De-Tubular Bellsing. Eh?

Remember this lot? The rather zany cooling hose run?

Well, it had to go.

Unfortunately I thought I'd got round the issue of the water thermostat housing clashing with the steering arm but having given it a trial fitting it was just too close for comfort. 1mm clearance but with a full engine rev likely a rock 4-5mm in that that direction will occur so that won't do.

Looking at the problem I could either order in a different angled stat cover from the states at great expense or work out another solution.

So looking at the main parts it's obvious the main action is centred around the seating of the thermostat in the housing itself. So making a spacer ring that allows the rotation of the thermostat and keeping the seating intact.

Whilst it will allow the flow of water to circulate into the car heater circuit a bit earlier than would normally happen the volume of water involved is negligible compared to that which is in the thermostat protected side of the water circuit and it's unlikely the car will ever be used regularly in sub zero temperatures so again it's not a big issue. I can add a small mod to the thermostat if it's a problem. 

So a quick bit of work saw the above fitted, spacer ring with new holes for the thermostat.

The photo doesn't show the new gap created in full but this works!

 

Chamfer done to help with steering clearance.

Gasket made and sealed with blue hylomar front and back.

And the job is done. More of a ubend than zany artwork but now much better functionally.

Desnagging

Other than the steering column linkage - water thermostat snag which was predicted (minimal though - only a small extension flange needed to rotate the thermostat which my neighbour has kindly offered to make in his workshop, the other desnagging required is to make a small cut out in the nearside inner wing where the alternator is current touching it.

First the fibreglass was cut out with the dremel. Having the vacuum hose on next to the dremel blade took almost all the fibreglass dust straight away meaning that I could see what I was doing and not covering everything in fibreglass dust! Must remember that for all occasions now.

I drilled all four corners of the stainless to give the dremel something to meet, then with the dremel again I started gently cutting into the stainless.

Above I haven't chopped out fully yet.

Might need to go a little lower as the panel has move out slightly now the pressure has been released.

Not bad for 30 mins early on a Sunday morning, and much faster than having to strip out alternator to get to it from the inside.

Busy body

Yes, the major update! The body is on.

With the excellent September weather long gone - I was too ambitious in overestimating sorting out all the last little tasks - October came and went... And Sunday 9th of November arrived. Men were sourced, bribed with promises of beer and food once the job was done, they came in their masses, wives and children too.

Given AK recommend 4-6 people to help with the task, Mrs B counted 30 at peak attendance. Not bad!

One rolling chassis - check.

(The calm face is covering up the fear of having forgotten to do something really important. Mind you it's not like launching a boat for the first time... At least this shouldn't sink. Well, it will but not in its native surrounds)

One body prepped and ready - check.

I will so not miss brushing against the holly hedge each time I want to work on it. Vicious stuff.

Trial fitting. Working out the best angles and if / where anything was likely to snag.

Thankfully it was all clear, the careful measuring for gear shifter etc paid off.

Applyin the sealant around top of floor pans to prevent water ingress between body tub and chassis.

Given the weather was due to turn a bit later I gave Dave some sealant and asked him to mirror my side.

And back on again.

Some wiggling and pulling on the body was required to get all the bolts through but that was to be expected as the body continues to settle and set when it was stored but easy enough to do.

Team photo (of the ones that actually did the work)

And relax...

Only one small issue. I forgot to drop the oil cooler down from on top of the air intake where I'd left it to roll the car out. The gap between the corners of the radiator and top of the body meant I couldn't squeeze the hoses through.

Sorted now though, I held it up to drain some of the oil out back into sump and then removed the hoses, fed them through and reattached.

Job complete!

There's a lot less space in the garage now.

Totally uninteresting

To most however I thought I'd post this as there is much suspicion and fear about car wiring looms.

I need to tidy up some of the chaos pictured below

The easiest way is to consolidate some of the additional wiring I've added in and if room have it run in one conduit.

So stripping of the external tape covering and then peeling the conduit out from around the wire loom exposes it fully. Add in additional wires as necessary and then pack it all up in reverse.

And then you get the finished result below. Much tidier and easier to fix and manage so that nothing is in danger of moving about or touching something hot that it shouldn't. 

Just waiting for a bit of additional conduit for the red power lead to be delivered which I will fit a small amount prior to putting body on to make sure I have it located fully as access to this area afterwards will be tricky.

See, I said it wouldn't be interesting but important for IVA to make this stuff all tidy and well protected.

Finally plucked up the courage

Yes, it can only mean one thing... Cutting another largish hole in the body, this time in a rather visible and significant location.

Transmission tunnel to be precise, for the gear shifter lever thing. 

It's not made easy that you cannot exactly rely on the transmission tunnel frame on the chassis as this is designed to not touch the actual fibreglass so instead a series of reference points from the body to chassis bolt holes are used instead. Coupled to this that its a 3d structure and not a flat plain makes it much more difficult. So I set about working out how I could transpose the location fixed to the chassis tunnel frame to the top of the fibreglass body 50ft away outside.

Having considered creating some sort of 3d mesh set of dimensions I came to my senses, set up a plumb bob line and combined that with tape measure and protector and the right position was marked up. 

Adding in additional tolerances all round for fitting this should be ok.

Marking the centreline of the tunnel is a complete red herring as I have no idea if the frame on the chassis sits perfectly symmetrically beneath it or not. And I'm not about to waste time measuring for curiosity's sake either.

Next a couple of round holes for cable conduit and end of the lever pivot bolt clearance and it's ready for cutting out.

Add one masked loony with a fast spinning abrasive tool...

And we get the obligatory photoshop of one of my trainers. I might have to go back and count how many times they've got in on the act. 

More importantly one hole is cut. That's the last of the big prefit body jobs. One more small hole to open up in the engine bay and that will be ready.

Unlike the wire loom knitting that I'm still to finish sorting.

More tidying trans cooler hoses

This current task seems to be without end and taking forever. One of the things I've been wondering is how to keep the two transmission cooler lines (braided hose in above photo) away from the exhaust below it. 

Eventually I hit upon making a bracket that could reach forwards and down from a nice lug on the transmission casing which would also double as a fixing position for some cables too. The lughole (clever eh?) can be seen below amongst the spaghetti.

Enter the worlds most oddest and complicated bracket yet...

The welding isn't too bad - my kind neighbour lent me his kit again.

One makeshift spray booth against the garage door.

I know I know, I must be becoming a little unhinged to need to dedicate so much time to one bracket (it's acid etched, primed and top coated - 2 coats of each)

And installed below.

Above the cunning cable conduit is held in position...

And the finished article installed and torqued up.

Next is finishing off the spaghetti tidying.

A confession.

Ok... Have a look at the photo below and guess what's wrong with the picture.

If it's not obvious then have a look at the next one.

Or the next one

At this point you might have made out the letters D followed by R on a round shiny tube located between the engine mount and rubber bobbins.

Let me spell the rest of the word. 

"Draper 17 mm"

Yes. Somehow I have managed to leave a 17mm socket on the end of one of the engine mount bolts from when I torqued them up. What a total muff up! How did that happen? I remember at the time wondering where it had got to and ultimately thinking I'd thrown it out by accident so I bought another one.

It wouldn't poke out although it's loose meaning that nothing has been damaged as the engine isn't resting on it thank goodness.

So after feeling like a complete muppet for a couple of days I figured out a way of easily getting it out.

Loosen off the offside upper mount bolts on the bobbins but leave them on, trolley jack under the offside part of the sump and raised it up 5mm. This was enough to poke the socket out with the end of a long crowbar.

There you have the culprit above. All out, no drama. Thankful no engine lift out required.