I'd like to introduce "Project ExoSketch"

"xxstich666xx" (xxstich666xx)
03/14/2019 at 22:58 • Filed to: None

So it all started last Saturday morning when my friend Chris called me up to tell me he was about to buy a running and driving 2004 Crown Vic P71 and asked if I wanted to go half on it. He sent me this screenshot and being the impusive ass that I am, I said DO IT.

It looked pretty clean on the surface for 168k and with an obvious but typical cheap Maaco spray job. It ran and drove with a cylinder 6 misfire which is not unusual for a modular and the tranny actually had all 4 gears which was a nice bonus. Also hard to tell but it came with a nice push bar and all the mounting hardware completely free of rust.

The only issues we could see were that none of the door electrics worked and the trunk wouldn’t open either with the key or with the button on the dash. Everything smelled like a gym bag covered in piss on top of it. It was PERFECT for what we were about to do to it.

Within 2 hours we had the whole front completely disassembled and within 6 we had everything gutted that didn’t have to be cut with a sawzall......and then we started gutting everything with a sawzall.

Using the roof support as a guide, my friend started the process of temporarily turning this thing into a ute. We want to keep the B-Pillar so we can still use the factory seat belts in order to keep it as street legal as possible. Once that was cut we used the belt line as a makeshift guide and starting hacking at the C-Pillar until the only thing holding the roof on was the rear window and the inner parcel shelf but neither of those put up much of a fight from an angle grinder and some good leverage.

Tell me this doesn’t look like it could go on a Mercedes 350SL

After this it was a simple matter of cutting the floor behind the front seats and unbolting the body mounts. The whole rear tub came off with almost no effort. and now we’re left with this.

My friend cut the frame rails back to where the gas tank is and used the rear bumper to box the rails. That ended up cutting almost 3 feet out of the car alone.

For now it’s just an amazing burnout machine but we plan on building a full exocage, hence the name, sometime before the end of the month. We’ll fix all the various broken things on it such as the left front shock which is completely broken in half and the upper rear control arm which has about 2 inches of play.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

We’re going to make this a flexible platform where we can set it up for Autocross one weekend and rallycross the next. It’s all laid out in the intro to my friend Chris’ video on the build.

Sorry if this post came off like a middle-schooler writing an essay. I haven’t written in this format for almost 15 years lol.

DISCUSSION (10)

BaconSandwich is tasty. > xxstich666xx
03/15/2019 at 00:22

That looks both entertaining and slightly terrifying. Congrats! :P

xxstich666xx > BaconSandwich is tasty.
03/15/2019 at 00:53

Haha thanks. So far it’s the best $350 I’ve ever spent. We’re selling off all the parts we take off and it's going into a little fund for the 80ft of chromoly tubing we need. That shit is expensive.

Future Heap Owner > xxstich666xx
03/15/2019 at 01:54

Cool! It’s always neat to see a car get stripped down like this. For some reason I always expect there to be more stuff to remove than there is.

Keep us posted!

BaconSandwich is tasty. > xxstich666xx
03/15/2019 at 11:37

I've been wondering how much 1.75" drawn over mandrel tubing costs in my neck of the woods. I've heard $6/ft, but that's $6 USD, so pretty much a million dollars a foot up here in Canada. :P

xxstich666xx > BaconSandwich is tasty.
03/18/2019 at 20:33

We’ve been quoted $ 14 a foot from most places.

BaconSandwich is tasty. > xxstich666xx
03/19/2019 at 08:34

Oof. That does sound pricey. :(

xxstich666xx > BaconSandwich is tasty.
03/23/2019 at 21:35

Oh yeah. So what we’ve decided to do is save up and get a cage made professionally . If we’re gonna spend the money at least we’ll get it done right the first time.

BaconSandwich is tasty. > xxstich666xx
03/23/2019 at 23:26

Better than our unofficial corporate motto: we don't have time to do it right, but we do have time to do it twice.

xxstich666xx > BaconSandwich is tasty.
03/24/2019 at 12:28

HAHAHAHA I’m using that

BaconSandwich is tasty. > xxstich666xx
03/25/2019 at 11:05

I can't remember where I first heard it. Somewhere on the internet.