Time for a Brake

With the header off at HPC and the body work at José De La Cruz for it's sexy new paint job it was time to concentrate on the details - if you consider brakes a detail.

Since I've elected to keep the drum in the rear (I like the lack of power) we only need a bracket for the cable and Scott whips that up quickly on the Bridgeport. The front brakes require a bracket that will hold the calipers and Scott wants to do them on the CNC (computer numeric control) mill. The drawing on the computer (top left) which will make a program for the CNC to carve out of a block of aluminum. It's not as fast or easy as you may think. There is a lot of "fixturing" - coming up with ways of holding the part so the machine can carve it up. After all the prep work it's fun to watch the CNC rip through the program, changing tools and diving into the aluminum - then it does seem easy and take only minutes but the first one is a pain.