To Date: Start for the year: 1645Hrs - Total Build/Modification/Design Time: 1650Hrs
January...
First blatt of the year and boy, was it cold! Still we ended up with 6 Westys and two tintops - so pretty good. It was a run out to Pulborough, looping around Small Dole and back to the Cowfold Greasy Spoon - which was closed! What were they thinking! We went and found another (not so) greasy spoon for a very pleasant RBFYB(tm). The car went very well and coped with the very cold and slippy roads with ease... But we were very glade to get back home!
Looking at a new exhaust can, carbon (of course) in 150mm x 650mm giving me a 10'ish litre volume, which is about 3L bigger than the stainless jobbie on at the moment. The plan is for a carbon can, new turbo link pipe and mounts as I've decided the new can will be supported front and back, keeping the current rear mound system and adding an 'under slung' mount at the front. This means I need to make a new rear hanger bracket and complete front mount system that attaches to the lower chassis rail and hook underneath the silencer can... The only real issue I can see is that it'll be a bit of a challenge to design and make a system that still has a rubber mount to the can and is not hard mounted - and even if this is an issue. Time to hit the CAD software I think.
And so I did:
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So it looks like 750mm end cap face to end cap face by 152mm i/s giving a volume of around 13.5Ltrs which is about double the volume of the current can. This means... (a) it should be a tad quieter and (b) the engine may need a bit of a tweak. Found a company that will make up the can for just under £300 delivered and it'll get ordered on Monday! Had a chat with Powerspeed (Maidstone) and the lad is OK to make up the new link pipe - Plan is, make up all the mounting hardware and get the can in place, drive up with the 'old' can, fit the new can and Dave will do his stuff in an hour or so - Sounds good to me. The rear mount is pretty much the same as now but the front mount is all new... It'll use two bobbins at 80 degrees to each other and either an ali welded up mount or a carbon jobbie - depends on workload/time.
Total Build/Modification/Design Time: 1650Hrs
February...
Did a Pure Tech Racing event - ten identical car simulators that are fully articulated, now that just has to be a bit of a giggle. Had around 30 minutes in the 'car' and ended up exhausted! All jolly good fun and will be having another go soon.
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Almost forgot... The car insurance was due last month and it usually is a 'bit of a comedy of errors' getting it done. The car was with Sureterm (note the 'was') and had been for three years or so... Every year they'd send me the renewal documents and every year I'd fill them in and send them off, three or four times before they gave up and stopped loosing them. Seriously, I'd have to send them back several time before they had a complete set - funny, funny stuff . So, this year I was ready, I had several pre-stamped envelopes ready for the trial to come. I also thought "I know, I'll phone them and have a quick chat about them not loosing stuff this year", and so I did:
"hello, my car is insured with you and here is the reference number"
"Right, have you the renewal notice there?"
As I didn't at the time I stupidly said "No"
"Right" the helpful chaps said, "just a moment".... several minutes past, then several more.... "Ah, there has been an error I'm afraid "said the likely lad "the policy cost should have been £420 not the £180 on the renewal"
"What!" said I "are you sure as that does not sound right"
"Oh yes" said he "bit of luck that, you've got away with paying less for all those years"... Errrm, no actually - was the car insured was my thought.
At this point I, not unreasonably, asked to talk to someone a bit older (as it were) but they were all "Busy at the moment" - I just bet they were :-)
I politely ended the conversation and phoned around for a somewhat better price, which took me all of ten minutes. The company I ended up with is a dream to deal with, all the documents done electronically and the policy in my hand two days later. The 'deal' is also cheaper than the 'incorrect' Sureterm cost with better benefits and cover - result.
So, having sorted out the panic I re-phoned Sureterm and asked to speak to a grown up, I explained what had happened earlier and asked for the fellows thoughts:
"Yes, we did make a mistake, the original policy cost was the correct one, not the £400 odd one, we tried to phone up and explain but then, well just gave up as it was too much effort" Obviously this is not verbatim, but pretty accurate - trust me.
I'm just really, really glad I never had to make a claim with these jokers, the phrase "what a bunch of incompetent spanners" is gloriously inadequate when commenting on their performance... They even threatened legal action if I put this up, so.... should be fun.
Oh, and the Sureterm lot last year 'forgot' to tell the underwriters my car should be insured. I only found out by checking on the DVLA/Insurers database thingy. Now I know six month is not a long time in the grand scheme of things, but it flippin is if you think the cars insured when it's not! Did I mention that they are a bunch of spanners? I did? Well, just making sure :-)
The moral of the story is: For heaven sake, don't use Sureterm for you're your insurance needs (unless you like dealing with spanners obviously)...
Note: There was a lot more to this, but the above gives a solid general feel to how bad Sureterm is at dealing with its customers, or so it seems - beware. After complaining, they 'suddenly found' they could reduce my premium to £130... Way too little way too late by that time as I could no longer thrust them, would have turned them down if they'd offered the insurance for free in fact!
Ordered and received (after a little bit of a mix-up) my new Carbon Fibre end can from P E Engineering and very nice it is too. Also bit of a "how the hell did that happen" with the mounting bands but it was quickly sorted out with the minimum of fuss and two replacements arrived in very good order (these are the ones in the pictures - been replaced with the correct ones). So altogether a bit of a result. Have to redesign the front mounting bracket a tad, but nothing major - going to make it out of 3mm Ali (all braced up).
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After leaving the lights on when parked in a greasy spoon for an hour and flattening the battery to the point where bump starting it was the only option, I had an idea. As the car is now fitted with 150% H4 bulbs and these draw upwards of 6.3 amps each (the battery is a 12 AHr jobbie)... Why not fit some of those LED DRL you see on BMW and Audis? They'd do the same job in daylight as the headlamps, well probably a better one, with a fraction of the current draw. This would give me even more time to eat brekkie before running up and down a car park trying to bump the car back to life :-)
Found some on eBay and took delivery, they have a 60mA total draw. Wired up some relays so they switch on/off in a legal way and tested them on the car:
DLR...
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...Wiring
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So, not bright enough I think is the general consensus. These are 4 LED plastic units that are (W)80mm x (H)10mm x (D)30mm which sound OK, I think the problem with them is they have no reflector/lens. So I found some 70mm diameter by (D)53mm ali units with a slightly higher draw, but have a built in reflector. So, once I have them in my sticky mits we'll see if they do the required job.
