Rotisserie Measurements

[Jersey]

Hey all from NJ. I'll be building a rotisserie in the near future for my '73 240 and just was hoping i could get a couple of questions answered from those who have done it. I've read and accumulated pages of info on building one but want to be clear on these items before i start welding.

My Z is a '73 240 with the entire drive train, front & rear suspension, tank, doors, hatch and interior removed. Front glass and dash will remain. I'll be using 2 engine stands that will bolt to the front and rear bumper mounting locations.

I'm sure this is slightly different for all setups but best guess from experience -  Is 4" above both the front and rear bumper mounts about right for the center of the pivot point?

I'll be connecting the 2 engine stands together for stability. Will 40" from the ground up to the center of the pivot point be enough to allow the Z to rotate 360 degrees without hitting this connection between the 2 stands?

Thanks,

Jersey

[LLave]

IRC JMortensen built his rotisserie using two engine stands. Might want to check his thread.

I found that as I removed pats from my Z the center of gravity moved, so I welded old brake rotors to the rotisserie was ballast. That was an easy fix. 

[grannyknot]

I have done a rotisserie using 2 engines stands twice now for Z's,  for a car with no front glass or dash the perfect balance is level with the back bumper mounting points and about 5-6" above the front bumper mounting points. With your glass and dash in then you would need to bring the pivot point up some more from that, how much...I couldn't say.

To have the car flip 180* you have to be able to clear the front support wheels of the engine stands which means you would have to cut the main uprights of the engine stands and weld in a piece to give you more height, but the higher it gets the more unstable it becomes.  When I did it the car rotated to a bit less then 90* which was good enough for me. A completely stripped early 240z weighs about 550lbs.

[Jeff]

I don't have any of the measurements you're looking for but I do have the plans that I followed to build my rotisserie and photo references of the completed build.  I believe that the rotation point was around 27" down from the top of the 60" upright.  The car would rotate 360 degrees but I never quite got the balance right so I could still rotate it alone but it was a bit of a challenge.

Plans I followed are here.

Photo references are here.

 

[NC88]

5-6" above the bumper mounts seems right.  Build in adjustability though to dial it in.  I didn't bother to chop and raise the engine stands and could achieve a pretty steep angle.  

[Boy from Oz]

Add 300 mm to the height of the stands and have the mounting (axis of rotation) 75 mm above the bumper mounts.

 

Edited October 20, 2017 by Boy from Oz

[LLave]

Hmm... Not I can visually see just how far off my mounts are. My rotisserie was already constructed for another chassis (70' challenger), and the dimensions of my mounts were based around clearing my garage door opener track, so I can easily rotate in my garage without worry. At least, that's my excuse for having mounts so hight.