Week 51 - The Build

 A mixture of snagging and interior work this week! 

During the test drive my homemade glove box hinge pin fell out and dissapeared under the cockpit sole. I'm sure it will reappear one day. It was just a length of steel rod. The correct resolution would be to get a Ford Fiesta glove box hinge pin. They sell them om eBay - £16 !! Seems a bit excessive. A review from a previous purchaser also thought it was a lot for a Rawlplug! 

Like this ...

and here it is installed ...

Next job is to make and fit a panel to cover the brake servo vacuum pipe going through the inner driver side footwell. This was made from cardboard reinforced plastic covered in van liner.

Here it is fitted ...

Doesnt look too bad and the photo shows a hint of whats next! The covering of the cockpit sides.I used van liner for this. Much nicer than the supplied carpet. Also did the doors. 

Here it is finished.. Nice speaker grills fitted as well! I have trim to cover the tops of the doors and the aluminium strip under the door but will fit these pretty much as the last thing to prevent damage.

Making a start on the snagging. First job is thet the engine room bilge pump seems to not work. Afer exhaustive investigation of the switches and wiring I discovered that actually it does work - it just very quiet!

Next is the problem of the non working fuel gauge. I checked the wiring at the tank and tried but failed to remove the sender from the tank. Thought I'd take a look at the instrument cluster and it almost imediately started working again. I wiggled a few wires and couldn't get it to not work again so put everything back together.

I also tested the water drive clutch after putting on the new boot. It works lovely.

I'm not entirely sure about the brakes as I now see the front stbd. brake is binding. If it ever stops raining I'll go for another test drive.

Week 50 - The Build

 So, last time I'd been for a quick test drive and identified a number of issues to be addressed. 

First off was a binding rear stbd. brake. I don't really kmow how that happens on disk brakes but that probably just shows what I know! Anyway, I retracted the caliper pistons and it now seems OK.

Next thing was the front wheels ever so slightly founled the brake calipers. Maybe having the front brakes on front hubs from something else isn't supposed to fit. Solved this by fitting 5mm wheel spacers all round. They were 'universal fit' which means they dont fit anything properly. I made some annular spacers to fit correctly.

at least they centre on the hub now!

Next issue was that when driving the abs pump was doing its nut and the brakes werent that great. Had a go at bleeding the abs unit so we'll see how that went on the next test drive. Think I'm going to need to pressurise the system from the reservoir rather than applying a vacuum pump to each corner.

I also noticed the gaiter around the water pump drive shaft had a hole in it  resulting in the engine room being covered in grease!

Here it is off the shaft with my finger through the hole. And here is the shaft with the tripod removed

 

Next week its finishing off the interior!