Dug my 'trackday nose' out of the shed and cut the ali chin off. I'm going to re profile the chin in foam, make a mold, pull a glass item off and splice it into the original. The plan is to re shape the inlet to a smooth ovoid, repair the obvious damage, add some indicators/sticky number plate and spray the thing black - should be interesting...
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Still playing with the water injection system. For the end of last season I had reduced the activation point and the spray nozzle jet but am finding it switches on at motorway cruise speeds, which then bogs the engine down when you want to overtake. So, it's been turned back up 'a bit' and we'll see if it better - think this is the only way of doing it so it works well, all my heath kit boost test bed stuff is all very well, but the gauge is not that precise (down to 0.05 bar anyway)... 'Empirical' is the way to go!
Got all the stuff to do an oil/filter change and replace the brake fluid... Now they're going to be messy jobs! Next month will be OK :-)
MoT was due at the end of the month - And it................................................. Passed!
Total Build/Modification/Design Time: 1662Hrs
March...
Well, what a busy month this has been... And jolly expensive to boot!
Received the DLRs from Germany and pretty impressive they are too, simple to wire up or so it seems, just got to design and make some brackets to mount them just under the headlights...
CAD!
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And then fit them - as I say wiring is easy, they come with their own black box of magic electrons that just has a +12V/Neg to the battery and a lead to piggy backed onto one of the side light bulbs.
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Next job was fitting the new carbon end can, so while the old system was off the car I thought I'd take the turbo off and replace all the nasty pressed steel gaskets with some lovely cooper jobbies. Just undoing the four bolts that hold the turbo to the manifold and heard a heavy metallic clunk, As I hadn't dropped anything a nasty feeling of dread and foreboding came over me... Yep, something had snapped off the turbo! Around a third of the flange face that mates to the manifold had broken off which really was not a good thing to see. After about an hour on the phone trying to make sense of the repair options I was in the car, winging my way to Lancing Marine, who provided a very good service, bloody expensive and in hind sight probably not the way to go, but good. I hope never to have to use their services again mind you as I'd have to take up mugging little old ladies to meet their bills! However, the turbo was back with me in just over a week and back on the car a few days after that. But, while the turbo was away (at an exclusive spa given the cost) I'd had a look at the manifold and noticed the flange face was not 'flat', which may have been a factor in the turbo breaking (that and who the old exhaust system was mounted, but more on that in a little while), so off to B&G it went to be milled flat. Once that was back, the whole lot went back on the car.
The funny thing was that I'd been 'chasing' an activation setting for the water injection lately and had noticed that on the last couple of blatts the car felt 'out of sorts', so it'll be interesting to see what's what now!
Can you tell what it is yet...
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And back...
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So, time for a bit of fun... The engine oil and filter have been changed, all the pipework I can lay my hands on has been cleaned, blown through and cleaned again - in this case the engine really needs to be started, even though the exhaust system has been removed and only the 90 degree output pipe on the turbo remains. Out with the plugs and turn the engine over several times (as per the instructions given by Lancing Marine) to ensure oil has made its way down to the turbo wheel bearing. Plugs back in, blip the throttle a couple of times and turn the key and.... Vroooom! (but much, much louder than that!)
Left the engine ticking over (again as per the provided instruction) and nearly blinded m'self! In all the depression and excitement I'd completely forgotten about the DLR lights! Boy are they very, very bright? Well, yes they are... and very cleaver to boot. With the key out and even though they are directly connected to the battery, they remain off, put the key in and turn the ignition on and they still remain off. However, when you turn the engine over and it starts a couple of seconds later they switch on - MAGIC! Even better, when you switch the main lights on (be it side, dip or full) they instantly switch off, but when you turn the lights off a couple of seconds later the DLRs come back on! Then, when you turn the engine off after about five seconds the DLRs also switch off - what clever little things they are!
Anyway, back to the engine, by now it had warmed up so there was a medical need to blip the throttle 'a little bit' - what an amazing sound it was! After the fun, I did a check and found the engine/turbo to be oil/gas tight with only a little bit of smoke from the gently cooking exhaust head wrap cooking off - pretty darn good!
Back where we'd started from! On to mounting the new carbon end can and a re-think on brackets... At the back of my mind I always thought that hanging the rather heavy SS exhaust can from a single rear point and the 90 degree turbo output pipe 'may not have been the best of moves', OK with the original Leo Vinchy carbon job but maybe not with the bigger stainless can. A re-think was needed and a heavy session with my CAD software was in my immediate future I could tell.
I used the oversized SS mounting bands to make up a new set for the front (and eventually for the rear) mount...
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The first plan was to re-use the single point mount at the back and a new two point mount at the front, so CAD drawings to hand I cut all the ali to make both brackets and ran them over to B&G, who did their normal fantastic work (they really are very good you know!) and then rivnutted the chassis to fit the front bracket... the results where not as desired as the rear end 'levered' itself in and down to rest on the side of the car which was not in the plan!
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A good start but more thought needed. The solution was to make a rear bracket along the line of the front bracket... back to the computer, drawing printed and Ali cut with a run over to B&G who TIG'd up the new bracket while I waited - what a great company to do business with!
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Front and rear rivnuts now in place and Ali bobbins made on the lathe and the whole lot Sikaflex'd to within an inch of its life - pretty much done I'd say...
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Oh yes indeed!
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So the car is all set for a trip to Powerspeed to have the link pipe made up (while I wait no less) and then we'll see (1) how much quieter the car is, (2) is the water injection a 'tad' more stable now the turbo is in one piece and (3) is the car 'happier' now all the exhaust gas spins its turbo wheel! All for next month as we've now go to get the boat ready for the upcoming season - work, work, work :-)
Total Build/Modification/Design Time: 1691Hrs
April...
Trip to Powerspeed went well, borrowed a trailer (Many thanks to MH) and set off to arrive at Maidstone around 0730, pretty drive through the countryside on a sunny morning and got there with no fuss. They opened up at 0745, measured and cut and welded and sent us on our way at 0930! What a great company to do business with - Another 'many thanks' to Dave P at Powerspeed! As you can see, the car was a tight fit on ground clearance and I had to space out the cycle winds to get them clear of the trailer wheels - but... It was the quietest, nicest trailer I've ever towed, kept forgetting it was there!
