22 October 2021
Progress has slowed as I am working again. Spent today bench testing the indicator and hazard wiring I designed. I buzzed out the terminals on the indicator switch to work out which ones I needed to use for the left and right circuits. Had a problem as it was an old switch it had some dirt or corrosion in it there was a high resistance short between a couple of terminals. I cleaned it up by popping it in the ultrasonic cleaner, blowing it dry then giving it a good squirt of WD40 and then a contact cleaner. Once it was dry it worked correctly. The good thing with these old switches is that they can be serviced. The indicator warning light caused me some grief, my plan to have it in series with the other lights didn't work. I could have changed the flasher unit for one that would also drive a warning light but that would mean running another wire up from the fusebox and I really wanted to have it all contained in the dash. I did a bit of searching online and figured I could make it work by adding a couple of diodes into the circuit. Other than the warning light my indicator and hazard light switches all worked as I wanted. 24 October 2021 The diodes arrived yesterday and after rebuilding the circuit on the bench it all worked as expected. The hazard indicator circuit is probably the most complicated circuit so I am pleased that is all working. I need to now figure out where I am going to add the multiway connectors on the back and how many I want to have. 25th October 2021 Did some planning on the wiring and a pair of 15 pin connectors and a 6 pin connector should be enough to accommodate everything. The 6-way connector will handle the ignition switch connections, One of the 15 way connectors will go to link to the fusebox and the other will link to the lights etc. Ordered the multi-pin connectors and a few other bits from CBS. Back in the garage I remade the diode pack slightly tidier and covered the joins with heat-shrink. Soldered and remade all the joints for the indicator circuit on the dash so the wires were the correct length. I left tails for the wires that will go to the bulkhead connector that I have ordered. I added wires to all the light units, so that they can be connected to the loom with waterproof connectors when I am ready to install it in the car. The wires have been labelled with heat-shrink tubing that I can print in my label printer and shrink on to the wires. I started making up the wires for the gauge illumination but had to call it a day before I could finish that off.
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13 October 2021
Not much activity this week, I fixed the fusebox to the rearmost cross member of the chassis. Spent the rest of the day stripping down the old loom to get as many of the wires out. It's a slow process cutting out connectors and untangling wires. Needed to keep an eye out for a couple of connectors I will need (e.g. brake fluid reservoir). Sorted the wires into piles based on the main colour groups. 14 October 2021 Finished stripping the last part of the loom and sorting out the wires into colours. Drilled out the holes for the rear lights making the fog one slightly wider so I can sit it back to match the other light styles. I have a chrome trim ring I picked up at Beaulieu and I've ordered a rubber boot which I will cut to allow it to fit round the lens. I started looking at the wires to decide how to go about making the loom and how to route the wires. Looking at the wires I have for the indicators the best option seems to be run the wires down each side of the car outside the chassis. I will either wrap the loom or mount some tubes to run the cables in. I worked on the indicator runs and roughly laid the wires in position using tie-wraps to secure them to the chassis. I had to joint it to reach to the back of the car. I twisted the wires together then crimped them with a bootlace ferrule and covered that in heat shrink. I intend to wire up the dash and have connectors to join the circuits to the body wiring. At the front and rear the lights will also have joints so I can remove the body without having to cut the loom. Spent a bit of time reviewing my wiring diagrams, making changes for things like the starter switch, and the hazard switch I am using, corrected a couple of mistakes in my diagrams and added more detail for the gauges. 4 October 2021
Took the GRP dash panel off and used some of the dash offcuts to make pieces to fill the gaps at each end. Secured them in place with self-tapping and cut out the matting. Mixed up some resin and roughly pasted the mat in place. Once it is dry and the sections are held in position I will remove the screws and tidy it up before applying more layers of mat and resin. 5 October 2021 Removed the self tapping screws from the dash and added more layers of GRP. When it was dry, I trimmed and sanded the GRP to get it roughly to shape and remove high spots. Applied a few additional bits of mat and resin. While the GRP was drying I inserted the last few riv-nuts for the gearbox tunnel and checked the fitting. I looked at the positions for the ECU, battery and fusebox. I'm mounting the battery in a cage against the passenger firewall, suspended from the bulkhead supports. The gel battery I'm using can be mounted in any orientation so I am mounting it with the terminals on it's side. I cut some lengths of flat steel bar to bolt to the underside of the bulkhead, I drilled and bolted them in place. I offered up the cage and marked and drilled holes to bolt the cage to the steel bar. I elongated two holes to give me room to insert the battery to the cage when it is in place. Still have to finalise the fitting and then paint the steel bar. I am thinking about cutting off the retaining lip on the cage and adding a retaining strap that could be bolted to the cage, just to make access easier in the future. 