Door Locks and Cards

It took a full day to do this, much fiddling and fettling. I didn't take many pictures whilst actually fitting the locks so here is the drivers side finished:

We marked the rough position using the door card, then cut a nice wide slot for the striker. The driver's side striker had to be spaced off with 4 ugly washers. The passenger side only required 1. The passenger door doesn't quite seem to fit flush with the lock, possibly the addition of the door seal is pushing the lower edge of the door out a bit. May require some future fettling. Door cards were easy, drill some holes in the correct position and tap it in. I say easy, the passenger side took me 4 goes at getting the holes right, but fine in the end. Door hinge finishers also fitted, and door seal.

You will notice of course that the lower hinge estutcheon thingy is the wrong way round. I shall correct this, then immediately fall on my sword. As an aside, we found these very tricky to position as they have to fit right up against the door seal lip and the body isn't quite flat there.

Fuel Tank

I painted the mounting straps for the fuel tank with a few coats of Hammerite and seeing that the car is on axle stands for gearbox removal it was a good opportunity to fit the fuel tank for the last time. The filler neck also went on, and the earth strap. I was pleased to find when we did the straps up good and proper I could get my hand between the front of the tank and the De Dion beam, something I was a bit concerned about before. Oh, also we drilled out and re-did the rivets in the boot floor so the flat rivet heads were underneath, instead of the knobbly ends digging in the tank as before.

Handbrake

We were a bit apprehensive at fitting the handbrake as the forum is full of posts about people having trouble with it. The rear cables went on easy enough, bit fiddly with the clevis in each hub but not too bad. Its worth saying that the handbrake components in the hub came fully assembled and all I've done is just pop the rear brake disc over the top and  hook the cables on so we have missed out on a lot of the difficulties that others have described.

Right, handle on:

The cable then routed through the bulkhead as low as possible whilst still clearing the chassis lurking behind. The front cable then routes round to the half moon thingy.

I pulled the cable as tight as possible on the threaded section on the equaliser above so all the adjustment was taken up at the handle. It was then a case of adjusting away (easy with no seats) with Naomi turning the rear wheels by hand until the handbrake shoes grabbed. The IVA manual says the handbrake must hold the car on 4 clicks. As the car was in mid air we don't know if it will hold it but you can't turn the wheels by hand. Not the same as parked on a slope I know, but still it would appear to work. The IVA manual doesn't say how you achieve 4 clicks. I had to straddle the handle with one leg outside the car and pull like a mad person.

Clutch fork removal (and gearbox)

No sooner was it in, now its out almost immediately. The clutch fork needs shortening, therefore it needs removing first.

After browsing the cobra club forum and reading that gearbox removal is impossible without the engine also being removed (or at least off its mounts and shuffled forwards) I was a little apprehensive of attempting this, but not completely deterred.

First, I supported the rear of the engine with a nice big bit of wood under the flat-bottomed sump. I was a little concerned about this but didn't really have a choice as my borrowed cranes have all gone back to their homes. Max reminded me that most of the engine weight is on the mounts so it should be fine.

Right, so, back of engine supported. Gearbox on hydraulic jack (with wheels) aligned fore/aft. Remove fixings from bellhousing and move gbox+bellhousing backwards.

For some reason I thought at this point I could reach in, pop off the clutch arm and remove it. I forgot about the flywheel and clutch. So, next step: remove bellhousing from gearbox and put it back on the engine.

Our spirits were high at this point and I somehow managed to remove the bearing from the fork and manipulate it out of the bellhousing. Unfortunately we were deflated slightly by the gearbox being jammed in the chassis to the rear so at this point it couldn't be removed as the splined end would clash with the opening in the bellhousing before it was at the required angle to take the gbox out from the top.

The bellhousing cant be removed as it wont clear both the flywheel/clutch and the gearbox shaft. Solution = partially remove bellhousing and dangle it on some string off the scuttle hoop, then heave the gbox around (taking some nice chunks out of the chassis powder coating of course) et voila!

