Schimmer and Son "I" class fuel lakester:

[Rex Schimmer]

John,
Lot more fun to beat it out of aluminum, besides I have the buck half done.

Rex

[Milwaukee Midget]

John,
Lot more fun to beat it out of aluminum, besides I have the buck half done.

Rex

Why does this not surprise me?

Rex, I can't tell you how happy it makes me to see you on this project.  It's been a long time coming.

[tauruck]

That's a skill I wish I had.
Would love to try but I've seen the tools required
and I don't have any.
Rex, I think there's way more pleasure in making
than buying. I can't wait to see what you create.

[Rex Schimmer]

Still making some progress. Duke and I completed all of the locating linkages for the front axle and should have the thing on the ground tomorrow or Sunday. The front suspension will be by coil overs that are mounted below and parallel to the frame rails and activated by the lower section of the lower locating rocker, and it looks like everything will be inside the body! How did that happen on the first try?? Blind luck is my guess.

Couple of pics to look at, also included a pic of the rear axle in the car.

Rex

[Jack Gifford]

Nice work, getting all suspension pieces "out of the air"! I can't quite see where the front coilovers mount- will they work in extension (like late H-D rear spring)?

[tauruck]

Awesome fab work Rex. It looks great.
Take all the lucky breaks you get.

[Rex Schimmer]

Jack,
Hope to have the shock mounting pretty well at least tacked into the car today or tomorrow and will send pic then.

Rex

[ggl205]

Rex:

Unique and elegant design for front suspension. I really like what you have done and how you have done it. I also like the mono shock (damper) for this application. What do you reckon front corner weight to be?

John

[Tman]

I like that front suspension Rex, been toying with the idea of springs instead of rigid in mine.

[Rex Schimmer]

T man,
The car came with coil overs and I thought that I would try to integrate them into some sort of front suspension that was totally inside the body. I hope to have the coil over setup tacked into the car in the next couple of days, a couple of links, a rocker and I think I can make it work. Right now I am planning to run some shock snubbers on the shock shaft and have them about 1/2 inch from the end of travel so that any real axle movement will be against the snubbers. Anyway that is my plan.

Rex

[Tman]

Sounds good

[tauruck]

Agreed!.

[SPARKY]

wow  Rex ---we will be following closely on the axel fairings ---then maybe we can say  "they look just like Rex's---also waiting to see what you do with the exhaust---

[Rex Schimmer]

Sparky,
We may not have any axle fairings this time around as we have plenty to keep us busy until speed week. I may cobble up some "vortex disruptors" for the axles but probably not full fairings this year. Exhaust is going low and out the left side and pointed to the rear. Even 10 lbs of exhaust boost at 200 mph (doubt we will make that) is about 5 hp and when you are limited like my little Kawasaki you need everything you can get!

Rex

[Rex Schimmer]

Got one side of the suspension pretty well mocked up, it looks like everything will work, lots of rockers and links but I was in my best "Rube Goldberg" thinking when I came up with this,but it does get the shocks out of the way and the motion ratio between the axle and the shock is about  1.7:1, 1.7 inches of axle travel at the mount is equal to 1 inch of shock travel. As you can see from the pics I have a pretty long snubber on the shock and initially I will preload the spring until the shock has about 1/2 inch travel before the snubber is touched, I may eventually go to heavier springs. Now to get my "welder" (Duke) to get everything fully welded, I just can't lay on the floor with the TIG pedal under my knee and holding myself steady and get any kind of good weld. Duke is as strong as the proverbial ox and can weld like that all day. Oh to be young again!!!

Rex