8 October 2021 I've painted the cage supports to match the chassis and bolted them in place with the battery cage. I added some draught excluder inside the cage to stop the battery and the cage from rattling. I'm going to mount the ECU to the left of the battery on the firewall, I decided to glue a piece of wood to the inside of the firewall that I could screw the ECU on to, rather than drilling through the firewall. Found a suitable piece and painted it with primer and grey top coat. Whilst I was waiting for the paint to dry I got back to the dash and finished sanding down the GRP I had added. It still needs a few low spots filling with some filler, but the shape is there. I drilled and mounted the riv-nuts to the new section of GRP and did a test fit with the aluminium part. I decided to fit all the hardware to the dash to make sure everything still fitted with the dash in position. I needed to trim back a bit of GRP to allow the mounting brackets for the speedometer to fit. I cut some pieces of wood to support the ends of the dash and screwed and glued them to the GRP. I need to figure out a way of securing the wood block to the chassis rail. My initial plan was to drill a hole through the chassis rail underneath and run a wood screw up and into the wood, but this will be hard to access with a screwdriver so I'm looking for another way. I've refitted the body and the dash to recheck it all still fits (which it does) and to look at options for the fusebox location. It's going to be somewhere in the centre of the car but I want to still have good access to it. I'm still planning to cover the GRP dash panel in vinyl and want to anodise the aluminium panel but I want to finish like the fusebox position and the rest of the wiring first. 28 September 2021
Made up a round former to form the bottom edge of the dash, I used some left over 50mm drainpipe, sealed and filled with sand so I could hammer against it. I used a scrap piece of aluminium to practice hammer it over which worked quite well clamping the metal in my workmate and clamping the tube behind it. I had to clamp the dash panel to the side of my workbench as it wouldn't fit in the workmate and then a collection of bits of wood to keep the pipe pressed hard against the metal. I hammered the metal over using a plastic mallet, I checked it several times against the dash. The curve formed using the pipe didn't quite match the dash so I used a thick bit of dowel as a former to hammer against until I was happy. Next I reworked the document containing the dial, switch and lamp template, I added centre marks for all the items and refined the layouts a bit. Then I cut them out and arranged them on the dash. The space above the column where I want to have the speedo and tacho doesn't have a lot space to position the dials and still be able to see them clearly so I moved the warning lights to one side. Once I was happy with the layout I taped the patterns to the dash panel and marked the centres with a punch through the pattern. I then practised cutting out the 52mm and 80mm holes for the gauges, I cut them slightly undersise then used a file and flap wheel to enlarge them carefully. 29 September 2021 Pilot drilled all the holes in the dash so I could drill them out from the back. This is because the bend on the panel stopped me drilling from the front. I drilled out the dial holes with holesaws as I practised yesterday. The switches and warning lights were done with a step drill. The holes for the u-bolts were done with a drill. This all took quite a long time checking that I had the right sizre hole for each switch, light, or dial. Then I had to trim each one carefully using a combination of files and flap wheels. Finally I cleaned up the front and rear of the holes to remove any burrs. I test fitted everything in the dash panel and I'm pretty happy with the overall look and layout. It will need cleaning up and some sort of finish applied to the aluminium. I am thinking about a darl blue paint to complement the body, the rest of the fibre glass is going to be covered in vinyl material. 30 September 2021 I've done a bit of research and I'm going to look at anodising, which can be coloured. Back in the garage I stripped everything off the dash and added holes for the speedo trip/programming button and another toggle switch and guard for a map light. I cutout the GRP panel behind the aluminium panel and trimmed it so it didn't foul the switches and gauges. I drilled out the bracket I had previously made and attached it to bulkhead bracing with a bolt and riv-nut. I will pop-rivet the bracket to the dash top. I then turned my attention to the side brackets and found I had not planned the dash layout as well as I thought. The right hand switches fouled the planned bracket and worse there wasn't enough space behind for the ignition switch. I did a bit of thinking and I decided to make a different bracket that would attach to the bottom rolled edge of the panel. This wouldn't foul the indicator and horn switches. The ignition switch was still an issue, I realised I could put the ignition switch in the hole I had made for the speedo trip and the speedo trip button which is not very deep could go where the ignition switch had been. I made those changes and then clamped the dash in place ready to do the bracketing. 1 October 2021 Made up a bracket behind the ignition switch from a strip of aluminium bar and bolted it to the bottom edge of the dash and the dash support bracket. Made another bracket to support the dash next to the steering column, bolted onto the bracket around the column. In the centre I made a bracket to support the top of the dash, pop-riveted to the dash top so to avoid a protrusion on the top rubbing on the underside of the body when it is on. I bolted it to the bulkhead crossmember. I made up another bracket for the passenger side of the dash. I then added another bracket to support the GRP dash panel near the middle. I bolted it to the dash using a row of bolts to reflect the ones holding the dash panel in place, the back was bolted to the bulkhead cross member. The result of all these brackets is a solid dash that hopefully will not shake too much when the car is driven. |
AuthorThis is my first kit car although I've messed about with cars all my life. Archives
November 2023
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