to "pick up" a good habit.

Below is my Ford from 1946 I thought it made sence to show it since Hakan and Carina is waiting for their Coupe to arrive. I bought mine when I was 16 years old, restored it and had it for around 20 years until I wanted to move on to more drivable cars. It was a full restuaration  Chassi, Powertrain, body, interior electrical, chrome paint etc…. Took some time but learned a lot   

It looks good 

Kind of elegant in grey 

AAHHHH!!!!! Wonder's what Hakans and Carinas  looks like ?

A Swedish alternative to Pick up is a Volvo Duet (I like them a lot). This was a kind of the beginning of all Volvo Wagons, before they defined the flying brick !!! 

Bought this one since it looked good…. but it turned out to be mostly rust which ended up in some heavy welding, new sheet metal etc….. Parts from other cars….

Getting closer to paint

Painted

 

Looked good

Just some more bright work and details, then it's good.

Sold it since I needed the money to buy a horse trailer. Sometimes the voice of the family guides you where you have to go.

Conclusion You need to let go to be able to move on.

Christmas is over = The frame is painted!!

When a milestone is reached, it's time to celebrate. Our target was to paint the frame before the Christmas 2015 was over and here it stands in machine metallic gray.

Yes, we're proud.

 Salt Slush Race frame/safety cage from one angle.

Same stuff from another point of view.

Paint & Pipes and some cool stuff

Everything was set for workshop progress today.

We met up and gathered around a cup of coffee and since we're prepared for the most drastic disaster, we didn't show any sign's of frustratuon when the coffee machine basically blow up. Instead we made quick swap to a spare brewer.

Magnus were busy working with oil and cooling pipes for the life giving turbo's. Cutting up and weld the pipes that Hakan has bought as suitable donor pipes to modify.

Magnus takes the opportunity to play the turbo flute.

 

Before the final oil inlet concert. (yes, the picture is turned 90 deg)

 

Turbo drain pipes should have a steep slope. Like this! We're good!

One funny detail is that Hakan designed some of these turbo pipes (some or many years ago) but he´s rather old now, not slow, but old.

Anders had been extremely productive and therefore he has arranged a poor mans spray boot with some ventilation devices, to handle the spray fog from the water based paint. Every one covered up what they wanted to protect, and as usually, the one that spray paint in a big common garage is the most hated person if it goes bad.

Therefore, Anders spray boot contraptions was assembled with support from others.

A first and good layer of primer was applied.

Then, out of the fog, came the speedy frame all dressed in hard working speedy machine paint.





I kept on working on the cooling tank and focusing on the internal fixation of the two Volvo V70 coolers with pipes and hoses. The coolers are to be set up in series. As always there is an improvement of ideas and we will probably add a circulation pump for the water in the tank to avoid local hot spots.

Planning, thinking and doing. A think tank.

Besides of working we are heavy in to dreaming and discussing different vehicles to buy and we have some interesting ideas in pipeline which will be revealed in the future pending that we don't change our minds. Currently, we are all in for pick up trucks of different types.

Carina started to wax her C20 which is right now in the Salt Slush workshop for some winter TLC.

Carina, her father-in-law and the C20.

Anders Dodge Hemi Ram was parked outside together with Magnus S10. It's only me who is without Pick Up presently...

In to the blue, thinking about the Moon

Since it's Christmas Day, Carina and I took a break from Land Speed project. 

 

While Magnus, Anders and Kalle worked like there was no tomorrow, like ants, like...I had to bail out to fulfil a promise. I told Cina I could give her another one. But no, that didn't help. At all.

 

To enable a more classy steering wheel in her heavenly blue C20 pick-up truck even more cool stuff from the Moon was added today. Painless? Well, let me explain...



How it all began. A happy wife at Mooneqipment in L.A. Yes, she likes only this steering wheel. Which is ok. I'm happy too! The sun is shining. No clouds on the blue sky California sky.

Fast forward: 3 months later in dark and gloomy Gothenburg, I was standing there, (following Moonequipment cool instruction which says: -If you don't have the original steering wheel puller, be creative...) using a too high percentage of workshop tools. The Salt Slush team were all mocking me... 