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Decided to change the brake fluid, it's been in there for 7 years and must be getting tired. Did some research and came up with Motul (use their engine oil and am impressed) RBF-600, found the jar with my custom, superduper highly technical... length of rubber tube with one end blocked off and a slit cut in it and off we go. So, from memory you bleed the longest brake pipe run first, then the next longest and so on - all well and good. Car jacked up, rear wheels off and... no fluid squirting out of either rear caliper! Move on to the fronts and lots of fluid, what is going on? Next day I find m'self swearing at my stupidity (that'll teach me to tackle 'complicated stuff when I'm a bit tuckered out)... I had the damn hand brake on when I was bleeding the rears - idiot! So off we go again and this time... lots of fluid squirting out of the rears, do the fronts again for good measure, make sure I've cycled all the old fluid out and I have nice new RBF-600 coming out and we're done.
A test drive! This one tests the new DLRs, the brakes and the new carbon end can and all work 'very well indeed' The car's brake pedal seems a tad stiffer (probably just me knowing I've done something to them), the DLRs work just fine and the car is much quieter than it ever has been, to the extent I can now hear all the little squeaks and rattles (that I know are going to drive me nuts until I find them) that the old system covered up!
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After looking at the state of the old exhaust can I decided to put on some front 'mud flaps'... Got some rigid plastic jobbies used on Rally cars and cut it to shape/size and then thought... Hmmm, do we really want to drill holes in the nice carbon cycle wings? The obvious answer was "no we flippin don't", so out with the Velcro! Works a treat too, cleaned the inside of the wings with Acetone, roughed up the plastic flaps with some 60 grit paper and super glued the Velcro to them, wheel off and stuck on - perfect and no holes...
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An early morning blatt and a later morning blatt to a very nice little cafe for a bacon sarnie and I'm very happy with the 'upgrade' to date.
The only 'oddity' is the water injection... now the turbo is working as it should, the 'on' boost for the WI is now waaaay too high, so it's gone from always on at Motorway cruise speeds (which was a bit of a pain) to not switching on until the turbo is at maximum boost - and I've not changed anything on the WI... really weird stuff. But, as my old electric tyre inflator thingy had died, the new one is much more controlable so setting up the 'on' pressure was pretty simple compared to past efforts involving the big air compressor and several yards of rubber piping!
Oh, and the boat got launched with no fuss and we spent the Easter weekend in the hellish sunshine with warm winds wafting us along - it was terrible, it really was... did I tell you there was cold beer as well? :-) Actually, the effort put in to get both the car and the boat ready for the coming season was a tad wearing, so we're very happy they are both done!
Total Build/Modification/Design Time: 1701Hrs
May...
A group of went up to the Stoneleigh Kit-Car Show (Nr Coventry’ish, sort of), two and a bit hour blatt on Motorways and all went very smoothly indeed, temps were ‘normal’, the only noise was wind rush and the occasional high pitch growl from the engine and the WI was spot on. I even got around to making a footrest for the clutch side... Shaped resin block glued to the tunnel sidewall.
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The show was as remember it from, what, five, six years ago... This is odd and just goes to show not a lot changes in the Kit-Car world. The Westfield stand had the same cars on with the only ‘innovation’ being some sort of Euro friendly jobbie and the FW bodywork, which has been around for a while now anyway. Given that they as a company scrapped the 11 and the XTR range you’d think they’d be doing ‘things’ to the chassis to bring it up to ‘modern’ standards (which other 7 type car companies are indeed doing), but inboard pushrod suspension, re-jigged suspension pickup points, proper ARBs with allowances for heavy/light engines would be nice as would redone front uprights/steering geometry... but then, if the current car sells why change it?
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The car got its fair share on interest on the WSCC stand (which was a masterpiece of organisation and effort) and we got to chat to Chaps we hadn’t seen in ages, so a pretty good day. The ride home was uneventful but seemed much longer!
Did another Pure Tech racing event in the middle of the month – did a tad better this time and everyone seemed to have a good time. We even took the car this time which was fun.
Decided, after a mere seven years, to move the breather/catch tank from the front chassis cross-member where it was ‘snug’ up against the turbo cold pipe and clutch cover (it made getting the air pipework out a right pain I can tell you) and moved it to the offside top chassis rail. While I was doing this I thought, “Well it’s been a fair few years since I’ve emptied the thing out... I wonder how much ‘stuff’ is in there?” The answer was around half a tea spoon of condensation mixed with oil vapour – so, not a lot! This lead me to think that just maybe a two litre catch tank may be ‘slightly’ too big and that a smaller one would be the way to go... So a quick look on the web and I was please I was sitting down! I really don’t remember ali catch tanks being THAT expensive... £90 for a one litre jobbie, you’re having a laugh. So a more detailed look on ‘a certain auction site’ and the item was found at a much better price of £30, and this was for a 750mL carbon fibre (YES! More carbon) round tank with mounting kit and level tube – perfect. When it arrived I was even more impressed, what a nice piece of engineering it is. Ordered some new Silicone pipe for the breather and just got to work out how and where to mount it.
My on-going search for brighter, less power hungry headlamps (while trying to avoid HiD items) lead me to having a look at LED headlight/dip bulbs. They are sold as road legal, ‘E’ marked and are 55/65W equivalent with a tiny current draw, sound ideal don’t they? So on the May club meeting I installed them and off we went, the drive up was daylight but the drive back, blimey I haven’t been that scared in a long while. These things are lethally dangerous and there is no way on Earth they are 55/65W ‘equivalent, more like 5/6W, they were so bad the DRLs were brighter. We crawled along the country road until we found a pub car park and swapped them back for the normal H4s (which, being a distrustful fella, I’d thoughtfully brought along). So, these nasty LED H4s will be consigned to the bin being utterly useless. They look very bright when view from the front, but they just don’t cast any light – odd stuff.
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Guess which one is which...
