BUILD ~ OCTOBER 2003

01 to 03/10/2003

Start of a new month, so an update of the jobs until engine start. 

	Fit offside exhaust (nearside done).
	Fuel.
	Coolant top hose (pipe now here).
	Fill cooling system.
	Fit rocker covers (still away being re-painted).
	Minimal electrics and instruments.

As I have today off work, I am now off to the garage.

First job was the hole for the side repeater and then fit it to the offside side panel.  It is definitely easier the second time.  We also fitted the now painted exhaust bracket.  After lunch it was on to the exhaust.  This went far better than I expected, seven of the eight bolts went in a treat, despite it being very slow turning some of the bolts about a sixteenth of a turn at a time.  So in all it fits through the side panel holes and clears the steering column, result!  Some people say bad things about the Dax exhausts, although I have not run the engine yet, the fit is better than I was expecting.  With both on, the car looks much more complete, feels like a real step forward.

I then spent a couple of hours on wiring, this was the beginning of the scuttle loom.  Once bored with this I started with the flexi front brake pipes.  It is easier to fit these before the variable Kenlowe thermostat and before the front suspension.  On the outside a washer was added to prevent the nut digging into the fibreglass, however, this needed filing out to fit the large diameter of the threads.  

Thursday, and another day off work, good this.  Job one is to lower the expansion tank, sadly despite being a Dax part, it just fouls the bonnet.  Much thought has gone in how to do this both easily and without the result looking like a total bodge.  Finally elected to cut the bottom off at about 8mm up from the bottom, the base was then re-positioned higher up the legs (for want of a better term) and once the mating faces were roughened was stuck with HV-350 and placed in the airing cupboard.  This glue is a much raved about product on the Dax list, this should provide a test for it!  If it fails to provide a strong bond, I will resort to rivets.

We then started to fit the top hose between engine and radiator, as you have probably guessed this is an Earls hose and blue finishers.  This is complicated by needing a spacer at the radiator as the engine outlet is 1½" and the radiator inlet is 1¼", there is also the sensor for the Kenlowe adjustable thermostat (capillary style).  At first attempt the spacer keeps sliding into the pipe.  So plan two is to stick the thermostat seal to the radiator and the spacer ring inside the large pipe.  Good time to stop for lunch.

We had a look at the position of bonnet and nose cone, it is obvious the nose cone needs to go further back but the leading bottom edge of the radiator is stopping it.  So I raised the radiator by 10mm, which also necessitated raising the bracket for the air horns.  This makes a lot of difference, but before final positioning I need to glue wing piping to the bonnet.

So moved to wiring, although the front, rear and engine looms are done, I now need to make the scuttle and dashboard looms.  These are much more complicated by fuses, relays, switches, Ford stalks and the desire to have it all easily removable (well relatively).  After a few hours, I got bored and switched back to the main hose.  As you can see from the picture it fits.  However, this was attempt three, in the end the spacer was fitted to the radiator first.

We then replaced the now shorter expansion tank and re-connected the hose.  I think you can hardly notice the surgery and the glue certainly seems strong enough.  Then looked at the small bore hose to the radiator, which is meant so any air in the system can escape to the tank.  Have decided to mount it on brackets along the top edge of the side panel to keep it from dipping, then most of the slope will be near the tank.  This should still let air escape.  So more brackets to make.

Not a bad day.  The cooling system is almost complete and ready for filling.  I just hope V8D achieve the promise of having the rocker covers back for the weekend.  We are in with a chance of first start up.

4 & 5/10/2003

Well the rocker covers still aren't ready so there will be no start up this weekend.  Therefore I have concentrated on wiring in a semi-organised manner, rather than just 'rushing' for engine start.  By the end of the weekend the scuttle loom is about 60% done and the dashboard loom is about 40% done.  A few more hours should see me have all engine and instrument circuits complete.