Re-fitting is the reverse of removal.

More clutch clearance issues

Does it ever end! Decided to fit the clutch slave cylinder now that someone explained which way round it goes (oops!) and I was met with the following:

I can just about squash my little finger in the gap. Obviously this is bad. I've seen solutions on the forum of chamfering the corner off the chassis but that sounds extremely drastic to me. Local makers-of-metal things Mackays in Cambridge may have a job to do for me, namely a bracket that raises the slave cylinder by 10mm or so. The slave also needs to move out 5mm as its jammed up against the oil filter. It's a good job I'm not fitting the oil cooler immediately as the sandwich plate on the oil filter won't fit with the slave cylinder there. What a mess!

Starter Wiring

The task of wiring the engine is commenced - first job: massive battery  cable to starter. I had no idea where the starter was when I originally fitted my battery cable. I knew it was somewhere near the engine mount but before getting the engine had no real idea exactly where. One thing to note, my cable isn't the Dax one. I did buy one from Dax but it seemed quite short so I made my own cable in a generous length.

Needless to say this cable is massively too long but its a larger diameter than the Dax cable so will handle the current better. Can't remember what mm^2 it is but its pretty big, at least 50mm^2. Taking inspiration from solid brake lines from days of old I coiled the wire round in an anti-strain loop and got it on the starter.

I had the battery cable P-clips doubled up on the same holes I drilled for the brake lines but I stupidly put the cable below the brake line so I couldn't fold it out the way when I realised the engine was very close. With the massive lump of iron in the way it took absolutely ages to remove two screws and refit with the battery p-clips the other way round (towards drivers legs) to give enough clearance. I predict many jobs over the next few weeks will be hampered by the enormous lump of metal now in the middle of the car.

Brake Servo Heatshield

Its a brake servo heatshield. Not much else to say other than its 1mm thick ali sheet with some rubber u-channel on the edge to tidy it up. It's folded in two places and goes all the way under and around the brake servo. We realised immediately on fitting it that the bracket could have been hidden on the other side, but by that point it was almost midnight and we couldn't care less.

New Wheels

New wheels at last! Brakes now fully assembled, apart from anti-rattle springs which don't fit, and incorrect banjo bolts supplied by Dax for the rear. Almost knackered the thread in one of my rear calipers before I realised (they had provided M10 fine instead of M10 coarse)

Clutch arm clearance

In all the excitement we didn't really notice the clutch arm is a bit close to the chassis. It looks like it has already had the edge ground off in anticipation of this problem:

As the clutch master/slave cylinders aren't plumbed in I can't actuate the clutch to see if the arc of travel of the end of the arm fouls the chassis. Its impossible to move by hand, of course.

Engine in

Well that was interesting. The engine is in.

Just a couple of people round to help. Shaun and I did the last few engine bay jobs the night before: brake servo heat shield etc. Then in the morning we fitted the gearbox (numerous times) and had to shave a small bit off the opening in the bellhousing for the clutch release arm. We also noticed that the slave cylinder bracket that came with the engine is a bit wonky and not really in line with the release arm (below), so that's a job for another day.

Well anyway. The engine and gearbox combined is probably around 300kg, which is way too much for Max's crane at full reach so we had the following solution:

More friends were employed with another crane the same as Max's and an enormous metal bar between the two. I learned from the forum that other people who have fitted Chevy engines with Getrag gearboxes have had to grind off the rear mount to clear the chassis. We fitted a landrover engine mount on a nice handy flat piece of the structure, reasonably central. The offending mount is on the other side but we found to our pleasant surprise it didn't have to be bodged.

All in all it was fairly easy. The straps at the rear of the engine were on ratchets so the angle of the engine could be controlled. We rolled the car forwards and after a bit of superhuman strength on the gearbox to get the whole thing in the right place (before we realised we had about 5 trolley jacks doing nothing) it all went fairly well. Currently the engine is mounted but the gearbox is resting on a plate across the chassis. We have got the height of the gearbox correct (so the carb sits flat) but its final alignment will be determined by what makes the prop shaft the straightest.