All in all the May club meeting was a tale of ‘disaster’... On the drive up I’d just pulled out to overtake a slower car on a dual carriageway when we hear a very load (and expensive sounding) POP! At that instant at least 150hp just ‘went away’, the car was running OK but we had no power at all. Pulled in to a garage and popped the bonnet off and found.... nothing, all looked fine with no oil spray, bits of piston or burn wire hanging out of the engine. A bit of a mystery until I started poking around and found the pipework from the turbo outlet had popped of, five minutes later we were fixed and on our way again – I couldn’t have tightened up the clip when the turbo went back on the car – note to self: Check all the others when you get the car home!
Another Kit-Car show and this one a tad nearer being ‘only’ in Kent; First meeting point only one out of five cars showed up (and as we’d driven 40 miles out of our way we weren’t too impressed), got stuck behind three motorbikes that ‘were not the best ridden we’d ever seen’. When driving either the tintop or the Westy I tend to look out for bikes and move to the side and let them past as a common courtesy. I kind of feel that if they want to drive along 10 to 20 MPH under the speed limit, they should do the same, but oh no, these chaps spread all over the road and crawled along in a very inconsistent way, knew we were there and refused to just let us pass. Finally we found a space and overtook two of the pillocks, so we only had one last one in front who decided that he ‘show us’ and zoom off... Imagine his surprise when he (inappropriately and without looking, on a bend just as the road narrows) braked hard and found both of us right there with him, didn’t arf make him jump... A real ‘aware’ biker we had there then.
Got to the next meeting point (where we’ll be going next year) and picked up seven more of the Chaps, pulled onto a roundabout and the car just stopped! It was dead, the starter clicked over but that was all. Pushed the car to a crosshatched area and had a look, nothing obvious so tried the starter again with the same result... Time to call the RAC and 30 minutes later the van turned up, hooked up his battery pack so we could move the car to a better place and off we went. Checked the battery and found that while it only had 11V charge it was ‘good’ in that it was taking and holding a charge from the vans supply. This left either the regulator was fried or the stator/generator was dead, neither of which were fixable at the roadside. So the car got transported home – damn!
Time to find out what was wrong... Checked all the wiring and found nothing untoward, check the regulator and found the centre AC input connector was very charred and even though the unit itself checked out OK on the required resistance - time for a new one I feel. Next checked the three AC leads from the stator – The book says they should show a small resistance between each lead (check) but show open circuit between any lead and ground, whereas mine ones were all the same small resistance to ground – Problem found, maybe*, they were putting out around 28VAC unloaded on tickover which from memory is correct. The book says 445W at 5000rpm which equates to 50-70VAC'ish to end up with a solid charging voltage. New stator going in anyway and I think I'll replace all the charging circuit wiring from the stator, regulator, earth and starter block.
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So, I’ve ordered a new regulator, all the gaskets including some clutch cover ones and a new stator. The Honda item was just shy of £300 where a good quality pattern one was £80... Hmm, what to do, what to do? While the engine is out I’ll take the time to check the clutch, the turbo and give the engine bay a really good clean (it is very mucky in there, with stones and dust that you just can’t get at with the engine in the way). I’ll also do a tidy up of pipework and loom while I have the chance, I’ve also ordered some high current thin wall cable for the rewiring and for, finally, the 12V aux socket – so a bit of a pain, but not the end of the world.
So, after around four hours spread over three evenings the engine is now completely disconnected from the car and ready to be lifted out this weekend. The’ sort of’ annoying thing is, the actual job to replace the stator will only take 15 minutes! The plan is:
In my exploration of the wiring I've found the main 30A fuse had blown+, the issue I now have is; "When did it go pop"? I noticed a slight hesitation when accelerating past the three idiot bikers as I put on the main headlights (to give them a hint as they really didn't seem 'aware') and it wasn't long after that the car died, call it 15-20 minutes, so maybe that was part of the problem. Looking at the circuit diagram the batter goes straight to the fuse, so the car would be running on the stator output and the battery would discharge running the water pump, intercom and DRLs... But it did restart when it first died, suppose the battery recovered enough, but then stopped again as the charge dropped - so the fuse should have been good at that point. Round and around at the moment. Still, all new bits in the car so what ever it was should be no more...
Engine came out fine, a one man job - This time the hoist went in from the drivers side with that front wheel off and the car jacked up, as very short lifting strop and out it came with no issues, pretty easy tilting it to clear the turbo gear doing it this way. Engine lowered on to the metal saw horses, generator cover off, gasket face cleaned up and stator/cable clamp dismantled. Cover given a jolly good clean, new gasket and stator and all bolted back up inside 15 minutes with a new multi-block connector on the end. Clutch dismantled and checked... All the frictions are a little bit worn but inside the service limit and the plains look as good as new. Took out the extra long clutch pullrod and cut two shallow grooves in the shaft that goes into the main gear reduction thingy, the thinking is that as it has a flat machined into it, the two grooves will help with oil distribution (it was really so I could just use the lathe truth be told). All bolted back up in 45 minutes or so.
New wiring for the AC voltage to the regulator and 'really' checked the DC wiring, which checked out OK, new connector block for the earth, positive supply and the three AC lines for the regulator socket - I've also re-routed the AC wiring away from any other stuff and made it easier to check/replace (just in case). 12V Aux. socket installed finally, only been four years since I'd bought the thing!
Engine bay degreased, washed, dried and generally pampered - it was sooooo dirty! New carbon catch tank bracket made, installed and I fitted the bore increaser thingy I'd made on the engine cam cover breather. This was to make 15mm I/S diameter silicone pipe fit properly as the new catch tank has 15mm fittings (and very nice it is too, weighs under half of the original 2L jobbie). Engine got a bit of a clean and then 15 minutes later Val and I had the naughty little devil back in the car - just got to 're-connect' everything now, ho hum.
* Now this IS interesting... After installing the new stator I thought I'd just check the resistance between each of the yellow AC out cables and ground (the engine in this case) and with my super expensive digital multimeter, they too showed pretty much a closed circuit - now I was worried. The I thought 'wait a moment, didn't I read somewhere that digital multimeters can give 'odd' results when measuring coils to ground (can't find where, but I'm sure I did), so I got the trusty old AVO out and lo and behold, open circuit between each yellow AC cable and ground. This means that the original stator 'may not' have been U/S, hmmmmmm. Oh well, with everything new installed to do with charging the problem should be fixed - bit sledge hammer Vs. Walnut I know but I got other jobs done at the time so not too much pain incurred (he tells himself repeatedly while shaking his head sadly).
