The Elephant In The Room: unloading the load from a B-body.

[fullmetaljacket]

How a super lightweight steel wheel look was achieved.
The old centerline Auto Drag riveted aluminum wheels that's it. After being painted black, they are the perfect stand in candidates, but the only give away were the rivets themselves which help keep the two wheel halves together.
How were the rivets to be concealed?

 

[Badvert65]

I might have a pair of those in a 15 x 10 size. Now I have to go check my stash.

 

[fullmetaljacket]

Concealing rivets?
Here's a wheel disc or more appropriately a hub cap pushed and spun out of lightweight aluminum. I only have this crummy image.
The convex ark part of the cap was important to land in the groove between the rivets and the inner brim of the rim, thus hiding them altogether. The caps were then placed in the wheels inner face with the flat part seated on the mount plane of the rim for accurate measuring and scribing from behind. After cutting for the axle centering flange, they were accurately scribed and drilled for the lug bolts.

 

[fullmetaljacket]

Here's the wheel in service. Most cats out on the street, including Mopar guys never suspected an aluminum rim, especially at night.
Larger than normal aluminum washers are used under the lug nuts to evenly spread the load when they are tightened to seat the wheel. Lug nuts themselves are Titanium. I'll post weight differences as soon as I get back in the records.

 

[fullmetaljacket]

So I found the numbers for the rear Centerline Auto Drags and steel wheels.

The Centerline 15" X 8" Auto Drags on the car are 14-1/2 Lbs each.
The steel version of the same size from Wheel Vintiques were substantially heavier at 28 Lbs each. That is almost 30 Lbs of rotating weight shaved off.

All eight of the original lug nuts weighed 2 Lbs.
The eight titanium lugs all weighed 1 Lb total. One whole pound of rotating weight was removed.

 

[Badvert65]

All eight? Not ten?

 

[fullmetaljacket]

All eight? Not ten?

Correct, all 10. LOL.
That's what happens when you write the number with letters instead of the number itself. LOL.

 

[Badvert65]

OK, just checking. I wasn't certain if you might have removed one stud/nut per wheel to save weight.......

 

[fullmetaljacket]

OK, just checking. I wasn't certain if you might have removed one stud/nut per wheel to save weight.......

Now there's an idea. LOL. I'm crazy but not that crazy. LOL.

 

[Badvert65]

It's an idea.....just not a good one.

 

[fullmetaljacket]

Where as the trunk area is a perfect den for ballast, the theory here was to start from the top towards the bottom as far as moving weight around.
Yes, the lid could have been dipped to remove a good amount of lard, but why not leave it relatively stock and take small amounts off and place it in ballast compartments located lower in the trunk area. These images are of an unfinished lid, but as soon as time allows, the holes will be cleaned up. Took off only about a pound or so.

 

[fullmetaljacket]

Outside of the subject of weight, there are barely any decals or stickers on the exterior that are indicative of special parts onboard, but they can only be seen when the lid is opened wide. I like keeping things subtle.

 

[fullmetaljacket]

Work is a calling, so I'm going to take a short break and let y'all digest all that has been shown and discussed on here. Feel free to add comments and ideas or in the case at hand, remove. LOL.
I'll answer when a second of time allows.

 

[Badvert65]

Just to keep this thread going. I decided that I wanted to keep a driver side windshield wiper, but not the passenger side. (I like to test drive the car occasionally on the street). I removed the passenger side assembly and that totaled to a 1.73 pound weight saving. I found that the wiper motor for an 89 Dodge pickup will work in place of the OE 65 wiper motor. The factory 65 unit weighs in at 6.7 pounds while the truck wiper motor comes in at 2.8 pounds. So altogether, that's over 5 1/2 pound savings. The cool part is that the wiper motor is out of site, under the dash, so no one is the wiser.
I am not trying very hard to hide my weight saving methods, but I'd like to keep things as "1965 era" as possible.

 

[fullmetaljacket]

Just to keep this thread going. I decided that I wanted to keep a driver side windshield wiper, but not the passenger side. (I like to test drive the car occasionally on the street). I removed the passenger side assembly and that totaled to a 1.73 pound weight saving. I found that the wiper motor for an 89 Dodge pickup will work in place of the OE 65 wiper motor. The factory 65 unit weighs in at 6.7 pounds while the truck wiper motor comes in at 2.8 pounds. So altogether, that's over 5 1/2 pound savings. The cool part is that the wiper motor is out of site, under the dash, so no one is the wiser.
I am not trying very hard to hide my weight saving methods, but I'd like to keep things as "1965 era" as possible.

Badvert.
That's a good weight shave from high and front on the car while still enabling the use of a wiper. Cool that a currently available Mopar item can be repurposed and at less than half the weight difference.
In this case, It was a night car and the weather was /is religiously monitored, so only fair weather will do. The running joke has been that: "If you see this car out and about, you can take your girlfriend to the beach"

Actually one wiper on the drivers side follows the lead of the A-865's and 990's to the T.
I am sure they weren't intending for these things to be raced in the rain. I would guess that the factory had them that way along with one muffler out back to pass homologation rules and the gauntlet of politics within the NHRA. Funny enough though, no exterior rearview mirrors were ever part of those factory race cars.

 

[HEMI-ITIS]

FMJ hounded me for years about going on a diet.When we finally got going,200lbs was the loss. "J" bars and a parachute added is included in the 200lbs.
Aluminum oil pan replaced the Milodon.Notched the "K" frame similar to DVW,the aluminum heads must have shed 80 lbs.

 

[fullmetaljacket]

Aluminum bolts and washers were utilized for mounting the deck lid onto the hinges. Again, high removal and low and rearward installment is butters.

 

[fullmetaljacket]

FMJ hounded me for years about going on a diet.When we finally got going,200lbs was the loss. "J" bars and a parachute added is included in the 200lbs.
Aluminum oil pan replaced the Milodon.Notched the "K" frame similar to DVW,the aluminum heads must have shed 80 lbs.

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Trust me, the load was off my head when you went ahead and started the Jack Lalanne diet on your ride. Car must have had a sigh of relief like no other. An Elephant up front is heavy enough and losing even 200 Lbs is a great start forward.
With that huge and heavy screw up top, the 200 Lbs loss might have possibly settled you down to 440 wedge weight while still carrying and spinning the screw.

I love that new oil pan and it must be much lighter than your old Milidon.
I was going to have a Steff's aluminum pan made up to replace my old school deep sump Moroso, but just haven't gotten around to it because of having to remove the old one in order to fashion a new one after it. My old pan is custom tailored to clear the center link with the engine set back.

 

[stage3]

FMJ hounded me for years about going on a diet.When we finally got going,200lbs was the loss. "J" bars and a parachute added is included in the 200lbs.
Aluminum oil pan replaced the Milodon.Notched the "K" frame similar to DVW,the aluminum heads must have shed 80 lbs.

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hey hemi, do u still jack the front of your car up by placing the jack centered on that Notched K frame ? or some kind of modified jack process ?

 

[fullmetaljacket]

Stage 3
Not to bum rush an answer to your question, but I think I know what you are getting at. I wouldn't jack it up from the center anymore after that surgery.