The frameover, part 3	Guestbook

(this is a continuation of part 1 and part 2)

The actual transfer.This is the big one!

February 22: On Tuesday, Basil was moved on to the lift. A number of parts have been stripped, including a highly reluctant steering relay. This afternoon, the frame will be brought to the shop and the big job begins.

February 22 (midnight): Okay, a quick update. As you can see from the photos, Basil now consists of an engine, a tranny, an exhaust and a rear tub. Everything else has been removed. The new frame has almost complete hydraulics (it's very easy to do this without a steering column or throttle linkage, by the way) and suspension installed. I'm going to pull the bulkhead off so I can install the engine and transmission as a unit. Easy enough at this stage. One note - the limited slip diff in Basil's rear end made it impossible to steer the rear axle when wheeling it from one frame to another. It was a bit of a comedy. I'd forgotten how physical it could be working on this beast.

February 25: Yes, I did survive. Basil drove out of the shop under his own power on Monday afternoon. I've got lots more photos, and they'll be posted shortly. Bill Cardell, Don Piburn and Jesse Nolan all put in a lot of time to help me do this much work so quickly - thanks guys!

See Part 4 for the remainder of the swap...

	A BIG thank you to Flyin' Miata, my employers, for letting me destroy the shop. The equipment here will make a huge difference.
	One advantage to doing a frame swap is that you can use extreme measures. Here the steering relay is being convinced to leave.
	Interesting cross section of the relay mounting. The size of the plate in the bottom surprised me.
	I know this crack wasn't there in August. It's along both sides of this frame rail underneath the driver's feet. The loss of strength here is what alerted me that the frame was hurt.
	The assorted parts arrive at the shop from my home garage in preparation.
	The frame comes over soon after.
	Meanwhile, Basil loses more things. Such as the bulkhead! The gas tank is gone as well.
	The new and the old.
	The new frame, ready for installation. That Snap-On creeper was actually used to move it.
	Brake lines, clutch lines - whee!
	Oh, look at that. Perfect.
	The fun part about a lift is that it makes it easy to remove a big heavy axle.
	And off comes the front.
	Rear axle getting installed.
	Poor Basil's looking pretty sad.
	Meanwhile, the new frame gets better.
	Oh, almost nothing left to do! :)

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