Week 31 - The Build

 A quiet couple of weeks as I've been consumed by other things! But the good news is that I think I now have all the key parts required to complete the project. There is still a massive amount of work to be done but slowly and unsteadily I'm making progress. 

The main parts which I've been waiting for so long are the layshaft and dog clutch that connects the power take off to the water pump.

The clutch is made up of a drive shaft with a cv joint. The cup of the joint slides up and down on a splined shaft to engage or retract from the tripod. This is controlled by a lever on the end of a cable. This rather clumsy diagram endevours to show how the water jet is driven and controlled.

 

 This photo shows the shaft with the clutch disengaged....

 

..... and this one shows it engaged!!

Next week its to pick up on the issues arising from the test drive. Cooling system leak, wayward rear tracking and binding brakes.

Week 30 - The Build

 Well. here you are. You wait a fortnight for a week then two come along at once!

Anyway, having got the radiator fan sorted out it's now time to get some water in the system to see what happens. A standard Fiesta should take 5.5l of coolant so I'd expect to be needing a fair bit more to fill the under hull tubes and the extended runs to the heater.I managed to get nearly 7l in before the header tank was full which didn't seem very much but time to run the engine. I've still got this strangeness of non starting unless initiated by the spraying of some flammable liquid into the air intake.

Just on tickover the engine warmed up very quickly and in fact nearly boiled before I turned it off. Either thed (new) water pump doesnt work, the thermostat is stuck shut or there is a massive air lock somewhere. The heater didn't get hot so hopefully an air lock. Lots of sqeezing and squishing of rubber hoses running it again with no improvment then going home while it all cooled down seemed to do the trick. The next day all seemed fine. The heater got hot and the radiator hoses got hot as well. If anything it didnt get hot enough which makes me now think that the thermostat is stuck open. Better than stuck shut but a problem for another day.

Next job is to put some wheels on and see if it starts and stops. 

The answer is here;

Really exciting time but every jar of ointment has it's fly. A number of flies in this case! The brakes are binding to a point where they are almost solid, the rear tracking is about 10 degrees out on one side, the handbrake cables foul the wheels and there is another water leak from the heater end of things. 

Week 29 - The Build

 The avid follower of this blog will now realise that some of my weeks are sometimes longer than seven days! This is mainly because I don't seem to make interesting progress all the time. This week's mantra has been 'Don't just do something - stand there!'

First job was to wire up the radiator fan as previously outlined. This all went well apart from it not working as expected. The main bit works ok in that the wire from the ignition switch to the relocated relay turns the fan on. The break in this wire that will accomodate the 'Off' switch turns it off. So far so good. The bit that didnt work is the 'Off' switch override. The plan was to take the the trigger from the original relay socket to close another relay that bypass the 'Off' switch.

Upon investigation it seem the terminal on the original relay socket which I supposed to be the trigger is always at 12v when the ignition is on. The terminal which I supposed was to earth is at 4.5v when the igition is on. Not enough for the relay to switch but perhaps when the engine runs hot this terminal drops to 0v and the relay switched and the fan comes on. 

Anyway I've replaced the original relay and used that output (that would have sent power directly to the fan) to trigger another relay that bypasses the 'Off' switch. 

Those of you that read the bit about my improving the cooling system with 27 jubilee clips will appreciate my using three relays instaed of one to turn the fan on. Fortunately I was able to saw off a couple of relays and holders from another Fiesta.It'll be fine - probably!

 Here is the relay by the fan

The relay by the fusebox that feeds off the original power cables

and the wires that will connect to the switch

All these wires and bits will all be tidied up after I've had the engine running up to temperature.

Next job is to fix the fan to the radiator. Again not so simples. The fan in the Fiesta goes behing the radiator. In Amfey it will go in front. This means that all the little brackets on the fan housing and radiator are useless. Some bracketry is required but here it is all fitted.