odds n sodds

Spent today trying to tidy up the looms and tie up some loose ends.
Made a bracket to hold the fuel lines a little tighter by the compressions.
Heat wrapped the starter and loom, Just need the exhaust elbow so I can run the o2 sensor and heat shield that loom too.
Trimmed off the upper middle body mounts. These ones aren't bolted but act as support and locators. You could bolt them but then you'd see the bolt in the cockpit.

Clutch slave

As room is tight in there and having a setup that isn't common, I had to get a special mounting plate made up. GD were incredibly helpful and remembered roughly what was needed. So I took some measurements they wanted, trial fitted a plate they roughly made (to my rough measurements). I offered things up, and sent it back for finalising which meant they made some spacers and bent the plate so that the slave part leans onto the block to eliminate any flex.

Painted and fitted.
Just need another pushrod. The one GD gave me originally, was spot on. Thinking it needed to be a different length I went about cutting it 10mm shorter, only then to realise that it is at its correct length when pushed all the way in.
Made Andy chuckle.

Prop shaft bolts.

In my haste, I bolted in the wrong bolts. They were the right size but too short as the thread wasn't through the nylock part of the nut (possible IVA Fail) and I then noticed the shank wasn't deep enough on longer ones that I bought, so changed them for longer shanked ones.Then for some reason I realised I better keep them the same length for balance purposes seeing as the prop shaft is balanced too.
So I took one out that was shorter than the rest.
Glad I spotted it now before the body goes on.
Maybe a bit too picky, but I don't want to risk driving about wandering what that shudder is.

Prop shaft shoehorned in.

With the help of my pal Kev, we got the engine linked to the back wheels.
But before we did I luckily remembered to check the gearbox ratio. (good to know when calibrating the speedo)
This meant going from 1st gear through to 5th and counting the turns of the engine to one revolution of the output shaft.
The spark plugs out, and the crank pulley marked, I marked the output shaft and counted as I cranked it over carefully with a socket ratchet.

Now came the fun part, the prop shaft slides in about 5 inches into the gearbox (Prop shaft is 5" longer than the gap it fills). but getting the best angle even with the UJ's we found couldn't be achieved from the sides, top or bottom.
The only way I could see was to get the whole lot in the tunnel and over the diff, then feed it forwards into the gearbox.

The brake union had to come off and the bake pipes carefully moved. The flat side of the UJ had to step over the diff to get enough clearance.
Once we got this far the rest was easy and it slotted in prefectly with 6mm tolerance on the shaft.
Another concern was the fuel lines. Before I had the gearbox mounting plate, the bolts were really close as I was resting the box on a wedge to have the rubber mount in the right place flush with the bottom. GD told me I needed 5mm clearance round the gearbox to allow for movement when under torque. Tried to dremel some of the bolt head to give a bit more room. Luckily the gearbox droped a little when the wedge was removed as it sat on the rubber mount. Phew. Sure is tight in there!

Hoses Fitted

With the new dogleg hose, it all links up nicely.

Cooling Fans.

Fitting the fans with the mounting plates means drilling into the rad housing. Did check that there were no cooling cores behind cos it just didn't look right but all was clear. Not distrusting GD but the thought of drilling into a rad with a 5mm bit was a little worrying.

The fan plates have a thread welded in and they are a good fit. The fans have a little lip on the edges that I cut off to get them closer to each other. May cut off the outer edge ones too as they touch the side edge of the housing.
Also drilled and tapped the holes for the header thank into the top brace. There isn't much to tap into but the fixings only stop it from rattling about as the hoses hold it in place so a bit of thread lock it should hold fine.Next thing I have to work out is the wiring, as the feed in the loom is enough for one fan and two fans on a hot day could pop the fuse. So a separate feed and switched relay thingy will be needed for one fan.

More bits arrived.

A few bits that weren't ready when I collected, came in the post along with some extra bits I needed.
Twin Fans, New Header tank with side elbow, gearbox mounting plate, Prop shaft and the dogleg Link pipe for the bottom hoses.When I spoke to Andy about the extra bits I also asked how they mount the fans? He said they can make some mounting plates slightly different to Simon R but the same idea and out of stainless. :P All extra bits you don't budget for but don't have the time to source material & make.