The other work done was fitting the vent pipe to the expansion tank with the brackets Dad has made.  The only problem here is the ridiculously short pipe exiting the top of the Dax ali' radiator, whether the pipe will stay on is anybody's guess, fingers crossed.  With this done we filled the coolant system with 6L of 50% mix (water and antifreeze / summer coolant), occasionally running the EWP as the expansion tank filled.  However, 6L was not enough, so I will have to go and buy some more antifreeze.

Also realised that on Saturday I passed the milestone of 400 hours in the garage.  

6 to 10/10/2003

A little more work on the wiring over this week.  Also filled the fuel tank with 2 gallons of super unleaded to test the calibration of the gauge.  Found that the tank has a slight leak at the outlet pipe.  I don't want to take it out before the trial engine start, so just put rags down to soak up the drips.

The re-painted rocker covers also arrived, so I will try and fit these next week.  Now off sailing for a long weekend.

13 to 17/10/2003

Tuesday night, made it to the garage for an hour this evening.  Decided where to fit the HT lead organisers on rocker covers, and drilled the required holes.  Took a bit of time, but the rockers are now ready to be fitted to the engine.  Also put the scuttle back on the car and connected some of the wiring harnesses.  Spent a while trying to figure out why horn would not work, in the end this donut had forgotten to attach the earth for the low tension side of the relay.  That done it now works from the button on the removable steering wheel.  Earlier today Dad blocked up the EGR port on the carb as this won't be required, as the picture shows this is a short length of tubing with a bolt stuck in the end.

This evening I fitted the new air filter, which was simply a case of cutting the air filter mast to length and fitting it with thread lock.  Then offered up the temporary dashboard and connected a few wires, clock immediately starts ticking, ominous!  A turn of the key and the electric water pump and fuel pump fire into life.  Fuel also starts pissing out of the regulator, this was mainly stopped by a quick tightening of the filter bowl.  After a mop up we tried again, this time a small leak from the pressure gauge, I will add some PFTE tape tomorrow.

The odometer is showing 3.4 miles already, and that's without turning a wheel.  Must be from GreenGauges testing it.  A slight disappointment is that my run on timer for the EWP does not work.  The purpose is to prevent heat soak after a fast 'rush', but can't seem to make it kick in.

Friday and a little work done, the run on timer was purely a case of not turning the key far enough (using the usual start position for this - as I have a start button instead), it ran for about 12 minutes, which also seems to have removed a few airlocks from the cooling system.  Also put PFTE on the fuel pressure gauge, wired the fuel sender and put the battery on charge ready for tomorrow.

18 & 19/10/2003

Well the big day has arrived!  Will it start? Will oil pressure be found.....?

First job was to re-install the battery and check connections, check oil level, check for further fuel leaks etc.  Then there was nothing more for it than to start it up.  With fingers crossed and fire extinguishers to hand we had attempt one, it turned but did not fire but the oil pressure light had flickered out, also gave a clonk but as I had no idea what this was it was dismissed.  For the second attempt we applied more choke, sure enough it fired into life, a bit rough but catching it on the throttle kept it alive.  Once the choke went in she ran much better, quite a bit of smoke from the left bank and more of a concern was the oil pressure reading of nearly 8 bar.  That's 116psi

I quickly rang Ray at V8D, who suspects the gauge to be inaccurate (he does not trust or recommend electrical gauges).  Ray also mentioned that if that pressure was real the oil filter would have probably blown off its threads.  I am not sure if that is comforting or not.  The final outcome of the conversation was to run the engine up to temperature without rev'ing it and see the pressure reading when warm and the smoke should also reduce.

So after lunch we started and ran the engine until it was properly warm, the smoke almost totally disappeared and the oil pressure dropped to almost 7bar (102psi).  As it was warming up we kept feeling different parts of the oil circuit, as it all felt the same temperatures we are assuming that oil is circulating correctly.  The exhausts turned a rather lovely golden colour, now have to decide whether to leave them golden or polish back to a shine.

