10 May 2021 Finished painting the water pump pulley. Fitted the catalytic converter section of the exhaust which has the O2 sensor in it. I found the centre silencer section and bolted that up and then tried to figure out where the exhaust back box might go. It's not a standard back box but a centre exit Powerflex unit which I picked up last year cheap. It will need the centre pipe modifying to join up, but I'm not sure how the exhaust needs to sit in relationship to the rear bodywork. Posted up a question on the Facebook book to see how others have positioned their exhausts. Good news and bad news, got notified I was going to be made redundant from work (bad news) which means I will have more time to work on the kit (good news), at least in the short term until I find another position. 11 May 2021 Popped over to see John Ham and look at his Jetex exhaust box, it fits really well with the box held up nice and high in the boot space. I think the centre exhaust box I have will cause clearance problems. Will look out for a second hand one for now but will probably have to bite the bullet and buy new. Need to also take a close look at centre pipe, it's quite rusty so might need to look out for a better secondhand one. Also looked at the rear body mounts and how the dash and body sit in relation to the chassis which helped me understand a bit more. Back in the garage, the replacement clutch master and slave cylinders arrive so I set to mounting them, made up a bracket to support the pipe on one of the starter motor bolts, waiting for the paint to dry before I can fit it. I fitted the water pump pulley wheel, I applied thread lock to the bolts. Fitted and tensioned the belt. I put some paint on the power steering pump bracket, and cleaned up the pump and associated hardware. I primed the steering column support bracket ready to be painted the same colour as the chassis. Had a look at the power steering pipe to understand how it is going to join to the rack but need to study that some more. 12 May 2021 P-clips arrived today so I finished off securing the engine harness. I refitted the clutch pipe and added a clip to secure it to the gearbox. I fitted the radiator, which was a straightforward task once I had figured out where the radiator needed to sit and how the brackets would be attached to the chassis. I spent a long time with blocks of wood to get the radiator in the right spot, checking the position of the brackets. I used steel M6 steel rivinuts in the chassis rails to secure the brackets. I practised on a scrap bit of steel first, I drilled the hole in 3 stages, 4mm drill, 8mm drill and then out to the required 9mm with stepped drill. This worked really well and the brackets all lined up nicely. I had to slightly bend and twist the offside top bracket to make it sit correctly but I'm very happy with the result. 13 May 2021 My new air filter and pipes arrived today. It's a generic kit so I wasn't sure exactly how well it was going to fit. In the end I cut the throttle body end off the Mazda intake pipe off and joined that to the new tubing and the air filter. I want the filter to be down to the right side of the radiator to get cool air, hopefully there will be enough space behind the bodywork. I was able to drill a hole in the pipe to fit the intake air temperature sensor for the ECU, the rubber pipe holds the sensor nice and firm. 14 May 2021 Spent a lot of time reworking my wiring diagrams, comparing it to the wires I have pulled out of the loom, particularly around the ignition switch. Finalised the fusebox layout, fuse values against the bulbs and relays. Then I placed an order for the fusebox, fuses, relays, warning lights, and some other things I will need like body mounts and fuel filler cap. I've also been thinking a lot about steering wheels and seats, Theres a steering wheel on Car Builder that I like which is 17” in diameter, after playing around with the MX5 seats and steering wheel testing getting in and out I decided that 17” was just too big. I think I will go for a 15” steering wheel, there are plenty of options for that and I don't need to make a decision now. I had another look at the column light controls, and unscrewed the wiper stalk that won't be needed, I cut the wires where they go into the connector on the steering column. Decision made I am reusing the MX5 light and indicator stalk. 15 May 2021 I did some trial fitting of the power steering cooling loop that runs in front of the radiator. There are mount points already on the chassis that are designed to pick up the old brackets, I had taken mine off to paint the pipes and they were not looking great. I tried several different angles and eventually settled on a position that looked like it would work. I needed some new brackets to support the pipes, for the far end I could use a p-clip, for the middle and where the pipe goes round the radiator I drew up a design for a bracket in Fusion360 and printed it off on my 3D printer. 16 May 2021 Thinking about seats, all the aftermarket ones seem very expensive apart from the BB range but they only have a few with headrest and little choice of material. Had a chat with a friend of mine who is rebuilding an E-Type and he mentioned that he's putting some MK1 MX5 seats in his e-type as the originals don't have headrests. Got me thinking that maybe this is the route to go and I could recover them in the fabric I want rather than taking what is offered. Might have secured a pair of seats for £50 which I can strip and see how they are put together and try my hand at seat upholstery! My 3D printed brackets worked great for the power steering pipes, and I was able to secure the pipes. I used a bolt through the lower radiator bracket and then epoxy glued and compressed riv-nuts into the pipe mounting points in front of the radiator for the others. The pipes needed a bit of bending so they didn't touch the anti roll bar, another job ticked off. I then had a look at the throttle cable, the old brackets bolted on to the intake manifold easily, I needed to make a square hole in the firewall to allow the bulkhead clip to fit. I drilled a 12mm hole and then filed it out to a rectangle with some needle files until the clip fitted.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorThis is my first kit car although I've messed about with cars all my life. Archives
November 2023
Categories |