Fitting the gearbox mount was the next thing to do so I could fit the prop shaft. This needed measuring from the holes in the chassis to drill the holes for the mount. Measure 3 time and drill once. All lined up perfectly.

And relax.

Got a few things to do away from the garage this weekend. All in all great progress this week. Next week, Fans, New header, Gearbox Mounting plate, O2 sensor nut and a few other bits to come so a drink this weekend me thinks. :P

Engine bay loom + EFI loom

Wiring isn't a weak spot, not knowing what does what and goes where....., is.
Dont get me wrong, the engine loom comes with instructions. Remembering how the EFI is plumbed was the tricky bit.
The engine bay loom is pretty simple. As the EFI loom was already used with the engine, I thought it would be straight forward to make it fit.Yesterday and today was spent figuring out how to get the two plumbed in and neat. Ended up ordering some new conduit and of course some wrong bits I'll never use.
Hard to plan till you start looming things up. Figuring out what was used where and how it was run, took time.
Then I spoke to Andy again to give him some measurements and also asked about some of the wires. One needs to be a switched live to the alternator as he said some alternators are open live when the engine is off and can drain the battery over time, and there is also the issue of fire. As one poor chap found out when he saw smoke coming from his garage even though he hadn't driven it for a few days. So getting my head round what needs to come from where to feed one of 2 terminals amongst other things.I have no idea which one is which.
The rest is all becoming clearer. Need time out to have a think and unplug, excuse the pun. ;)

Adaptors fitted

Popped out again today, got the adaptors, enabling me to fit the speedflow fittings.
Also got some expanding foam. This is advised as the roll hoops are mounted direct to the chassis, they could transmit noise to round your head. Foam should cut this noise down. Personally I can't see how I'll hear anything over a roaring V8 and wind in your hair, but it looks like fun.
Says on the tin surface must be moist, could use a spray. Hmm to get inside the roll hoops? I dug out a small hand held steam cleaner that I bought one night very drunk off QVC. Knew there was a use for it one day. hehe.
After steam came out the other hole I injected the foam. As the harness anchor points are welded in, these seem to cause a block towards the top of the hoop so I "gave it some" in the other hole too. You can imagine the potential mess.
The rear leg was just filled till it was coming out the hole. 2 tins was enough, with some left over. May save it for the trick or treaters in October. :P

Fitted the started motor, this involved opening a bag with some wires in. More like opening a can for worms. I hate worms....

Note*
Now the body is on, this is too much of a loop as the red cable wont reach the + terminal!

Fuel lines

Spoke to Andy again as I need to fit Speedflow fittings as the system will be pressurised, and I had no idea how to link from copper line to JIC. He told me to track down a hydraulics suppliers and ask for a 10mm compression fitting and then an adaptor to JIC dash number (-6 and -8) He would have given me some but hasn't got any in stock.

The fittings are 10mm L - 1/4 BSP female stud :GAV10LR.
They didnt have the adaptors to -8 so had to get them ordered in. Lots of driving about today to find bits and go back out to buy other things I forgot. Who needs a shopping list. :P
Cut the crimps off the ends, plunged the pipes so no swarf got in the fuel line, and then fitted the Compression fittings. Good fun blasting them out with the air line. Think I managed to waste 10 min's seeing how far I could shoot the rear ones. :P
Also need to convert the fuel return to a JIC connector.Out I popped again, got this but it makes it too long and fouls on the engine. Looks like it'll be a speedflow adaptor. Another Kerching bit.

Getting the horn

Also fitted the horn. This comes with a relay, but isn't needed as there is one in the GD loom relay block. Replaced nuts with nylocks.
Yes, I did put the air line up to them..... Nearly shat miself. hahahah, idiot.

Temp fitted the Rad

Fitted it temporally to see how to go about with plumbing in the cooling. I have a load of hoses, link pipes and an old header tank.

The old style radiators have a straight bottom outlet, the new ones are 90 deg up and towards the middle so a bit of re routing is needed. Also the header tank doesn't quite line up either.
I have asked Andy to make up a new style header with the outlet bend. and also a dogleg to link the bottom hoses.