[DeTomaso] Engine cover

[Mike Drew]

Chuck,

Some of you guys just don’t get it. 

Not everybody has a garage full of tools. I probably spent a hundred bucks on my tap and die set 30 years ago. But for a guy who doesn’t own a vice, or a hacksaw, or a tap and die set, you are talking about an investment of a couple of hundred bucks just to get two lousy nuts. 

In minutes, instead of tool-shaming people who are less fortunate in that department, somebody whose car has the motor out could provide the measurements to me, and I could go get a piece of scrap steel from my local blacksmith and have this guy taken care of. And yet there’s been zero actually helpful information put forth. If I had my car here I could take it apart and find it myself, but it’s not here at the moment which is why I am asking. 

Why is that so hard to understand?

Mike

Sent from my iPad

> On May 6, 2020, at 12:25, Chuck and Linda Huber <lindahuber at cox.net> wrote:
> 
> I might suggest that if a person can't take a flat bar of mild steel, lay out a bunch of holes, tap it (to any size they like), and then cut the bar into squares with a hacksaw, maybe they should just take their car to a specialist....  OR.....  just buy the nuts from one of our local vendors?
> 
> I am happy to mail this piece of stock off to you or to your buddy....
> 
> The stock is 1/8" thick, by 1/2" wide - the length is immaterial.
> 
> I agree with Larry - this project is a no brainer.  It is also possibly a good learning opportunity for VERY BASIC fabrication.  You get a lot of pride out of successfully completing a project yourself.
> 
> Chuck
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Mike Drew [mailto:MikeLDrew at aol.com] 
> Sent: Tuesday, May 5, 2020 5:19 PM
> To: Larry Finch
> Cc: DeTomaso Forum
> Subject: Re: [DeTomaso] Engine cover
> 
> Larry,
> 
> Not everybody is fortunate enough to have the wherewithal to cut steel, and drill and two holes. That's why I volunteered to help the fellow out. 
> 
> I don't have an original to copy and don't have ready access to the cavity where it needs to go. All I need are the dimensions and I can go from there. 
> 
> Or since you have already done it, and have access to a car in a much better state of dismantlement to provide the necessary data, maybe YOU could volunteer your services to him?
> 
> And my 'simple metric nuts' observation was base on direct experience--that is what the 1971 cars used. The later cars use bigger captive nuts. How much bigger I don't know. 
> 
> Mike
> 
> Sent from my iPhone
> 
>> On May 5, 2020, at 16:09, Larry Finch via DeTomaso <detomaso at server.detomasolist.com> wrote:
>> 
>> Mike,
>> 
>> You are making this minuscule task much harder than it needs to be. 
>> 
>> No one called you nuts, but I did ask if your “simple metric nuts” opinion was based on any experience. It wasn’t. 
>> 
>> As the original poster and I had already discovered through our experience, the reality is that if you go to a hardware store and ask for a square metric nut the only option presented is smaller than what was used on our cars.
>> 
>> As I initially suggested at the beginning of this thread I replaced one of mine by simply constructing one out of a piece of steel bar stock.
>> 
>> M5-0.80
>> 
>> As for how large to make this nut, simply make it sized to fit the pocket it is going to reside in. Anyone care to bet money that all of the capture pockets were the same throughout the production run?  :-)
>> 
>> “Hey Guido!! We are running out of the engine cover nuts. What size are they? Do we have anymore of them? Never mind, find some bar stock and make some for me, we can change the capture pockets if we need to.”
>> 
>> I don’t know what your friend’s fabricating situation is, but this project doesn’t require a mill or a precision micrometer. Just about any man garage should be able to create these nuts :
>> 
>> Steel-drill-drill bit-tap-hacksaw-file-done
>> 
>> Or I suppose you could sketch a dimensional drawing and send it off to a web-based machine shop. 
>> 
>> ;-)
>> 
>> Larry 
>> 
>> Sent from me using a magic, handheld electronic gizmo. 
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