Machining stuff is fun (light bar in progress)

[jamal]

Ever since I put on that ricer-iffic non-matching turbo front bumper I've been lacking my set of driving lights. I've messed around in Solidworks a bit and browsed through the scrap in the machine shop to figure out a light bar. Anyway I made some progress today and thought I'd share.

The plan is to have four FF1000s on a curved bar so the middle two sit higher than the outer two. Like so:



The "C" part will fit through the grille and bumper cover to clamp onto the beam. Holes, will be tapped in the bottom of the C so that you can just crank on bolts from behind the grille. So today I started working on that "C" part, which I guess will be 2 pieces.

Here's some sort of a bracket I found in a room full of stuff we don't use anymore. I cut it in half:



It's going to go in here:



Needs some work on the mill, though:



(and yes I was wearing safety glasses)

First I evened out the top fairly half-assedly:



Then started removing material from the inside of the "L"







But I had a long way to go:



It was time for a different approach:



Except that was taking too long so I decided to use the bigger saw:



Much better:





Then I just needed to clean them up a bit:



That's looking better:







Also I have a new sticker:



And that's all. Tomorrow evening I'll do some bumper drilling and try to get a pair of lights mocked up and possibly installed.

[AWD_addict]

Cool. Looks like you could remove more material from the vertical sections.
If you really want to go crazy you could measure them, make a CAD model, and do FEA. I just finished a project like that, made me feel a little

Awesome grill badges too.

[SubaruNation]

didn't your car already have a setup with these?
i swear i saw a picture somewhere of that already...

[jamal]

yes it did:



But when I replaced my scuffed/bent/crooked bumper I didn't want to cut holes in the new cover.

Cool. Looks like you could remove more material from the vertical sections.
If you really want to go crazy you could measure them, make a CAD model, and do FEA. I just finished a project like that, made me feel a little

Awesome grill badges too.

Yeah, probably. Once I have the dimensions figured out I might run it through Cosmosexpress and trim off some excess. Maybe I'll be able to cut it into an H or T section or something.

And, yeah, that badge is totally JDM.

[Aerotech]

Nice little hobby shop ya got there!

[evolutionmovement]

They're going to resemble state trooper push bars. You should put some rubber pieces on the front so you can make your own parking space when idiots take up two spots (I miss the overriders the GLs had).

Are you going to have any kind of rear brace for the center lights? I would think they'd move around a little. I used to have lights like your old set up and I made some adjustable rear supports with rubber stoppers on the light end that mounted to two of the grille mounting holes since I didn't like the flopping and I wanted them to point a little down and out to the sides for corners. Worked for a little while until the beam mounts loosened up (thank you body shop). If I ever fix the car, I'll remount the lights, but do something different with the mounting to the beam so that I can access them easily.

[SubaruNation]

Nice little hobby shop ya got there!

no kidding...

[jamal]

Yeah it's a decent setup. We need new endmill bits and I'd really like a better table saw and a rotary table for the mill. Here's some pictures of that stuff:



What's nice is the digital X and Y readout:



And also this:



Anyway I found some more aluminum to make more of the bar hopefully. Good old 6061-T6 aluminum. One of my favourite materials:



So I've got some channel and flat bar:



I milled the flat bar so it was the same width as the L pieces:



Then I trimmed off part of the channel to make it an L:



So it will go together like so:





Anyway it's raining so I didn't get to drill holes in my bumper or mock things up any better. I leave for Montana Thursday so hopefully I can get some lights mounted by then.

I should probably thumbnail these pictures too. Sorry people with slow internets.

[jamal]

Are you going to have any kind of rear brace for the center lights? I would think they'd move around a little. I used to have lights like your old set up and I made some adjustable rear supports with rubber stoppers on the light end that mounted to two of the grille mounting holes since I didn't like the flopping and I wanted them to point a little down and out to the sides for corners. Worked for a little while until the beam mounts loosened up (thank you body shop). If I ever fix the car, I'll remount the lights, but do something different with the mounting to the beam so that I can access them easily.

Yes, when I add the center lights/ make the actual curved bar I will possibly tie into the radiator support with some small pieces. Right now I just want to get two lights on there and see how it works. If I get any vibration it's back to the drawing board, and I'll do some FEA analysis anyway and remove un-needed material. I'm also going to want to add rounds and fillets and probably some paint so it looks all nice.

I hear the rain is supposed to let up so hopefully I can get these on today. All I have to do is drill and tap a few holes. Getting them in the right place is going to be the tricky part. Oh and make some spacers to clear the bumper cover.

[SubaruNation]

I leave for Montana Thursday so hopefully I can get some lights mounted by then.

uh! Awesome!

[jamal]

yeah I'll be in Missoula Saturday night. Friday I'm skiing Alta.

Anyway, I half-assedly got the light bar on. Things started out fairly well and then went downhill from there. I'm going to re-drill some holes after I special order the bolts I want to use so it will be better then.

First up, drilling some holes:



By using that little locating rod and the digital readout, I was able to machine 5 holes in the exact same spot on four different pieces of metal:



Then I got out the super-deluxe tap and die set:



And tapped myself some holes:



Everything lined up wonderfully but my screws are too long;



The problem came when I tried to drill holes in the bumper since I can't exactly put the whole car on the endmill.





The lower holes in the bumper beam all turned out crooked and after widening them out a bit I still couldn't get everything to line up so I just used two bolts:



Anyway that turned out fairly well and it's really sturdy even without anything really holding it solidly to the bumper:



So I mounted the lights:



And I'm all set:



Time to finish packing. I need to aim the lights and buy some bolts that are the right length tomorrow before I leave.

[beatersubi]

Are the lights sturdy w/o any bracing on the back?

[SubaruNation]

i'll look for your huge bright lights on saturday, not that it will be hard to find

whats with all the lysol?

[jamal]

Are the lights sturdy w/o any bracing on the back?

Yeah as long as they're mounted to a solid surface the light itself doesn't need any bracing or whatever. I do need to use some bigger bolts to hold the things to the bumper and make some spacers. They made it 1200 miles, through a blizzard, and past 90mph with no problems though.

i'll look for your huge bright lights on saturday, not that it will be hard to find

whats with all the lysol?

I think I saw your car in Prospect this morning. There can't be too many TWs of that color around. I live a little farther up past the bus loop thing.


And yes I was changing my oil before the trip.

[Arctic Assassian]

That looks like oil to me...

[SubaruNation]

i'll look for your huge bright lights on saturday, not that it will be hard to find

whats with all the lysol?

I think I saw your car in Prospect this morning. There can't be too many TWs of that color around. I live a little farther up past the bus loop thing.


And yes I was changing my oil before the trip.

wow i'm a retard. i guess that does look like an oil container
for some reason i thought it was something else. forgive me...

and..
WTF YOU LIVE UP PROSPECT?
AWESOME!!!:-D
uh....are you working on your car here?
do you want any help or anything?
because im totally down
i just put my car in the garage right now to work on my new rs scooper a little, tisn't quite flush yet.
let me know though!

[jamal]

Yeah I thought that scoop looked a little bigger than usual.

I'm up in Canada at my grandparent's right now. I'll be back Friday or Saturday then I'm headed to Big Sky and then back down to LA.

I do intend to mount that light bar to the bumper a little more sturdily before I leave.

[SubaruNation]

canada kicks ass.
Fernie?

alright let me know on like friday or saturday when your back in the zoo.
i'd be glad to help, and maybe get a few pointers.[/b]