Techno Toy Tuning Camber Plates Install

[SUNNY Z]

Well I did a good amount of searching on the site before I posted this, so hopefully someone can find ths information useful.

Here’s my install thread for Techno Toy Tuning (T3) weld-in camber plates.

 

Tools required:

 

- Ball peen hammer

- ~4# sledge hammer

- Chisel

- Center Punch

- 4†grinder with wire brush, cut-off wheel, and grinding wheel

- Misc Metric sockets

- Sharpie (or other marking method)

- String (I used electrical wire)

- Plasma cutter / torch

- Welder (MIG)

- Drill with ~3/8†drill bit

- Fender cover (or a thick sheet you care nothing about)

- Clips to hold up said cover ^

 

I’ll start with the rear, as that’s where I started.

I started by removing the plastic on top of the strut towers. After that, I went to the seat belts. Remove the 17mm bolt first, which will allow you to get the mechanism out of the way, then the 12mm to move the plate. I peeled back the vinyl and used a razor blade scraper to scrape it off the strut tower to keep from tearing it. Once you get the interior pieces out of the way, (which required the removal of the hatch struts), Start by running wires from side to side, between the two bolts you just removed.

 

 

This will allow you to properly line up the camber plates, so you can mark them as to where to cut. This is where you mark them with a sharpie or similar marking device. I might add that the little "nipple" in the center of the strut tower needs to be removed so the camber plates will sit level.

 

 

About now is when I would suggest adding a sheet or fender cover between the hatch area and the rest of your interior (if you care- I DO)

I soaked my fender cover in water, rang it out, and hung it up using some small little clips. This will HOPEFULLY keep it from catching fire – however, whenever I’m welding or cutting I like to have someone on fire patrol.

 

 

Once this is done, you will need to drill out the spot welds on top of the thin layer of sheet metal (4). To make this simple, I like to use a center punch to mark them so my bit doesn’t walk.

 

 

 

Then use the cutoff wheel on your grinder, or pneumatic cutoff tool, and cut ¼†to ½†past the line you marked toward the outboard of the car. This will be a straight cut, and it will allow you remove that thin piece of sheet metal so you can get the camber plate flush with the top of the tower. After this is done, Use a hammer and chisel to remove the piece. If you drilled out the spot welds correctly, this should be a simple task. There is also a small tab on the very inboard side of the strut tower that I removed (not sure if its visible in the pics). I then used the same wire / string method used above to line up the CP’s again, and re-trace the outline.

Now is a good time to find a friend with a plasma cutter lol.

 

After you have your sharpie outline, take a ruler and mark ½†in from the outer edge of your outline. This will be the line you will cut. I didn’t get a picture of this.

I then cut out this section with the plasma cutter, and looked at the camber plate, cut a little more until I couldn’t see the strut tower through the camber plate.

 

 

Since the strut tower isn’t exactly the size of the plate, I had to cut off a corner (front) to make it fit right.

 

 

Don’t throw these corners away, as they can come in useful in a bit.

 

 

After they were cut out, I put in the wires for reference, and measured, eyeballed, tacked measured, moved, etc. until they were perfect. It can be a bit tedious, and I had to get IN the hatch to do this, but they turned out well.

 

Here is one of the rears after being burned in

 

 

I then ground the top down, and smoothed it out.

 

 

Now on to the fronts!

These were a bit easier, as I didn’t have to contort myself.

I took off the fenders to get at the strut towers better, and measured 8†from the rear of the little seam that has the fender mounting nut inserts in it. Then I strung a wire from side to side to use as a reference

 

 

Here’s a better shot of the alignment. I only used the 8†measurement because that’s where I could get a good line. This might differ year to year or car to car.

 

 

Then I massaged the tops of the towers with a 4# sledge until the plate fit well. This is where that corner from the rears comes into play. It just worked out perfect on mine that I could weld it under the front corner to take up the gap. If I had a torch, I would have just heated the plate corner and bent it to fit. However, I was using limited resources.

 

 

Its not PERFECT, but its easily do-able, and this is where it wouldn’t rock at all.

 

 

Here’s the front after it was welded, ground, and smoothed. I use a worn out flap disc on my grinder. It works well and gives a nice smooth finish. I ended up having a few little indentions that would have been hard to fill with a welder, so I threw on a thin layer of bondo. You can also see where I cut out the little fender lip so I could weld the backside of the plates

 

 

Here’s the rears painted, and trimmed the interior a bit.

 

 

Hope this helps some people, as I was just kinda flying by the seat of my pants on this one.

Edited April 17, 2012 by SUNNY Z

[ComicArtist]

Nice! I like how the rears look finished. Mine aren't nearly that pretty.

[robbs70z]

Looks good nice job

[MexiChriS]

definitely a job well done and great for reference; thanks for sharing!

[S30 SPL]

Nice!! Where are you located? Want to make some money in your spare time?

[SUNNY Z]

Nice!! Where are you located? Want to make some money in your spare time?

 

Kansas. lol. smack dab in the middle of the US. And yes, I would haha. It would help fund this hobby lol.

[S30 SPL]

Very nice, too bad Kansas is too far from So Cal... lol.