...but how about this? A well deserved Victory. Carina was right, in dark winter nights it's best to rely on the Moon for a nice moment. And there's a Full Moon tonight...

Merry Christmas and Creative New Year !

From all of us to all of you...

 

... a boosted high power Christmas!

Coming up soon:

• Anders has made a poor mans paint booth. Will we be able to paint our frame / roll cage this Christmas/New Year?
• Carina is planing to take care of the her small, blue C20 pick up truck. Will she have time to fulfil her dreams?
• I'm planing to work with the Amazon cooling system and as well produce some tables for my wife's kitchen shop. Will this be possible?
• Håkan is running around like a crazy while taking care of the Salt Slush turbo business and at the same time he's preparing for the arrival of his and Carina's Ford 1946 Club Coupe. How will this end up? A sunk ship that never arrives? A stressful moment? Or a glorious relief? Nobody knows.
• Magnus is preparing a pulse split turbo manifold for his private daily drive, while he's creating a glorious gasser. Serious turbo and hot rod projects while working hard at Volvo Car Corporation. Will he really manage?
• At the same time, Magnus is waiting for his Chevy pick-up to arrive from US. A good looking pair of wheels...which, as well, will need some serious TLC.

But right now now, everything and everybody is ready for Christmas Eve and Salt Slush Racing Team is no exception. Therefore we're waiting for 2016 and it's cheerful, painful challenges.

Again, from All of Us to All of You! 

 A Merry, Speedy Christmas, full of Boost!

No respons from Santa yet. Hoho. -What happening?

We're stubborn enough to move on anyway and since Santa doesn't to hear our calls....Magnus started to work with cost reduction activity himself. 

But NO Magnus, SSR team will not approve this solid looking front end design no matter how charming it is.

 

Which is why Magnus bitterly started to weld a little bit here and there, in order to soothe his soul.

 

And how about this? Look at the left weld seem. Amazing. A lucky shot or a grace of god? Nobody will ever know, but the rest of the team was not comfortable. There was envy in the air. Me? I don´t care. At all. Just as you know. 

To seal the deal. Salt is dusty. Salt is sticky. That's why we'll keep ourselves clean by keeping the vehicle sealed. 

Sealed of. No salt. No pain. we're good.

 

 Coming up: The new 2016 Salt Slush Racing T-shirt has arrived. How it looks? Within soon you'll know. Meanwhile, think about Mars.

Is Santa for real ?

During the last weeks we have had a never ending discussion; -Is Santa for real?
It was mostly the younger members in the team who has been ambivalent in their opinion.

We who are older and have gained experience over many years, do not expect any miracles or parts to the race car for free under the tree.

If Santa had been listening to us, he would have given us a set of rear brakes that fits our 9 inch Currie rear axle, but since he didn't, we have tried to set up a mix of Chrysler Voyager discs and Volvo 240 calipers.

We haven't been much in to brakes since we are more in to go fast side of the story…brakes is kind of the opposite.

So me and Håkan made some serious shopping today, which means buying brakes and aluminum, at the same time as when everyone else were running around trying to get ready for Christmas. We on the other side drove around in Carina's pickup truck collecting parts and stuff.

Chrysler disc could maybe be something...but instead, we later on, had  to return them.

The Volvo 240 Caliper

It can work... some modification here and some there...maybe hmmmm

Hmm maybe not, not ok, no it will not work, Oh No …..shit.. 

….but, but if we cut and weld and and and….. 

No it will not work. Let's call in the Cavalry, 

CPP they have a kit for + 500 USD.  A well working short cut !

Competence and knowledge are sometimes heavy to carry the only thing to remember is that it's even more work and burden to be without this. This was proven since we had to go back to Biltema and return the heavy metal (discs...)

How about the front brakes? We would like to have vented brakes.

Volvo 240 Girling fits on the hub and the Caliper seems to fit reasonably well,

 maybe some mm on or off. Then we're good. 

We found a nice 1,5 inch aluminum pipe with 3mm thickness to use for the cooling system.

Aluminum sheets 2 mm thick for the belly pan.

Material lining up for some happy work in the Garage.

Tomorrow we are to pick up some more.

