My Hustler rebuild (with a few tasteful modifications/upgrades) :D

[arieck]

Well, I've enjoyed reading everyone else's build thread and have been gaining a lot of insight and ideas from everyone, so I figured I'd start documenting my rebuild and contributing, in a small way, to the body of knowledge that this site has accumulated.

I'm going to start by just posting a couple of pics of the Hustler as I received it, and a few of where its at now. Then I'll follow up some posts getting into the details with various stages of completion. I still have a ways to go... gotta wire everything back up, pry the trans apart to fix a output shaft play issue (parts for that are on the way), and throw my new chains on, but I can at least see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Things I've done so far: frame out, sandblast and respray, split shift set up, transmission bracing, plastic welded multiple body holes, bearings, flange seals, upgraded lights, made: diamond plate skid plate, winch mount/bumper/future instrument panel, resprayed roll cage, replaced seats, upgraded tires and wheels.

Before


After

[JoeMeg]

Lookin' Good!

[rodp]

Very tidy build. Is that an MGB GT in the background ?

[arieck]

Yes, its a 69 MGB GT... the "other" project waiting for my attention after I get this one buttoned up. When I got the hustler, my progress on that one stalled out big time!

[rodp]

Worth doing, they may not be the best handling or even the quickest of the sixties and seventies sports cars around but they were very reliable, a good everyday car.
They didn't have any "quirks" either that tried to kill you at the first sight of a bend or wet road, which is nice. It's also more than can be said for the Spitfire, Vitesse, 3 ltr Capri etc that did their very best to put you in an early grave, as you can see, I survived

[Linco]

Looks real nice!

[Noel Woods]

Looks really nice. The only suggestion I have is to relocate the sticks in the middle for a better balance and more room for the driver. The sticks are easy to cut and bend and within an hour or two you'll be surprised how good the middle stick set up is.

[wedge]

Look's Very nice ! I like the wheels !! What size are thay and where did you find them to fit ?

[ARGOJIM]

Looks really nice. The only suggestion I have is to relocate the sticks in the middle for a better balance and more room for the driver. The sticks are easy to cut and bend and within an hour or two you'll be surprised how good the middle stick set up is.

Sticks in the middle?

[Noel Woods]

Yes, Laterals that is. I relocated mine to the middle of the floor and made for a better balanced machine and still had room for a passenger as long as you are on a friendly basis. I've always thought the sticks were too far left on the Hustler. I have big feet so my left foot barely fits left of the lateral on a stock machine.

[racerone3]

Sticks in the middle?

It is a HUGE IMPROVEMENT on the hustler. In the stock location, if you have a left foot larger than a ladies 6, you have to put it to the right of the sticks and sit sideways. I centered mine and sit center unless I have a front seat passenger.

[ARGOJIM]

It is a HUGE IMPROVEMENT on the hustler. In the stock location, if you have a left foot larger than a ladies 6, you have to put it to the right of the sticks and sit sideways. I centered mine and sit center unless I have a front seat passenger.

But with buckets (2)? Or are we talking making some funky sticks that pull over right leg to center of driver?

[arieck]

I relocated the seat frame back a couple of inches hoping to gain some more foot room. Once I get running, I'm going to try it this way for a little bit, but if its not comfortable, I'll definitely be relocating them to the middle

Wedge, I was wanting to do something a bit different with the wheels and I was looking at I think stonewall's setup... where he knocked out all the wheel studs, and then redid the bolt pattern to a more common atv pattern. Good idea, but looked like quite a bit of work. So I went on a hunt to find something that would fit and these were literally the only thing I found... They are 10 x 6 with a 5/4.5 bolt pattern and they bolt up to our stock Hustlers perfect. 10 Inch 5 Bolt Gunmetal Inlay Aluminum Trailer Wheel On the positive side, they look good (IMO), are pretty cheap, and being 10" expands the tire choices a bit. On the negative side, they are very narrow and it limited my tire choices. Those are 25x11x10 Sedona Mud Rebels and once you get them on that 6" wheel, you couldn't get any closer to not being able to turn the wheels for lack of tub clearance on the front set. I should have gone smaller, but I'm going to go with it... they'll wear down eventually! I have no idea if they will mud trail or swim worth a damn, but for my normal purposes it should be fine. We really don't have much mud around here... for me its mostly dry ranch roads with an occasional dip in a lake. This hustler is a scrambler with a 28HP kohler 2 stroke anyway... more set up for speed than crawling.

[arieck]

Split Shift Modification

I'm going to add my version of the Hustler T20 split-shift to the pile. Here's what it looks like finished and a video of it shifting/moving (very loosely mocked up). Pros: simple, functional, uses existing infrastructure, and looks stockish. Cons: I have to relocate the parking brake somehow, and somewhat blocks underseat access from the front. The following posts will be the step by step process... may be a little tedious, but these sorts of 1, 2, 3 threads helped me when I was attacking this.





VIDEO

http://vid254.photobucket.com/albums/hh109/arieck/Hustler/IMG_2562_zps88211523.mp4

[arieck]

Split Shift Part 1 (Front)

Stock Configuration, Battery Tray and Parking Brake in Place.


Removal of Battery Tray/Parking Brake. Basically just attack the welds with a cut off wheel and grinder, trying not to cut into the surrounding frame too much.



Should look like this when you are done...


Find a piece of bar steel (round would probably be better, but I was using parts on hand and as you will see this square bar had a end attachment that I incorporated into my design) that looks like it will thread through the existing shifter tube like so...


If yours is like mine, the tube may be partially blocked by a messy factory weld, which you can hog out with a drill until your bar clears (not so much that you compromise the weld... just enough).



From there you need to start figuring out how to support the other end of the steel bar. I chose a piece of angle iron that was tall enough so that I could drill my carrier hole to be level with that of the hole on the other end of the bar in the stock shifter (first pic). When mocking things up for this support bracket, be sure that the arm which will be attached to this end, is lined up straight with your rear shift linkage attach point, use the shift linkage from the driver side to mock up. (second and third pic)







Next you are going to need a shifter. I found this in the scrap pile and decided it would work. You could just as easily do this without the bit on the end, by going directly to the bar with a piece of pipe, and then using a spacer to clear the tang on the stock shifter that keeps it from popping out of gear. Whatever you use, this will obviously have to be welded directly to the bar so that when you move the shifter the bar moves too.




Affix the lever on the end of your bar, this will be the lever to which the linkage from front to back will ultimately attach. I happened to have this piece that was already made for the bar (that's why I used it), but you could just as easily weld a piece of flat bar steel of an appropriate size on the end... just need to drill a hole.



From there you should make a spacer to run over your bar and between the outer support bracket and the new shifter. This will help prevent the assembly from shifting and help clean up the look. I used a piece of conduit cut down to size.


The last picture is pretty complete, but there are still some things to do to the front assembly at this point. 1) Cut off any excess bar from other side of stock shifter assembly, I left enough room for a bronze washer (bearing) and then welding a hefty washer onto the end as a retainer (pic 1). Its all painted up in this picture, but you can see what I'm talking about. 2) Weld up or bolt your passenger side support bracket to the floor... I had an issue here. The floor sheet metal is not strong enough by itself to sustain the flexing of the shift movement. So I cut a piece of steel bar to fit between the two frames and then welded it in as a support (pic 2). 3) You also need to go ahead and weld the shifter to the bar it connects to if you haven't already. You can also sort of see this in (pic 2). Caution, when you make your welds you need to have everything as it would be for a successful shifting through the full range of positions that your transmission is going to require. The easy way to do this is just to match your new side's range of motion to the range of motion of your stock shifter and all of the linkages back to the transmission.