Engine Pics 2

Couple more, and a bit of silver hammerite on the gearbox went down a treat too.

Engine Pics

Here's a few pictures of the engine:

The plugged hole next to the thermostat should be for temp sender but it looks like it might get a bit close to the top hose. I'll see if I can find a right angle hose tail for the heater pipe outlet and swap it with the temp sender.

1/2" NPT threaded boss in the sump, I'll put the oil temp sender in here. The sump is baffled for track days and offers slightly better ground clearance. Its also baffled for normal days. Might possibly be able to get a tee piece to add the pressure sender or low pressure switch to this fitting too. There is a sandwich plate that goes on the oil filter to provide a take-off point for the oil cooler. This has a fitting in it for a sender too, but I'm not sure what it is yet.

Taped-off port is where the vacuum line to the servo goes. Everything else remains blanked off.

Engine arrived

Guess what turned up today:

The skateboard worked a treat, even if it was an inch higher than the pallets so we had to recruit the next door neighbours to manhandle the engine onto it.

Ready for Engine

Did a little bit of work to prepare for the engine coming, made a bracket for the brake fluid reservoir and plumbed in the hoses on the low pressure side. The clutch is on a separate system with its own reservoir and looking at it now I think it may be in the way of the engine so I've left some slack on the hose and will finish it later. Also (although not in this picture) added the wiring to the pressure switch that does the brake lights.

Turbo Progress

Or should that be naturally aspirated progress?

Thanks to the superhuman building ability of Max, loads of stuff was done this weekend. Before that though, I fitted the side vents a couple of weeks ago but I don't think I've put a picture up until now so here's the driver's side one, taken before I fitted the side repeaters:

Right then. Max has lent us his engine crane which should just about do the job so thats stowed safely away in the garage awaiting its moment to shine. Most of saturday was spent getting the doors on. The procedure appears to be 1) cut nice big holes in the door to allow adjustment of the hinges, 2) put door on and wedge bits of cardboard until you get a nice even gap 3) nip up all nuts and then do final adjustment with a big hammer.

This process was mainly as follows: "up a bit, back a bit, down a bit, RIGHT NOBODY BREATHE!".

We were hoping to get the door locks on but it occurred to us that the door trim needs to be on as there is a cutout for the lock in it, so we had to abandon door lock fitment and just settled at some nice looking doors (i.e. much better than in the picture above). It amazed me how good the final fit looks at a glance. Obviously Max and I know where it could be better, because we did it, but the casual observer would think it was pretty good. Then you go and look at any production car and you can DRIVE A CHUFFIN' BUS through most door gaps on any car, even supposedly well-built German cars.

Next was a bit of electrical work which was tedious but ultimately absolutely critical and very rewarding when it worked without making fire. The fog light was a separate switch but its now on the big rotary headlight switch and we are now using the full functions of the left column switch. With the Lucas rotary switch I had no headlight flash unless you clicked through position 1 and 2 (sidelights + dip beam), which is less than satisfactory. Now though, we have saved the need for a separate fog switch on the dash. The rotary switch is now wired pos 1 = sidelights, pos 2 = headlights (which then goes to the left column stick for dip/full/flash) pos 3 = fog light (connected with a diode to pos 2 so the headlights don't go out when the fog light comes on).

This satisfies the IVA requirement that the fog light only comes on when the headlights are on, and goes out when the headlights are turned off, seeing that you have to click the rotary switch through the headlight on position to get to the fog lights. The fog dash light can then be positioned next to the fog position on the rotary switch. We can cover up the holes for the fog switch and original fog light position with a bit of tape and Max informs me this will be invisible as he found loads of extra holes in the old dash on his Gemini that didn't show through.

This was all good work but didn't really lend itself to photos as its just a bunch of wires. One of the outcomes of all this electrical work is that the loom behind the column will eventually be far tidier once I put it together and all the wires going to the dash will be contained on three 11-way connectors instead of a multitude of 6 and 8 way connectors. We did check the fog light actually works, and the reverse light while we were at it.

