Each segment is more interesting than the last. Thanks for sharing this with us all. I know this will be a great help to me down the road when it's my turn.

 

Impressive!!!!!

 

Got some things done this week but it looks the same as before. I finished one of the two fuel cell mounts. Most of the time was spent getting the mule ready to flip over upside down. I have the front suspension off, the engine and trans out and the front end is on the rotisserie. Next week the rear end.

 

If we're very good and quite, will you post some more pictures Pretty please!!!???

 

Next week should pretty productive. Once I flip the mule over I hope to finish the sub frame completely. Once that's done it's off to powder coat to look pretty. ...gloss black. At that point I will be done with the mule and on to the real thing.

 

Here is the fuel cell installed.

 

This project is absolutely Incredible. I'm still curious about the exhaust. Have you decide where and how to route it?

 

I have no idea. I'll take it to my exhaust guy and he will figure it out. I do know that I will have to leave an area large enough for exhaust tubing to go between the engine cradle and the bell housing. That is an area on the rear of the engine cradle that I left rough cut knowing I will be back in there. I will have to get the car up on a lift for that. Right now I'm just using jack stands

 

For the first time I actually have enough clearance around the rear tires for them to actually turn! I have about 1/2" in the front and rear on the wells. This is about all the rubber that is possible in the rear of an HHR without COMPLETLY cutting the crap out of the wheel wells which would involve cutting the bottom rear section of the rear doors and reshaping the rear bumper.

 

I wasn't able to tell if I needed to cut a giant chunk out of the rear frame rail sections of the body until now. I have the rwd almost completely finished now and I can see that i don't need to notch the crap out of the body. This is really good news as it is a major structural area of the body. In this first photo I put a red circle around the area I'm talking about. The rest of the pics are just where I am at this point on the build.