+ Pretty sure the nice RAC man's battery pack did this++
Total Build/Modification/Design Time: 1753Hrs
June...
Well, that didn't go to plan! Got everyting re-connected and ready to go and thought "I'll just prime the oil system". Took the plug leads off, key in and Whirrrrr, Whirrrr, Whirrrr. The starter was turning but wasn't actually connected to anything, so the engine had to come back out again... Popped the generator cover off and found that the starter gear shaft had not located (at all), two minutes later the engine was back together and 15 after that it was back in the car, damn it! Not my best hour, not at all but on the plus side... the engine bay got cleaned twice :-) Another plus was I found that I have been operating at 7/8s throttle for years! One of the Honda clips that holds the carbs to the airbox had moved slightly when I'd tightened it and was fouling the throttle shoe on number three cylinder!
So, a delay of a day due to my error but when I had everything re-connected (again) the engine started up first time and purred along like good'un. The only odd thing was that the WI pump was on all the time, not good. Switched it off, checked all the wiring and connectors, switched it on and............... It still was on all the time, oh well. Checked the voltages on the connectors/battery and found all to be as it should be, the battery was taking a charge of 13V+ on tickover, 14V+ at 5000rpm and was showing around 13V as a static charge - pretty damn good*. Took the car for a test drive and heard that nasty 'Pop' noise again, got back home and sure enough the charge air pipework had popped off - I really need to tighten up the damn clips, I really do.
* The battery conditioner thingy takes a couple on minutes on 'full charge' before switching to maintenance rather than the two odd hours of before - result.
Took the car for another test drive and, wow! Don't know whats gone on but flamin hells bells. The shift lights are pretty usless in that you can't actually change gear quick enough when the first one flick on. The time between the first green light and the final red light is now so quick it's ridiculous and the thing is set for maximum spread. The car went very well indeed with no other niggles apart from ticking over a little bit too fast, which was an easy fix - so, apart from the WI and the DLRs it looks like 'Job done' - finally.
Phoned Aquamist about the WI pump and they asked if I could bring it in - oh yes indeedy I can! 30 minutes later I was knocking on there door... They have stopped making the pump I have now (but still have all the bits to fix 'em) and now use a bought in item - that weighs four times as much as my one! The head chap went and found the test rig for the pump, connected it up and off it went again squirting water everywhere :-) After five minutes or so he found that there was a tiny bit of corrosion on the centre pin that was causing an open circuit and running the pump - fixed! He then gave the thing a health check and found it to be in perfect working order with a good high pressure. Once done I got a tour of the factory, which was fantastic - a small'ish operation in deepest Sussex that makes (apart from the new pump) all it's own product and does all it's own R&D that goes to make up some very flash toys. Got the pump home and found it was still 'on' all the time, found the same corrosion on the harness socket - 30 seconds with some W&D and a cable tie and the pump was working normally.
The DLRs now where the only niggle left to fix. They where fine with the engine running above tickover but at low rpm they switched themselves off and on every 10 seconds or so - not good, checked all the (very simple) wiring and found nothing obviously wrong, so probably the sealed control box is (++) fried... Note to self,; disconnect the DLR power if I'm going to jump start the car. Ordered replacments, the new DLRs arrived in very fast time from Germany and where installed (and work correctly). These ones are slightly different than the first ones which had smoked lens, these ones have a clear lens and are much, much brighter - another (expensive) result.
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New ones...
...Old ones
Blatt out to the Goodwood Brekkie Club as a long test for the car - it went perfectly! Another test out to the greasy spoon in the evening later in the week and again, perfect! All in all, man I'm glad that's all over - got very fed up with the naughy car, but now it's back and work (better than before in fact), it's very difficult not to grin... Another plus was I took the time to redo several little niggles regarding the fuels pipes, breather pipes and coolant pipes as well as some of the aux wiring, just to neaten things up a bit and make working on the car a tad easier.
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So, all systems are go... Except that on the way home from the Greasy Spoon I think that under (massive) acceleration the front of the car lifted (quite a way), the wind got under the car and ripped the belly pan floor off! So I have a new project, make a new mould for the belly pan (which is the easy bit), make a new carbon pan (again, pretty easy now I have the vacuum pump) and work out how to install it without having to take the engine out again (the 'tricky' bit)... :-) Finally, fitted a 12 Volt aux socked (finally), it's just under the electronic panel on the passenger side (nice, neat and protected) and also got a digital clock (finally)... Just a cheapy job that goes on the passenger side on the brow dash (guess when I did it).
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Looked at getting carbon rear wings from MOG Motorsport, £600'ish all done in 2x2 pre-preg twill for a pair, which isn't tooooo bad'ish. The down side is I need new carbon arch protectors and Westfield don't make them any more, Carbon Mods so, but they scratch the mould and have to re-face it. As I need both items to do the job, I'm going to wait until Carbon Mods can produce the protectors before ordering the actual arches from MOG, just in case...
I noticed that the last time the engine was re-installed the gear shift was a little bit 'sticky'... Not bad, but you noticed that it was not as free as it once was, and like most things you get used to how it is. When the engine was going back in I lost the bolt, nut and washers I'd been using so had to find some more... which used (I'm pretty sure) smaller washers. The gear change with this new nut & bolt was much smoother and was how I remembered the gear change was, so I had a look and decided to make up some bobbins that fitted the various gear changer components somewhat better than a bolt and two washers. I made up an ali piece that replaced the 8mm O/S dia fuel line I used to make the Honda gear change lever match the changer cable rose joint and another ali bit that went the other side of the rose joint (it also gives a straighter run for the cable as well). The upshot is a much slicker gear change that is pretty much effortless - result!
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Still fiddling with the W/I... Found now that the engine can bog down unless you keep the weight on, so blasting in a lower gear then easing off but still with a bit of weight as you change up seems to inject too much water (fine if you keep going though - but that gets silly very quickly now I would think), so readjusted the activation point to 6.75psi and see if that is a happy medium. Part of the new issue is that the engine spins up the turbo much quicker now, so the W/I is coming on much earlier than it used to - good and bad... but mostly good as the car is flippin manic now! Think I'll end up with the activation point around 7 - 7.5psi in the end though...