After this run we checked the oil level only to find the end of dipstick missing.  I now know what that clonk was!  We therefore dropped the sump off and retrieved the end.  It appears to have met the crank as the dipstick must have missed its small hole in the sump's catch tray.  Then bolted the sump back on.

Sunday and another run of the engine , just for the sake of it.  The picture shows the dials with the engine almost up to temperature.

I then drained and removed the leaky fuel tank and fitted some initial carpet to the footwell panels.

Then a little bit of tidying of wires and thoughts on some refinements to dash layout, have realised that most of the warning lights will be obscured by the hazard button.  They also appear quite cramped.

The dipstick was parcelled up ready for sending back to V8D for replacement.  The fuel tank was also rinsed ready for return to Dax for replacement.

20 to 24/10/2003

Mum & Dad kindly drove to Harlow today to exchange the leaky fuel tank.  However, all I managed on the car tonight was ¼ hour sticking some wing piping onto the bonnets leading edge.

Tuesday evening and managed to fit and connect the replacement fuel tank.  Thankfully this was much easier than expected, with the pipes fitting relatively easily (ends slightly warmed in a mug of water), top result was not having to take out the fuel filler cap to enable all this.

Discussions with Think Automotive have confirmed the oil circuit is connected with the correct direction of flow.  Therefore the gauge and/or sender is believed to be the most likely fault.  After emailing their support desk, I have to send the gauge and sender to Speedy Cables who do repairs for Greengauges.  Hopefully it will just be a calibration issue.

25 & 26/10/2003

The rear edge of the bonnet is not straight.  We are therefore carefully marking and filing the edge before the wing piping is added.  I have elected to stick the piping to the bonnet (rather than the scuttle and nose cone) as this will help protect the bonnet when it is not on the car and hopefully will look slightly neater.

Fitted a double screen wash nozzle to the scuttle using Araldite.  The pipe is also glued onto the nozzle.

The headlamp shells really are bad, the picture shows how wavy the front edge is.  This is after they have been sent back to Dax for repair/replacement.  It is actually the worst bit of the car so far.  Instead of the nice chrome shells ordered, I have some poor quality (shape and finish) fibreglass ones.  I also have to sort out fixing in the headlamp as well.  Anyway, the plan is to carefully file down to the line you can just see on the masking tape.  This line was decided upon by the biggest part of the gap, then measuring back that far from the headlight all the way round.

Wired up three pin connectors for the back of headlights.  These are separate little looms so the headlights can be easily removed from the car if needed.  Also continued with the dashboard wiring, fitting switches and some of the associated wiring.

27 to 31/10/2003

Monday, the replacement dipstick has arrived, it is about 1½" shorter than the original and now has full mark and about 1" of stick beneath this.  Hopefully this one won't clash with the big end.

Tuesday, and the oil pressure gauge and sender have been returned from Speedy Cables.  The gauge was quickly re-fitted into the temporary dashboard.  Then carried on with wiring of the dashboard, including the new layout for the warning lights.  Before the end of the evening the dashboard was re-fitted to the car and we could test the switches for the first time.  Lights work, well number plate light, switches and instruments.  Very pleased the instruments are readable as Tim had some problems, I attempted a photo, if it comes out I will add it here.

Wednesday, re-fitted the oil pressure sender, fiddly because this time the side panel and steering column extension are all in the way.  With this is in we started the engine and ran it to properly warm to check for leaks and pressure readings.  At first the gauge registers about 4.75bar (69psi), when the oil is up to temperature this falls to under 4 bar (58psi) and builds to 4 bar if rev'd.  I know from the dyno datasheets that she is really stable at 46psi across the rev range (3.2 bar), so although it still over reads by about 1 bar it is a lot nearer the truth.  I will live with this difference, in a way it is nice as a quick glance at the gauge should show the needle vertical (i.e. in the middle of the scale). 

When we turned the garage lights out to see the gauges in the dark the front exhaust headers were glowing red hot.

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Last Updated 31/10/2003