Fitted to door locks to the passenger door inner ready for fitting this next week.
Loads of little jobs done in the past couple of weeks. So here goes, first off was to re-fit the new fuel pump and wire this in, an additional key operated switch was fitted to the boot floor and put in the live earth circuit. I also connected up the fuel tank sender and the hand brake switch, I have used the spade connectors where possible and then covered them in heat shrink this makes a really neat job and should not come undone of suffer from corrosion. Next job was to sort out the cooling system, I am using the method as described in the Articles page used on the Westie. This is a dual circuit system that uses the thermostat to open up a longer route when warmed up. This should help cold starts and keep the running temperature reasonable. A trip to Halfords saw me with four flexible hoses for connecting the water pump outlet to the bottom of the radiator via the Astra pipe and the top of the radiator to the thermostat via a piece of ally pipe. Next, via odds and ends of pipes the first port on the Astra pipe was connected to the thermostat and the second to a T piece which connected to the header tank and the heater. The other heater pipe then goes directly to the rear of the thermostat and the header tank outlet connects to the small thermostat pipe. Sound simple but took a while to figure out the best route. (See pictures/build for a diagram). Forgot to mention that the heater had been installed (well sat in place and the hole cut, thanks to a template copied in cardboard whilst at Fishers).
Next on the list was to fit the header tank to the bulk head, this was a simple job as the Volvo header tank already had it's own bracket. Next was to fit the Sierra washer bottle, this fits neatly on top of the drivers pod and a simple L bracket was made to do this. Now, before the passenger door gets underway, was to try and refit the bonnet. Fist job was to fit the bonnet latches bought at Christmas, these look really good in black, next was to see where to fit the bonnet stays. I had it in mind to put them in the traditional place between the top of the pod and the bonnet but they were miles to short. On a closer inspection The best place was between the top fixing of the bonnet frame and the webs inside the nose. A 25mm hex M8 spacer was added to the inside of the top fixing and the gas strut attached, the bonnet was then chocked up to a sensible angle and a hole drilled to attach the other end of the strut to the bonnet webs. This worked really well, has a great noise when you open the bonnet and does not get in your way when working on the engine, well recommended. Final part was to unbolt the temporary fixings on the bonnet hinges and set them in the correct place. Easier said than done, first tip is to remove the gas struts first otherwise the bonnet lurches forward, but after two night trying the bonnet is finally near where I want it to be with a nearly equal gap across the window screen end and level at the front, the gap is a bit bigger than I would like but it is bearable at the moment. One final job was to fit a new tyre to the front wheel, I found a match and at only £33 for a 185/70/13T Kormoran Impulser it didn't hurt the pocket to badly, I may even change the rear tyre if they work well. The only slight problem is that the tyres clash with the front edge of the pods on 3/4 lock, may be time for a bit of jigsawing ? |
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October 2010
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