Energised!
I think it must be still the after effects of Open House, but I’ve been really enthused recently to work on the car. Plus Susan has been particularly accommodating, possibly because the kids are now off from school.
I worked from home three days this week and each day got about 3 hours of car time in. Something I can’t normally do with the 6 hours of commuting each day when I go into the office.
So this week I tackled the footboxes. ?Driver’s side is mostly done – I’ve left the outer side and outer top off while I finish the brake lines. The inner top is riveted but I will cut an access hole and fabricate a cover panel for access to the master cylinders.
I had some difficulty getting the top of the passenger footbox to fit properly – I went to bed Friday with a 3/8″ gap. ?Woke up Saturday morning and knew that the amount I was ‘stressing’ over it, I had to redo. So I drilled out the rivets, used my hydraulic jack to lift the passenger floor and then rivet the panels back into place. ?Much better and less stress (on me).
The tranmission tunnel front also went in, a very strange A shape piece that had to be ‘persuaded’ to go in with BFH. All panels in, siliconed for waterproofing and to stop rattles, and riveted. I didn’t count, but must be a couple of hundred rivets. Thank goodness for my hydraulic rivet gun – I’d have arms like Popeye at this point without it.
Passenger side done:
Driver’s side done:
Before the engine goes in, I plan to polish up the engine bay aluminium. Many people put heat protecting panels on, but I will do that on the inside under the carpet. With the exposed engine bay panels polished and sealed with Shark Hide the amount of radiated heat should be limited.
With the boxes done, the next part was the cockpit rear. The seats are resting in place here, hiding the rear, but another 100 or sole holes drilled and riveted.
Of course, with the seats in I had to try for size. With the accelerator pedal suitably bent to no longer interfere with the pedal mounting I doesn’t seem too bad. Certainly not roomy but with a little pedal adjustment should fit my 5’11” frame and size 11 shoes.
The passenger side is slightly smaller and probably not comfortable for any long rides as there’s not enough length to stretch.
At this point I turned back to the brake lines. Thread lock on the fittings, tightened up, and then started to make them permanent with insulated clips
At this point, drilling the next fitting, the drill bit bound in the hardened steel chassis and snapped leaving me having to pull it out with some pliers and tools down until I can get a replacement.
All in all, very happy with the progress made over the last few days.
