Rites of Passage(making) . . .

I'll spare you all the drama of re-machining the support brackets for the tanks. Needless to say it was tedious at the least. I hate doing things twice. So here we are all re-cut, extra support flat pieces welded in and primed being trial fitted in the chassis.

















Now I can try the first tank again.


















That one's OK. I needed to put the tanks in for a trial fit to make sure the U-bolts I made didn't foul the tank fittings when I drilled the holes for them in the brackets.
So now the other two tanks (that aluminium sure makes everything else disappear in the flash) and it all fit's but it sure is a little "tighter" than I anticipated.
I will of course just say "It was meant to be like that".















The brackets seem to work better this time so take them out, put a coat of black paint on and set them aside to dry while I start the bolting up process.
The chassis needs the equivalent of rivets back in so put hard washers each side to apply the load better.
This bit is not optimal but it is sometimes difficult to get exactly the type and length of bolt you want.
If the thread doesn't go far enough down the length of the bolt it can mean you need a longer bolt than you would like and it wont "pull up" properly. So an extra washer is required.























On the other side another hard washer and a "purlin nut" upside down.
This is done up tight to act like a rivet and to still leave as much thread as possible remaining.























The reason for this is; you will remember the original tank was mounted on the side of the chassis (actually more difficult than a simple cross support like I am putting in).
This is because the chassis will probably flex quite a bit at this point and the cross support would be stressed and or damaged so mount it on one side where it can just stay relatively unmoved. So I have to make some sort of allowance for this.
So place a thick rubber washer over the bolt;























Then imagine the bracket placed on top of this (if I put it in you wont see what's going on as I can't get a camera in there) and a second rubber washer on top and finally a nyloc nut to retain the whole thing. This will allow the cross braces some degree of movement when the chassis flexes and will stop them fatigue cracking (hopefully).
























Now off to see the nice young girls at couplers for all the various blanking plugs (there seems to be an awful lot of holes to fill up in these darn tanks) and fittings to make it all work.


















If it wasn't for the fact I'm going on sea trials in my neighbour's new 43' powerboat tomorrow I could get it all working in a few more hours.

Wait a minute - WHAT am I doing tomorrow ??
That's why I'm not building a passagemaker.
I get seasick !!!