Nick S;
Depends on the way the body is fitted to the rotisserie…
I’ve seen (and built) a rotisserie that bolts to the firewall and
the rear of a unibody car (like a '65 Mustang). I built a really
heavy-duty rotisserie for use with the Tri-Five Chevy bodies
that attached, via a unique set of six-way adjustable mounts,
directly to where the body mounts to the chassis (body was
lifted via two fork-lifts, then main support beams with lifted
and fitted into place on the front and rear pivots… “Balancing”
the assembled unit with body attached was a royal bitch!!..
Both these units could be rotated a full 360 degrees and
“stopped” (pinned) at the 12, 1:30, 3, 4:30, 6, 7:30, 9, and
10:30 o’clock positions.
The E-Type Rotisseries I’ve seen in photographs are built for
a unibody car, in that they fasten to the firewall of the body
and probably at bumper mounting points in the rear… This
will NOT work for an XK body of ANY body style!!! The
XK REQUIRES “frame support” to keep the unibody from
flexing and sagging!
I built two rotisseries for my XK120… one for the chassis
(a light-weight unit-- call it “LT-1” ;-} ) and the second for
the 120DHC’s body. On the “Body” rotisserie, instead of
building a “dual rail” system that weighed a ton, I opted to
build a single rail that goes thru the center of the grill opening,
crosses thru the g-box opening “just above” the bottom of the
firewall, goes thru the cockpit right at floor level, thru the
prop-shaft opening at the battery shelf then continues thru
the spare type well and out the back…
Some mountings on this rotisserie are six-way adjustable,
some mounts are eight-way adjustable and all “tee” off the
center beam of the rotisserie, . The 120’s body is mounted
to the main bar with five pair of mounts… basically at all but
one place the DHC’s body mounts to the chassis. I even
built special bars that not only brace the door openings to
maintain their “factory stock” distances but I made them
adjustable with heavy-duty guy-wire tensioners… This allows
the top of the door opening to be adjusted to within tenths
of a millimeter of accuracy. It is a rather stout set-up, there
is no “bounce” in the body during rotation and it is very
stable when rolling this rotisserie around in my shop. It
was an easy build but one MUST be very confident in one’s
welding skills before attempting such a project! Dropping
one’s XK body from four or five feet is horrible enough, dropping it on
one’s self might just be more than physically
and mentally painful!!!
I went thru some real photographs I have taken of “Things
Jaguar”, but found none of the rotisseries… I will need to dig
thru several 12" x 12" x 7" plastic lidded boxes that contain
several hundred(s) of CD’s and DVD’s that contain our family
photographs, and view EACH disc to find the photos… so
allow time for that… but then, you might be finished with your
Jag by then…
Charles #677556.----- Original Message -----
From: “N�ck”
I’ve only a few months of body work left and was thinking
things would go better if I mounted the car (minus chassis, of
course) onto my E-type rotisserie. It would especially come in
handy for media blasting and painting the underside. Has
anyone on board done this? Cockpit bracing is easy enough to
figure out but I’m specifically wondering about attachment
points for the rotisserie and framework required. Again, your
advice please, oh whiskered ones. Photos would be great, too.Nick Saltarelli '68 Cdn mkt E-type S1� OTS, '54 XK120SE OTS
Niagara, Ontario, Canada