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How to: Mod the chassis for serious lowering


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A big issue with Lowering a Lupo is the o/s drive shaft is very long, due to the location of the gearbox so once lowered the angle the shaft sits at causes it to catch on the chassis.

After speaking to Clifford at Edition 38, I decided to get on with it.

I'm not confident enough with a welder to take this on my self, but wanted to do as much as possible.

The plan is, to cut out a section of the square box section, and replace it with an arch for the drive shaft to be able to sit into.

To do this, we will need to cut a pipe in half to give us a perfect arch.

The Tube I'm using is about 3mm thick and 3" in diameter.

Really heavy, really oily, bloody perfect!

Tube.jpg

This is not a job to do on your own, or if you get frightened easily.

Inside the box section is **** loads of wax oil.

To those who don't know this stuff is as flammable as you can get, all I was thinking was if the catches fire again I'll never live the shame down lol

Anyway it's quite simple. If your alright with a grinder (my job) and a Mig welder.

Marked up the shape using the pipe and the depth of each side (its narrower the further forward you go) then off to the vice to grind out the shape.

While I was doing this, Derren started cutting the arch shape out of the chassis leg.

He used a drill to get the shape, and was going to use a burner until we saw the amount of wax, so it got finished with the drill also.

Next job was to remove all excess wax, and remove the rubber grommets in case we need to put out any fires in the box section.

Spot welded the cut out section of pipe, and then shaped the 3mm thick piece to the leg.

Quick check and he seam welded it up.

Needs two of you, as one needs to be fire watching from start to finish.

Cutoutsmaller.jpg

Once all the seams were welded, we cut out a plate, to replace the strengthening plate we had to cut through.

welded.jpg

Next job was to grind down the plates, to try and hide the welds a little (still 18 months warranty remember!

Just picked up a can of stone chip paint to cover the arch before painting it.

spray.jpg

Completed.jpg

As I said, it is a REALLY worrying job but well worth it.

Result.jpg

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