I picked up a '75 roller a few months ago. Its a decent shell but I need to replace the rear half of the floor pans, the bottom edge of the inner and outer firewall and get a better look at the longs. The longs look pretty good from the outside, but of course there is a hole under the battery tray so time will tell.

I'm planning to build a rotisserie and wanted to run my idea by some more experienced folks. Honestly, supporting the car from the ends via the bumper mounts scares me, so I'm going to make one similar to the one by restoration design with the two hoops. The difference being that I would essentially build a rectangular cart on wheels that would mount to the front suspension area and either the rear suspension or the transmission crossmember. I would then bolt the hoops to the cart. The main benefit being that the cart would add structural rigidity to the body by reducing the twisting/bending forces. I would still use adjustable bracing from the upper seatbelt bolt towards the front of the car to keep the door gaps/targa top dimensions in spec.


Has anyone done something like this? Is it worth the extra effort? How much space should I leave between the cart and the bottom of the car (about 8")? I'm thinking rectangular tubing, can I get away with 1.5" x 3" or smaller/larger?

You really don't want to do structural reapirs while on a rotisserie.

Your idea is interesting but I haven't seen exactly what you describe. The main issue you're going to find with the cart "built in" is the need to counterblance the weight of the cart in order to not be bottom heavy and to be able to roll the hoops.

I think you'll need more than 8" of ground clearnace on the cart but that's just me. Surely you'll need to do something under the cart at some point. 8" isn't much to work with.

Sort of like what you describe minus the cart that connects between the hoops. This sytem depends on a solid self supporting structure. Not sure I'd use it for a Targa.

http://www.rollerhoop.com/

Thank you!

Ohh yeah, I forgot about the ounterbalancing part

The 8" is from the bottom of the car to the top of the cart. Which would be the working room when grinding/welding the floorpans. The dimensions of the tubing and the height of the casters would add to the overall height. Still wouldn't be able to get under it though.

I did it.

Strip the car. Do the structural stuff and brace the hell out of it.

Since yours is a 75 this is stupid simple. Take the bumpers off and attach the rotisserie to the shock bumper mounts. That's exactly how I did it on mine.



This is when I was test fitting the one I built out of HF 700lbs engine stands.
You can see I just used a cross bar and bolted it directly to the bumper shocks. I stacked washers into the gap for the shock mounts to make sure the ears did not collapse. The balance point was SPOT ON.


I tied the two hacked up stands with a cross bar that used the existing front leg mount. Easy to build. When I was done I sold the Rot quick and for a profit to boot. Car was up on it for 2 years while I did the restoration.

Zach

What am I missing here? What's holding the back end up?

Just the rear end of the rotisserie tipped sideways?

Front rotisserie oriented normally as two points on front and the rear is just enough to keep it all from collapsing?

Not making sense to me. I wouldn't be brave enough to crawl under there but you've clearly survived so I must not be understanding.

In this picture the body of the car is supported on Jack stands front and rear. Only the back end of the rotisserie is attached as I was testing fitment. The rotisserie is laying on its side, not supporting anything. IIRC I wanted to be sure that once I had the car bolted on I would be able to rotate the car around the rotisserie and I did this by lifting the free end and making sure everything cleared as it spun on its axis.

Or am I misunderstanding? Are you concerned about mounting the car via the bumper mounts?

The car was on the rotisserie very stoutly, yet rotated easily on its axis.

Zach

I get it now. Thanks for clarifying.

I think OP was wanting to put a whole build cart under the vehicle and then have the rotisserie rotate the whole unit.

I'm interested because I'm doing my strutural repairs on the Jeff Hail build cart and floor pans are PITA and will involve out of position inverted welding which is doable but I'm not looking forward to it.

I considered building a rotisserie off the ends of my build cart but unfortunately garage door opener isn't high enough to accomodate the cart height + additional rotisserie height and the longitudinal axis the car would rotate about.

The Jeff Hail cart is about 16" underneath it (easy access via creeper) and the vehicle then sits about 2" above the top of the build cart rails.

Bottom line for me is a rotisserie isn't in my future primarily due to vertical clearances but also the time diversion to build up a separate cart though I like yours and would have certainly built from HF engine stands to expedite. I'll just suck it up and weld upside down.

LOL engine stands are so, boring.

I built one a while back using 914- Rear arms to rotate off of, and used a common plan from there, height adjustable.

@GaroldShaffer has it now. Maybe he can post a few pictures.

808, if you have a lift....then just build a dolly. Raised up you can get to all the under-sides and inner fender area. The dolly works great for everything else, moving around the shop, off to the painter etc. Best, MarkClick to view attachment Click to view attachment