Think the W/I is now pretty well sorted out. What was happening was that under load/high boost the W/I came on but as the switch on pressure was set 'too low' it didn't switch off when you came off the throttle to changed gear, so squirting more screen wash than fuel in the carbs when you came back on the throttle. Now the W/I switches off and gives the turbo just enough time to spool up before it comes back on, so you get pretty much the same mixture on the throttle at high boost as off - result, finally!
Total Build/Modification/Design Time: 1779Hrs
July & August...
July was pretty much a right-off as the weather was 'nasty' so little to do on the car - August was another story! First week of the month we were due to visit a friend who owns not one, but two 50f t Gaff rigged Pilot Cutters, which is pretty good. That they were in St Malo and needed to get around to Paimpol for a music festival (more on this later) made it better. That we were taking the Westy made it great! First job of the day was to make up another luggage rack - the first one was sold along with my first Westy - so out came my trusty MIG and several lengths of steel tube. Speed was the name of the game here as taking the Westy instead of the tintop was a bit 'last minute'. Rough and ready it may be, but it does a great job of holding all our 'normal' luggage and or sailing gear. Also made a quick bracket to hold a hand held extinguisher... wasn't sure on the rules so though 'bung it on anyway'...
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The Brittany Ferries were great, they loaded us so we were on the main deck and we had a 'spotter' for all the lumps, bumps and ramps - great chaps! Next morning we blatted from Caen to St Malo on smooth, empty and fast French roads. Arrived at the boats in time for brekkie and spent the day prepping the boats in hot sunshine with the Westy sitting on the quay site posing like mad :-) Left the next morning for a days sail in a 'brisk' SW wind and arrived in Paimpol by 1800hrs for a 'crew' reception and lots of incredibly cheap bottles of wine. All this was idyllic and you just know it's all going to go horribly wrong... and it did, we had arrived during a music festival. I use the word 'music' in its loosest possible meaning, 'mindless folk music cacophony' would be a much better description. At one point, all four of us on one of the boats independently arrived at the conclusion that most of the artists were in fact reciting a shopping list in Swahili while chewing a squash ball. The result of the weekend (apart from the boats and wine) was we went to see a band called the Chieftains and arrived for the last song of the gig - as I say, result!
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During our 'French Trip' I noticed a hissing from under the bonnet when 'blatting' and thought, "hmmm... dump valve leaking?" so I put a turn extra on the spring and the hissing stopped. But the valve now wasn't 'dumping' when off load... When we got back I took it apart and found that the methanol in the screen wash I use is attacking the ali of the valve body and making it all manky (a technical term for not in the best of condition). So after a bit of a clean up and fettle taking the time to replace the 'O' rings it all went back together and works as it should - a cheap fix. Next up was my temperature sensor/controller for the water injection:
A simple device that will open a relay contact (that is normally closed) at a preset temperature... Ideal. So I set about making a pitot tube and mini plenium for the sensor so it would read ambient outside temperature.
The design...
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Reality...
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So we ended up with a baffled chamber (I love my lathe) connected one end via a 4mm vacuum pipe to a pitot tube, while the other end (via the temp sensor) to the controller. This was a simple bit of wiring to get a power take-off controlled by the ignition and run the relay wires in series with the level switch in the W/I liquid tank... And it all works perfectly.
Next time around the car should have a new set of tyres on and be ready for a solid winter strip down and check.
ou get pretty much the same mixture on the throttle at high boost as off - result, finally!
Total Build/Modification/Design Time: 1821Hrs
September & October...
September, Some great blatt so I could calibrate the W/I temperature switchy thing and a run to Worthing Discount Tyres to get tyres put on the front wheels. Looked at the cost of new Yoko48s and was glad I was sitting down, so had a look around for anyone who sold 'used' tyres'. A quick phone call and two days later I was the proud owner of a couple of all but new tyres that cost under £100 delivered - result. A couple of days later I was pushing the car out of the garage and thought "wow, either I'm getting weaker or the car is getting heavier, had a quick check and found a damn great big screw in the nearside rear. Pumped it up and ran it to my local tyre shop to get it fixed... This was the ever puncture in either of my Westys.
October found me removing the engine (yes, again)... This time it was mainly to replace the ripped off belly pan (hate popping the bonnet off and seeing the ground), but other jobs soon presented themselves...
While I was at it (and as the gearbox 'felt odd' I pulled the clutch and the gearbox... Gearbox was sent off the AB Performance for a look over and a bit of a refresh and I started phoning around to see if I could get the clutch pressure plate 'hard anodised' to try and stop the lock-up clutch pawls digging trenches in the face of the plate. My reasoning is; If the plate gets replaced every two years that's around £210'ish... or I could get one anodised and it may last four and cost less overall. Also ordered a new set of friction plates for the clutch from David Silver Spares as the current ones have been in the car for ages and are getting down to the service limit, no slip at all, just wearing out! The plain plates look in good condition so they'll just have a quick go over with some wet&dry.
So, new belly pan... Needed to made another plug for it and, as I'm 'not that good at woodwork' decided to use some 25mm foam sheet. Cut the indenty bit to shape and sanded it down then screwed it to a base and filled in the obvious gaps with Isopon, sanded that to shape and gave the whole thing eight coats of polyester resin. Sanded this down and polished the result up. There, that sounds quick and easy doesn't it? Well it was, it just took hours and hours:
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Once the thing was nice and shiny the carbon fabric was taped and cut to shape, the vacuum bagging materials were prepared and it was time for the messy bit. Laid up four sheets of 200gsm 2x2 twill fabric, smoothed on the release sheet, wrapped it in blanket and bagged it. Using the WEST 205 resin is much nice that the stuff I was using from ABL, much easier to work with and sets off in a more reasonable time. Three hours later the item was solid and it was time to remove it from the mould... two hours later it was finally out! What a fight that was... The foam plug came out in bits and tried to leave the top layer behind, what a pain!
