Engine Bay Electrics

After finishing off the wiring in the boot, it was time to fight the bodge monster before moving on to other jobs. My original wiring for the fan relay came out a slit in the plastic tubing which was sealed up with self amalgamating tape but for the sake of £4 I got some more tee-pieces to do it properly.

All the front wiring had to come out anyway to add the washer pump wire in, which was inexplicably in the engine spur (separate to the forward loom). Also there is no earth provision in the loom for the washer pump and up above the passengers feet where the washer bottle will be, there isn't any chassis nearby to earth on to so the earth goes back into the loom and pops out the proper t-piece spur going to the fan relay. It then joins up with the fan earth to an earth point near the front near side suspension mount point. I realise that I could have wired all the earths into the loom and had one massive forward earth point but then considered single point of failure etc, and the fact that I had already drilled a load of holes and left it was it was.

The ring terminal floating on its own is from the temperature sensor, which will eventually join up with the main fan earth and the washer pump earth. Then the good old convoluted plastic tubing over the top. Another change was to put the front loom on connectors. It was straight through until the washer pump debacle and it soon became apparent that to put the nice t-piece in for the fan relay, ALL the front loom would have to come out to put it through the t-piece. Can't be bothered with that so I chopped the loom and put a connector in. Unfortunately there are 11 wires going forward and the largest connector I had was 8-way, so two 6-ways were used. Minor bodge but I can live with it. My made up excuse is redundancy.

The two wires going off on their own are power and earth for the washer pump. 

A note on protecting the wires, each crimp termination has heat shrink sleeve over it, then each bundle of wire has a pvc jacket with a further flexible convoluted tube over the top. Self amalgamating tape is copiously used at the end of each bundle was it goes into each connector.

Fuel hose routing

The glue had dried on the grommets so I set about nailing the fuel house down today, bit of an odd route due to the fuel pump being in the boot but better than the standard Dax route under the diff. I drilled and tapped the holes on the backbrace for the fuel hose to get to the front of the car, mirroring the route of the brake lines. When I had spent an hour drilling and tapping, I remembered that there is a gearbox going in there at some point, although I have no idea as to clearance to the tubes. Oh well.

edited 15/01/13 to show complete fuel run from fuel tank (side exit)

Radiator Fan

As part of the "Beer and Spanners" Jubilee weekend, Matt and Sam kindly helped with fitting the fan to the radiator. Two bits of angle were cut to match up with the threaded mounting lugs added to the rad when I had it modified. These were spaced so the radiator would then bolt straight on, allowing clearance for bolt-heads to the rad matrix of course.

Just got to un-bodge the wiring to the fan switch by using a proper tee-piece and jobs a good 'un.

Fuel Tank

Finally got the fuel tank back from being modified, I had it made a bit too long so had to have some chopped off and re-welded to fit. I hired some help in exchange for bbq and beer and it all went very well.

A nice bit of adhesive-backed closed cell neoprene went on top of the tank, then the standard Dax straps and foam hold it on. The straps did need some adjustment as there was way too much gap to be taken up by foam and it would have meant the tank could potentially shuffle around a bit so out with the hammer and it was made good. Note the plate at the back of the boot, this bolts through the rear crossmember and then through the straps. We had to take into account the position of the boot lock loop and drilled/tapped holes for it. It fits pretty snug up against the boot lip, from what we could tell from the manual/having a look at the boot lid itself. Time will tell if those holes have to be made into slots!

The position of the original bend in the strap has left a weak point so this will be triangulated with a bit of plate and blobs of weld, then painted up, so I cant fit the tank just yet but its ready for when I make some plates and find a friendly local welder, as I still haven't learned how to weld.

Now the tank fits, and I know the position of the tank outlet relative to other stuff, next job is to put the fuel filter/pump and fuel hose in. I've seen a few cars with very noisy fuel pumps and some that are barely noticeable and after asking questions discovered a lot of people mount their pumps on anti-vibration rubber bobbin type mounts, so I've ordered some and will fit the pump when they arrive.

Hello World!

The cobra now has steering connected so we could roll it outside and turn it round. This is so its facing the right way when the engine comes! The steering wheel isn't in its final position so I cut the intermediate column over-long (to the point that the it binds in the joints) to allow future adjustment. It was nice to see it on the road and the steering on almost flat scrap wheels was surprisingly light. Also, with lights in and grill mesh on, it almost looks like a proper car from the front!

Also had a little clear-out of the garage as it was getting a bit cluttered. The garage door just about opens but is a bit dodgy in the wind.