All in all Santa is not to be trusted, 

at least when he is as busy as is the case these day's.

The Weight, The Hangman, The Cart, and The Front End

In the dark and misty morning of 19th of December 2015, Gothenburg was gloomy place. Cold rain was dripping over people as they were queuing up to buy useless Christmas presents...and since it was half a year to summer, depression was hanging in the air.

 

This was the state of things everywhere in the....but what is this?

 

No, not everywhere! In the Salt Slush Racing workshop the light was on and the spirit was high! How can that be? What make us so active? And why?

 

Let me explain.

The Weight

It all started with a healthy coffee drinking session in which plans were made and various crazy ideas was exposed to other gear heads. Then we drove to Mr.Santa to pick up Crager Wheels with (hopefully) the correct off-set. A cheerful event. Yes, we assembled immediately on the Currie rear end.

The Hangman and the Body

A nervous moment. Anders and Magnus are lowering the Amazon body over the new rear end assembly. Did they measure correctly?  The answer was, slightly surprisingly, Yes!

 

The Cart

Meanwhile, in another part of the workshop, the chassi /cage got another pair of wheels which will be use during the final fine welding and grinding phase which is now taking place, since we have the intention paint the whole creation before Christmas Eve. So we better hurry up...

The Woman and The Bike

When Cina started up her old Beemer a week ago she realized that a service was needed, which is why old fuel and old lubes are replaced by fresh fluids. I guess the bike will shine like a crystal ball when she's ready with the service. To be used at home instead of the boring old tree perhaps?

The Man and The Segway

When Magnus disassembled the front end from the frame, his associative mind was in full speed.  As usually.

All in all, it was speedy, cheerful spirit worthy Santa's Workshop. But will it all be painted before the 24th? To be continued...

To Do or Not To Do, that is the Christmas question

While, small kids make wish lists before Christmas, car guys write To Do lists. 

But there's different types of To Do lists...

The positive type is written with starry eyes and a broad happy smile...that To Do list represent the creative, happy and naive phase of a car / bike / race  project.

It's an exiting period when there's only possibilities. It normally involves writing car guy type of shopping lists as well.

Then there’s the other type of To Do list…the stressful list which represent a period which all creative people have to go through.  I’m taking about the period when you feel that you’re almost ready or at least have reached a milestone in the project.  When there's just few things left to fix, then your good to go…out of the workshop and hit the road with screaming tires in you new hot ride.

Then you make the To Do list. While anxiety is growing, you realize that there’s more work left then it took to build the Pyramids. 

At this point in time, making a shopping list doesn't cheer you up either, since you're often well over budget.

Luckily, the SSR team is currently creating To Do lists as if there was no tomorrow.

Paint the frame, make in-vehicle plumbing, buy zillions of small parts, weld, design and build a diffusor, start the electric system design and, and...celebrate Christmas.

But we're happy as kids, since we know that there's something nice with Christmas.

Christmas Chili 2015

Normally, Salt Slush invite for a big Christmas Party, but this year we just needed to relax, which is why we just invited a small group of gear heads and made a workshop chili.

No bands, no big arrangement, just a cleaned up workshop, some good food and some cold beers, while people playing the garage piano (Thanks, Mats!) and candle lights that spread light over rusty old friends and newly welded parts.

Relief, workshop mindfulness, you name it, for us it’s fantastic.

Workshop cleaned up.The frame fixture table is converted to a Christmas table, while the A-Ford frame serve a chandelier.

Next step. The Workshop Chef, is preparing the chilli (based on a well established recipe) Cina is here browning the meat before we let it cook softly for 5 hours in beer and red hot chili pepper until it was tender and nice. What Petter is doing? He's acting Kitchen fan with the workshop vacuum cleaner 

No smoke without fire. We couldn’t help starting up Cina’s old beemer as we cleaned up after the party. Yes, we needed to open up the garage doors afterwards.

So, no progress with the Amazon landspeed racer this weekend? Well, as the night grow older, we solved a lot of complicated technical problems…and yes, in addition we started to build the oil pipes and drains for our turbo system. The pluming is not ready, but we have parts and ideas.

No pics from the party? Nope, I was busy relaxing. Let’s see if anybody else…