Next it was our old favourite, the fuel tank. I hadn't actually checked it for leaks since having it re-welded to the right size so we took it off and had a close look at the welds. I did this with the welder who modified it and he filled in a couple of pinholes but I had never tested the tank with fluid. We poured in a few hundred ml of white spirit and sloshed it round a bit and couldn't see anything so that's about as good as we can do. I'll rinse the tank out with petrol later.

This was a good opportunity to paint the tank straps which is my job for the evenings next week. I had an extra bit of triangulation welded on to make them a bit meatier but in the process they had to grind off the plating to weld it, so I'll slap some Hammerite on.

With an hour left to kill we got one last job done, fitting the fuel filler. Fairly straight forward, we used the gasket as a template and got busy with the Dremel as I have no hole saws.

As the tank is on the floor because the mounting straps are dangling from the ceiling while the paint dries, the filler isn't actually connected, but its one less part in a bag cluttering up the garage. Obviously the gasket was later fitted and not just forgotten about.

Even More Dash 3

Here we go, 4 dial dash layout. Holes for switches cut too. We realised that we didn't have enough switches so that's something else to buy. Should eventually be:

off/on for washer

off/on/on for heater fan (off/slow/fast) 

off/on for heater matrix valve

off/on/on for wipers (special Lucas switch)

off/on fog lights (right hand side of column

The four holes around the speedo are for the various lights (full beam, low oil etc). 

Even More Dash 2

Cardboard dash became wooden dash, which now has a lump hacked out of it for the steering column. And some aluminium (ready to be covered in vinyl) to close off the gap at the edge.

Next job then, using some pictures on the cobra forum as a guide, and photo's we took at the Goodwood Revial, work out the dial positions (for a 427sc). I'll have to be creative with switch positions as the authentic position for some of the toggle switches are either side of the speedo but these will fall foul of IVA rules so I'll have to squeeze them all in behind the steering wheel. Also the original dash wouldn't have had stuff like a fog light tell-tale lamp, nor a low brake fluid light. Or a low oil level light.

Update - 10/11/12

I neglected to include the column shroud in the planning of gauge positions. Also I forgot to include the indicator stalk and its enormous plastic housing for the hazard switch, so there's no room for the water temp gauge in its roughly authentic position. Plan B is to fit everything and see where the gauges will fit while still being visible. The new layout looks like being 4 gauges above the speedo and one over to the right of the steering column.

This time we fitted the indicator stalk and partially fitted the column shroud. The tacho is slightly obscured below 1000rpm and above 7000rpm so that shouldn't be a problem. We are keeping the plastic Sierra column shroud and covering it in vinyl. But not after some butchering with a dremel.

Even More Dash

Right then, its starting to get interesting now. I left two tabs on the body to hang the dash off, just got to fashion something out of ali to close the gap at the end (lower photo). Then its out with the hole saw and eventually on with the vinyl. I have a cunning plan for the 20mm radius required on the lower edge involving some aluminium tube with a slot cut in it.

A bit of woodwork

A trip to B&Q and Screwfix for some industrial castor wheels, 18mm ply and some 4x2 (apologies for mixing imperial and metric units) and we now have a skateboard with a loading limit of 1000kg, ready to take the engine when it comes in a crate at some point in the next 2 weeks. 

More dash related jiggery pokery. Its a good job I bought a sheet of plywood large enough to make 2 dashboards as the first attempt wasn't very good. Even though we spent a good while carefully trimming the curve on the cardboard it was still nowhere near when the shape was transferred to the plywood. Mk2 is a lot better and I'll put a photo up when we have cut the holes for switches/dials.

The picture below is the offending connectors mentioned earlier, I couldn't get them to snap together so I binned them and got some high current Ford loom connectors, Ill update with a pic later. They are a bit excessive, in fact they are bloody enormous but they feel very secure when connected together so that's all that matters.