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I think I must have laid out the poly release sheet too tight on the carbon as I got some air bubbles on the base/tray join... A pain but not the end of the world, just needed to be filled, smoothed out and sprayed up:
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Next job was a cowling for my W/I temperature sensor probe thingy as the ali tube was very vulnerable to knocks. Same method as the belly pan except a GRP split mould was required. Shaped up some foam and coated it with resin, fair and polish as before, then gelcoat and around ten layers of 300gsm CSM. Dung the plug out (again) and cut the GRP in half (had to fill a couple of areas that had bubbled) which needed to be 'mounted' in a common mould which was also made from foam. Two layers of carbon vacuumed and popped the result off the mould. Bolted up the two halves and joined them together with epoxy putty from the inside which, when it set was super strong. Cut the flange off and faired thei tem up... From the start it was obvious that the join needed to be spray up, but the result still looks good:
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Turned up an aly outer tube to 'guide' the airflow to the sensor pickup, glued it in place and the task was complete... Just got to take the offside side pod out and bond the cowl in place.
Got all the gaskets/seals and plates from DSS and got my gearbox back from Andy at AB Performance, so once I find the time I can start putting the car back together again... Once we've got the boat out of the water and work calms down a notch or two. Other jobs are to get my 'new' tyres fitted to the rears and start a solid nut & bolt check on the car ready for next season.
Total Build/Modification/Design Time: 1843Hrs
November...
Well, bit of a 'Picture Diary' this month... Once then engine was out you can clearly see the sorry state of the belly pan, what's left of it anyway. Drilled all the rivets (there seemed to be hundreds of the damn things, what was I thinking when I install this?) and gave the ali floor a bit of a tidy up. Dropped the new pan in, jacked the car up and re-marked all the rivet holes (well, half of them anyway!), trimmed the edge a bit to match the various fitting in the floor, glooped it with Sikoflex and re-riveted it in... Looks jolly nice too. The old pan was 35mm deep while this one is a better fitting 25mm.
Old one...
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...New one!...
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...And fitted.
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Whilst doing all this it was also time to pop the gearbox back in the engine. A pretty straight forward nut and bolt job with the added stress of torquing up 20+ steel bolts into an ali engine crankcase - what a lot of fun that was, waiting for that rather nasty feeling and the thread strips itself... Which didn't happen, oh the relief! The only bit you need to take note of is ensuring the locating lugs and pin of the two gear spindles 'click' correctly into the case, well that and smearing sealant on the mating surfaces. I also had a 'new' pressure plate (thanks Andy!) hard anodised by a company in Crawley called A1 Anodising, great company to do business with, as is AB Performance come to that! You can see the different surface texture of the anodised item as well as the damage the throw-out pawls do the face of the plate (admittedly this is after several years of use).
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DAMAGE!
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So, the engine went back together again with no dramas and we're ready to drop it back into the car, but wait! The heat shield material I'd used to protect the chassis tubes for the worst excesses of the turbo were in a hell of a state, so much so that Val(tm) just would not allow them to stand and insisted that they be replaced! So, looked on Demon Tweeks site and found some shinny gold stuff and thought "just the job but a tad expensive", so looked on eBay and found the self same stuff for £30 less, yes that's £30 less on a total of £50... Some mak-up going on there then. Suffice to say I didn't order from DT. Couple of days later it arrived in a packing tube all uncreased and lovely. Removed the glass/ali old stuff using white spirits and a wooded scraper cleaned all the tubes with acetone and (carefully) stuck the new material on.
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Once this was done I found I had over ordered 'slightly' so I made up some heat blankets for the main water pipe from the block and the turbo pipes - I have a plan with these (see later in this post)...
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The original ali heat shield material was looking a bit tired.
Hmmmm, shinny...
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The engine went back in the car with little fuss but with no clutch. I had ordered a new set of frictions from David Silver Spares (DSS) and was just going to fit them when I thought 'Hmmm, they look a bit thin'. Mr Honda says that new frictions for my engine should be between 2.92 and 3.08mm with a service limit of 2.60mm. My clutch adjuster is run right up one end when the plates are new and right down the other when they get worn, which is pretty good. These new plates where only 2.86mm thick, so thinner than my worn jobbies - not good. So back they went to DSS for a refund as I didn't trust them to sort out the correct plates given the telephone conversation I had with them. Couple of days later I get a call from them for a very unpleasant chap who seemed to be telling me (A) the problem is between Honmda and myself, not DSS - wrong, (B) I gave them the wrong engine details when I ordered the plates - wrong again or (C) that I was just plain wrong - yet again, wrong!
The next day and yet another call from this odd chap and I finally get my money back - a very worrying and unpleasant experience this, so well done to the return chap at DSS as I think I'll be using alternate suppliers in future. On that front I called Andy at AB Performance who ordered me up a set of plates - which turned out were also wrong! Yet another call and a lot of research on Andy's part (many thanks again) and he sorted out the problem for me, so just waiting for the damn things to arrive!
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Spent quite a lot of time trying to reroute and simplify all the vacuum pipe runs and breather/water tubes...
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Looking at the damage the throw-out pawls do the pressure plate and the amount of weight that goes on the pedal when the thing spins up (and the relative lack of wear/bluing on the clutch plates) I though, why not replace the steel bolts with ali ones? So, I got five M6x15 bolts, Nyloc and washers from Pro-bolt and weighed the different sets... The steel bolts came in at 8g each set while the ali bolts were 3g. This means we have a 60%'ish reduction in the throw-out, just have to keep an eye on if the thing slips any, but with any luck this reduction and the hard anodising will reduce the amount of wear while keeping clutch slip to zero.
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And finally this month - Fitted the carbon cowling for the water injection sensor! made up a sort ali tube that the sensor pitot seats in and bonded the cowl to the side pod, just got to drill a drain hole in the under side and the job is done!
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Total Build/Modification/Design Time: 1895Hrs
December...
'Finally' got the clutch plates from AB Performance (not that impressed with the time scale TBH or the 'confusion' as to when they were actually posted off) and they will in fact do the job, I think it would have been better if I had nine main frictions rather than eight and the 'big pad' No1 plate jobbie - Ah, hind sight, I remember it well. No matter, it all fitted and the car now, finally, has a clutch that fits! Funny really, the last job was the clutch as all the other jobs were done BUT it took all flamin Saturday to get the car back together and working as it should. Admittedly I made a new panel for the Volt Meter and the inlet temp sensor read-out but even so...
