More Dashboard

Now, here is where I got a bit carried away....... I trimmed the openings in the leather and then thought I would try a couple of instruments just to see what it looked like...... By the time I'd finished I ended up with this:

And if that wasn't enough.... I went a bit further:

I'm 95% happy with the end results - you will always get some flaws (creases) in a natural material such as leather and there's little you can do about it - other than make a pigs ear of it by keep faffing on. Flash photography doesn't help either, but my expert seamstress Wife reckons its a good job - so that made me happy. I'll need to get some photo's in natural light to do the thing justice.

Off on hols in a couple of days so that will give the leather a couple of weeks to settle. Then I'll fit the edge piping to the dash (I must remember to clean the grubby fingermarks off) and then start to wire it all up (and also connect the mechanical gauges). Then it will be time for one last test of the electrical system (again) before fitting the dash and under-dash covers for the last time (hopefully!)

Trimming the Dashboard

After a few more trial fits and some judicious filing it was time to trim the dash. First step was to bond the foam onto the dash panel. I used EvoStik in an aerosol - smells good and works live the proverbial on a blanket:

The next step was to cut out the foam over all the holes:

Then came the slightly stressful job of bonding and stretching the leather - I was quite pleased with the results:

I was even more pleased with the fact that you cannot see any of the heads of the fixing bolts - there's one right in front of my finger:

Next job is to get the glue off the breakfast bar before I get found out!!

Demist and Heater Vent Plumbing

We are now in that no-mans land between Christmas and New Year - time for some garage time. The next big job is to trim and fit the dashboard - in preparation for this I decided it was time to fit the heater vents and connect them up together with the demist vents.

The demist vents fit into holes cut into the under-dash panels - easy enough - the ductwork is the fiddly bit!

The box in the front left corner of the under dash panel is a 12 volt socket from a Bentley GT (another e-bay Bargain) and should be useful for the old sat-nav / phone charger - very neat as it closes flush when not in use:You will need to make up two splitters - easy done with some plastic waste pipe and some plastic solvent - The joints were then sealed with Sikaflex and painted black (don't ask me why):

The windscreen wiper bundy tube is very convenient for tying the ductwork to:

As the under-dash panels will be fitted last - after the dashboard - you will need to leave enough length of duct to enable you to connect it up to the vent before fitting the panels - when fitted it looks like you have too much duct:Last job was fix the Mallory HyFire box into place:All very neat and tidy. I need to fit the footwell bulkhead carpet before I can finally fit the ductwork to the heater outlets.

Panic Over - Wipers Fixed

Job Done - (and by the way that is not last nights curry you can hear!)

Wiper Mistake

Well no-one has spotted my first proper mistake..... so I'll tell you. The wipers park the wrong way - i.e they park to the nearside not the offside. It would have been OK had I not turned the wheelboxes round to get a better run on the bundy cable - inadvertantly reversing the action of the wipers!!

However, all is not lost as this can be easily rectified. A bit of research shows that sometimes the motor mechanism can be supplied wrong in the first place anyway!. All we need to do is move the parking switch actuating ramp on the gearwheel 180 degrees.

Here's how:

Remove the spindles, bundy tube and motor from the car (insert your own expletives!):

Turn the motor over and remove the circlip and dished washer from the bottom of the shaft (note the orientation of the dished washer):

Turn the motor back over and remove the gearbox cover plate:

Push the mechanism out of the housing:

Under the gear wheel you will see the white plastic parking ramp:

Prise it out with a screwdriver:

Re-fit it in the holes on the other side of the gearwheel:

Then re-assemble - easy!

Just need to put it all back in the car now!

Windscreen in / out shake it all about!

Well, the windscreen came out from the stanchions so the stanchions could be sealed with silicone where they enter the body and the escutcheon plates added:

Whilst the windscreen was off the centre stay and bracket were fixed before the whole lot was re-assembled for the last time:

The bracket and centre stay will drive you mad - you will need to "modify" a screw driver, a spanner and an allen key in order to reach the pretty inaccessible screws. Fit everything to the screen first before re-fitting it.

Next I ran the engine again so the Accusump could be fettled and the electronic fan controller adjusted. All done with no probs - fan comes on at 90 and goes off at 85 - tested it for a couple of cycles - the fans need 2 and half minutes to get the temp down. For once it was nice and warm in the garage!

I then decided it was time to test the wipers - in particular the intermittent wipe function that had me stumped before. As mentioned earlier Andy had pointed me in the right direction after my first abortive attempt.

Thanks Andy! - Works a treat -I even get three "free wipes" with the screen wash!!

