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Quasi-Austin 7

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aeronca65t

aeronca65t

Great Pumpkin
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I continue to work on my little "side project".

I'm building a 1920s-30s style roadster loosely similar to the little Austin 7 "TT specials" (or works replicas) that existed at the time. Among other places, these cars were raced in Ards, in Ireland, not far from where my family is from. My Dad remembers seeing "cut-down, baby Austins" racing in Ards.
Mine will have an Austin/BMC 1275 engine and trans but all else will be fabricated or adapted from other cars. Front suspension is from a Sprite (including the subframe) rather than the A7 live axle. Rear alxe is also Sprite. Tires are 135-15s. I'm using a flipped, shortened and reversed Sprite rack for steering.
I think I will get more done in the Winter, but I've had the thing rolling about as a bare chassis for a while. It's sqeezed up against the Spridget right now...wish I had a bit more space in my little workshop!
These pictures are bad, but it will give you an idea of where I'm at right now.

a7-replica.jpg

austin7_replica.jpg
 
Nial, thats cool. Wish I had the time, and space to work on something like that myself. Good luck on it, and keep us updated.
 
Looks good! I still need to get my garage wired for my welder to get on with my Locost project.
 
What a great concept. Wish I had the time and skills to attempts such (as well as the room). Please keep us up to date on this.
 
Nial, are you going to hammerform the all aluminum body as well?

Jeff: One of my flying buddies has an English wheel, so that may come in handy.
I'm hoping most of it will be without compound curves....with boat tail and tapered engine cover. In my mind, I'm thinking along the lines of a Bugatti 35B.
Not sure about the grill and nose....that may be the tricky part.
 
Wouldn't the grille shell be fairly easy to form with a slip roll, and a little shot bag work? I'm still looking for an old air powered planishing hammer. You can do wondrous things with them, but are new ones ever EXPENSIVE!
Jeff
 
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I'm hoping most of it will be without compound curves....with boat tail

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Nial, I understand that several folks are having good results using 2-inch foam insulation sheets for temporary backing of fiberglass repairs. I've been using it for a totally different application that involves gluing it using foam-friendly adhesive.

The stuff is easily shaped using Surform files and a hot knife (careful of the fumes) and I wonder if it would make sense to build a foam form of, say, a tail and then shaping thin aluminum sheet around it. The right shape wouldn't need much support - maybe some thin tubing would be adequate. (It worked for Scaglietti).
 
You know, I have a 4 X 8 sheet of that 2" foam just sitting around...that might be a good use for it!
I've also seen some pre-war cars with partial fabric bodies and wooden formers (just like my plane). It'll be fun to figure all this out.
Here's a slightly better outdoor picture I took today (after I drove the Spridget out of the shop to load it in the truck).
quasi--a7.jpg
 
...Wouldn't the grille shell be fairly easy to form with a slip roll, and a little shot bag work?...

Yeah, the shot bag and a big leather mallet might be the way to go. I watched my neighbor Walt built the nose for his Pietenpol mostly with a shot bag. It's slow work but patience is rewarded....."Wax on, wax off".

Walt's Piet (his third homebuilt)
walts-pietenpol.jpg
 
Thats a homebuilt? Wow its beautiful. Does he have to fly it as an ultralight or does it have full plane credentials?
 
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A Birdcage Austin replica? What a concept!

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Hi Steve. Actually, I was thinking of just the "Superleggera" body construction they used, although I think Touring probably was better known for it. It involved using thin tubes (about 5mm) and building a frame just for the body itself - wheelarches, edges of all openings, and so on. Then they wrapped the aluminum body material around the tubes and it came out very light but it was pretty strong in some places and flimsy in others. Cars like 750 OSCA's, 150S-300S Maseratis, and Ferrari sports-racers had bodies built like this.

I think I like your interpretation better, though. A birdcage style frame would be certainly be unique on a car like that.
 
Fantastic. Please keep us posted with the progress.
 
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