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First minor panic was a coolant leak which was traced to the main block fitting clip, what a job that was! You could either see the fitting or get the socket there or there abouts, but not both..... Aaaaaaaagh! Did it in the end though and no more coolant leak. Next up was an odd one... Test blatt No.1 and as I pull away the throttle feels 'odd', so a quick 'Yes all the gears work, the brakes work, the electrics work' run and home we go. Fiddled around and couldn't see anything obvious so off with the Airbox/Carbs (yet again) and... Still nothing obvious, it was as though the cable had suddenly streched by 20mm, so I re-adjusted the throttle to give a tiny amount of slack when closed and WOT when fully depressed (which it did, really, really odd stuff).
So... Test blatt No.2 went very well, (apart from forgetting to do up the air inlet clip to the airbox, blip the throttle, BIG POP and 100BHP disappears!), just glad I brought along a socket set! Once the pipework was 'as it should be' the car again reminded me of just how insane it is... Big grin and a car that is 'all better now'!
The new mini dash panel thingy was due to removing the Terratrip intercom (Santa is bring me a pressie) and me thinking "hmmmmmmmmm! Voltmeter might be nice, inlet temp sensor would also be nice". So out with the carbon and epoxy, new flat panel made bit of rewiring and Bob is (as has already been established) my uncle... Very nice.
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Finally, the end of the clutch saga! For future reference: Honda do not stock or supply RR-N or RR-P (893cc) clutch friction plates any more, they will supply RR-S (919) plates which are very thin compared to the original plates. After a lot of mucking around I have found that 929 RR-Y plates will fit are are the same thickness as RR-P plates, so a good final result but I could really have done without the four week wait to get it sorted! The part numbers/quantities are: 7x 22201-MAS-E00 & 2X 22201-MAL-600 (these two plates are the first and the last installed). To get this sorted and confirmed I used a company called Lings Honda, just enter a part number and they tell you how much and if they have it - brilliant!
The downside is, I now have to order one more of the MAL-600 plates, take the clutch apart (yet again) remove the 919cc front plate that AB Performance supplied (not too sure why they supplied it, but so it goes) and put the proper bits back in... Turned out to be a jolly expensive clutch in the end, ho hum.
My original plan for the inlet charge temp sensor was to do it the same as the Criag Davis water pump sensor, that is to 'dangle' it in the air stream by feeding it in one of the Samco joiners... But then I thought 'wait a moment! I can see the wires fatiguing rather fast and snapping with the 20x4mm sensor head then being ingested by the engine' which would not be a fun thing to happen! Sooooo, next plan was to make a boss and get it TiG'd to the airbox, but then the light bulb switched on and a plan was born... Get an ali dump valve T-piece and weld the boss to that, which it much better and meant I could use the CAD software again:
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And reality (so far)...
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Got some more Yoko 48s for the rears, so popped back over to Worthing Discount Tyres who did their usual excellent job swapping them over. This now means we have (all but) new tyres on the car for the cost of £180'ish fitted, balanced etc which doesn't seem too bad a cost. It did mean that I got in another blatt with the car which is always fun, even dodged all the rain. Just got to put the diffuser back on and the car is ready for the next season! Well, apart from all the upgrades that are planned.
Ordered an ali 50mm dump valve Tee thingy and some silicone pipe, cut the 12mm hole in the ali Tee and just need someone to TiG it up for me...Had a bit of a redesign in the sensor boss, made it so it installs from the bottom not the top which makes for an easier fit.
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And reality (again, so far)...
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Was reading up about Vortex Generators for m'boat, under extreme conditions when pushing you can stall the rudder... Admittedly all that happens is you hear a loud 'WHOOOP' noise, get a huge rooster tail off the back of the boat and have to dump the main to regain control, but it does make you jump when it happens. So I had a look and found the designer of the boats solution, which is to install a gate on the leading edge to stop air from entering the water flow across the rudder blade - all well and good. But I had read about devices that act (in effect) as Gurney flaps attached to the transoms of boats to keep flow attached/reduce drag and about VGs on Lorrys between the cab and the trailer to again keep flow attached... Hmmmm, what about using them on my diffuser, would that do anything? Well, you'd have to see what was going on 'now' and then add them and check again, but not beyond the bounds of bodging something up! CAD to the fore:
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These are Wheeler VGs... Which seem to be the simplest to make
Finally gave in and replaced the coolant expansion tank, the running repair I'd make was leaking yet again, so it was time to bite the bullet and get a new one (£70!). The part is from a MK2 Fiesta or XR2, and Ford still actually stock the damn things! Turn up for the books... I had been looking lustfully at ali jobs but the Bailey one was upwards of £160 which seems a lot of money, I did find a very helpful (and slightly cheaper) company called Pro Alloy Motorsports Ltd who seemed really helpful, but great to be put on hold with... They have done away with the usual nasty 'Elevator' music and put in its place clips from Black Adder - excellent! The placcy bit wes ordered from my local Ford dealership and arrived the next day, which I was impressed with (given my recent experience!) and was exactly the correct part. Even swapping the tanks over went without any spillage...
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Made the 'mistake' of putting up this sites URL on my car club's site in a post... The ensuing traffic (apparently) gobbled up my bandwidth allowance for the day and crashed the site... Many, many thanks Plusnet just what I wanted! (they seem to change the T&C in an almost random way, just to hack off their customers). Looks like yet another redesign for next year... Odd stuff, as it's never happened in the last, oh, eight years, but just when I resign with a slightly lower price plan- BANG! I better stop now, I'm drifting, however I won't be recommending Plusnet as a good supplier in the future that's for damn sure.
Got a pair of Interfone F4 intercoms from Santa, they are Bluetooth systems that will connect to a mobile phone, GPS, MP3 player and each other - pretty damn clever!
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And so, another year draws to a close, it has been an 'odd' year admittedly (and expensive) but fun in general...
...Have a happy Christmas and a great 2012!
Total Build/Modification/Design Time to end of 2011: 1929Hrs