(Ignore the position of the wiper - it needs fettling yet)

And finally - I've sent off my SVA application with a request for a test on or after 25th March (A bit early but I wanted to get it in before the end of February Deadline.

The clock is ticking now!

Oh.... see if you can spot the deliberate mistake with the wipers!!!!

Today I should have been working on the screen and the dashboard. But last night I realised that it would only take me about an hour to jury rig the temporary dash (albeit with a chunk lopped off) and get ready for a start.

It has been laid up for eleven months as I have been working on the body. So fingers crossed .......

I am now having a beer!

Windscreen, Dashboard & Steering Column

Well, the longer bolts arrived and the windscreen was finally fixed in place - including the dashboard support frame. The last thing to do with the screen is to remove it - leaving the stanchions - seal around the stanchions - fit the escutcheons and refit the screen with the centre stay and bracket.

Having finally fitted the screen stanchions, column support bar and dash support bar I thought it was time to finally fit the steering column:With everything in place for the dash, I then fitted it to allow the ally underpanels to be trial fitted:

The column support frame needs to be set slightly lower than the bottom of the dash so when it is pulled up and over the bottom lip of the dash it pulls down on the dash. The ally panels are then wedged in between the bar and the bottom lip of the dash - the result is pretty secure and not going anywhere:The centre panel simply bolts through the lugs on the two support bars. The outer ally panels were marked up and the column support bar was drilled and three M4 rivnuts were installed for each panel to secure them at the rear.

Now that I've got a bottom to the dash I could start to figure out where to put the Mallory HyFire box and where to run the associated cabling:

Hopefully tomorrow I can get the screen completed?

Wiper Motor and Demists

Onwards and upwards. I tried installing the wiper motor and mechanism as per the GD build photos - only it would not fit without fouling the underside of the scuttle and the bundy tube wouldn't line up with the wiper wheel boxes without putting a tortuous s-bend in it???? I turned the wheel boxes upside down (compared to the GD build photos - but the way I had them originally - and altered the position of the motor and then everything started to fall into place:Fitting the wiper motor was another "upside down effin' & jeffin' in the footwell" moment. The mechanism is a good old fashioned bundy tube affair which can be pretty noisy if not set up correctly. I tested the whole lot with a power probe on the motor socket - and after a bit of tweaking it was all running sweetly.

Flushed with success I moved on to fitting the demist vents and escutcheons - another top tip - paint the inside of slot (i.e. the cut face of the fibreglass) with matt black paint - after filing it to match the cut out in the escutcheon.I even spent a while polishing some M5 button head bolts so they were as shiny as very shiny thing to match the escutcheons:

In the above the photo you can see the benefit of painting the inside of demist slots matt balck.

Hopefully my new longer bolts will turn up tomorrow so I can finish fitting the screen stanchions. Not exactly sure what's next on the agenda?.... probably the dashboard?

Windscreen & Column Support Bar

Time to fit the windscreen again - all lined up, column support bar fitted and the top fixings bolted up - I then discovered I need some longer bolts for the new bottom fixings!The column support bar was then fixed to the tunnel using jack-nuts installed into the tunnel top (cutting out an appropriate disc of carpet) you will need two or three penny washers between the bar brackets and the carpet:Next up was to drill the support bar and install a couple of M6 rivnuts to support the adjustable pedal box:I made a start on tidying the loom up and stuck the remainder of the tunnel carpet down in the passenger footwell. Last job was to refit the front lights after having removed them to polish the body:Next job on the windscreen is to remove the screen from the stanchions so that the gap around the stanchion can be sealed, the escutcheon plates fitted and the screen centre stay and bracket fitted....... but this will have to wait until I've got some longer bolts to fully fix the stanchions.

Cockpit Carpet - 1

The next job is to final fit the windscreen, and this includes fitting the steering column support bar. The steering column support bar has additional fixings onto the top of the transmission tunnel. So....... in order to complete the above, the tunnel carpet needs fixing first. This is a large piece of carpet and would become unwieldy if covered in Evo-Stick in one go!

I lined the carpet up - then carefully folded up the rear section - sprayed adhesive and then glued just the top down. I then folded up the front part - sprayed the remaining length of the top and glued that down.

It was then a matter of spraying each side in turn and sticking down working away from the change in width of the tunnel in both directions:

The sections of this carpet that then stick into the footwell sides will be done later (need to figure out what to do in the footwell extension on the drivers side!).

Having 10 minutes to spare before tea... I fitted the the wiper spindles:I have not fully tightened them up as they will need rotating to suit the position of the wiper Bundy Tube: