Well the past couple of weeks has got me thinking. The budget's a little tight in March so I've been thinking of some of the lesser things that I can be doing. So, March I shall take my time in fitting the brake lines front and rear, fit the fuel line and seal the body/chassis.
The tool that Gary loaned me to clear out the holes proved to be a God-send. Without it I could not have fitted the wishbones at the front nor the swing arms at the rear. Holes cleared out and parts nicely fitted - thanks Gary.
Following the wishbones I then fitted the diff and one of the rear swing arms - just so I could see some progress being made. That made me feel good.
Today I fiited on the handbrake lever and attached the cable underneath. One of those small, quick little jobs that literally took only 15 minutes.
I spent the rest of tonight looking around the car to see how other things would fit. I figured out how the pedal box fits on, where the servo and master cylinder fit. One thing that has got me a little puzzled is how to fix the brake pipes round to the rear of the car. Not so much fix them, that's easy with some small plastic clips, but more so the route to take. The pipe for the rear comes out of the side of the master cylinder that routes the pipe into the engine bay. Most people I've spoken to who have Sumo's say that it is easier to send the pipe around the side of the car than through the tunnel. That's what I'd prefer to do, but what's on my mind is which side to send it round on - nearside or offside. If I use the offside it simply means dropping the pipe downwards and then turning it around the side of the car. If I use the nearside then I have to go accross the engine bay and then round the side of the car. Only thing, with SVA in mind, and having to fix the pipe every 300mm, this doesn't look so simple. I'd welcome any suggestions.
That said and done, I made some phone calls today to find out who could supply or make the fixed brake lines I need. MPC in Swindon seemed quite reasonable. They offered to make the pipes to requirement (full kit around £40.00) or for me to bring in my own pipes and they could flare them up for me. I'll pop along and see them this weekend to see what they can do. I still need to measure up how much I need - if I have time, I'll do that on Friday or Saturday morning.
The new clutch for the bike should also turn up Friday, so that's another job that needs doing this weekend.
Well, went along to MPC today and managed to get a complete set of hard brake lines for £20.00 with an option to get some braided flexis for £10.00 a piece. Sounds good to me. I need to measure how long they need to be, but I think I'll fix the har lines first so the measurement is more accurate.
Spent the rest of the day trying to find someone local that could supply me with brake pipe clips. No joy, so they will be ordered from Eurospares in the week.
Sunday was spent fixing the clutch on the bike. Job nearly done until the circlip had to be fitted back. My circlip plies decided to fall apart and sent the circlip into oblivion. New one ordered to turn up on Wednesday. Bugga. Spent the rest of the day sulking. Not much has happened this week as I've been trying to resolve the ongoing problems with my clutch on the bike. The new circlip turned up on Wednesday and that fixed that problem, but turns out the return spring may be knackered also. I'll need to take a closer look at that too. I did manage to get some sealant around the inside of the chassis during the week. That's one of those oh-so-small jobs that needs doing - and is now done. Should give some waterproofing to the inside. I use frame sealant (silicone based) as opposed to something like mastic that would be used on baths - much better (and recommended). I hope to start fixing the brake pipes this weekend, but just need to get a strip of aluminium so that I can fix the end of the brake pipes correctly. Well, finally managed to get around to fixing the brake pipes in place. It was much easier than I first thought it would be. The only thing I need to do now is to fix the front pipes securely so that I can attach the flexible pipes. Interestingly, the Sumo build video shows there to be a bracket in place for the pipes to fit - that doesn't seem to be the case on my chassis, so I have got hold of some aluminium strip so that I can fabricate my own bracket. There are some more pictures here and here that show how the pipes are attached to the side of the chassis. The other problem I came across today was fitting the pedal box to the servo unit. As I attached the bolts to secure everything in place, the brake switch flew out. Is this the normal thing? Let me know if you've had similar troubles. I'll post a message to the newsgroup and see if anyone else has had the same trouble. Of course, I may just have fitted it wrong! Didn't do too much tonight, but it still took me a couple of hours. I made the holes in the rear swing arms to take the lower suspension fixing brackets on both sides, and then fitted the swing arms in place. The swing arms were a bit of a bitch to fit, but they went in eventually. When I can afford to get the suspension I'll fix everything together, although I reckon I can leave that until I have most things plugged together (budget is tight at the moment). I hope to put together the rear drive shafts and brakes, etc towards the end of this week which will then just leave me the suspension parts to fit. Closer inspection of how the brake switch fits into the pedal box revealed that the switch itself is actually adjustable. A simple twist/pull/twist back is enough to jusge how much should stick out of the backend of the switch. The only trouble I have is that when the switch popped out, the tabs that hold it in place broke off. I could either fix it with some super glue or get another from the breakers. I have to go to the breakers soon anyway to see if I can get my heater and some other bits, so I'll probably pick up a switch while I'm at it. The other thing that I managed to do today was to re-mill the wheel hubs so that they would take the now inverted track rod ends from the steering rack. On the Sierra these fit into the bottom of the hub, but due to lack of clearance on the Sumo they need to fit into the top. The video shows Mark Evans using a 7 degree taper drill which is great is you have one handy. To avoid this expense the manual shows that using the old track rod ends in a drill with some grinding paste you can achieve the same thing. This is a lot easier than it sounds. I cut the old track rod end apart with a grinder so that I could take the pin out. I then triangulated the end of the pin so that it would fit into the drill properly (it was too large to start with anyway). Then I covered it with some grinding paste I bought from Halfords, and drilled away. About 10 minutes later both hubs were done. After the hubs were prepped I quickly fastened one side together to see how it all fitted (picture soon). Now I just need to wait for my suspension to turn up to complete the job. I plan to get the rear suspension this month and put the back end of the car together as there is more work required there than on the front. When the front is together I should then be able to get the chassis out into the open so that I can start to clean up the engine. I watched a little bit of the build video the other day and one thing came back to mind yesterday. The differential has "sump" plug that can be remoed in order to top up the gear oil that goes inside. Mentioned on the video was to ensure this plug is loose before you install everything. I checked the plug on my diff to find that it wouldn't budge. With th diff in situ it was impossible to free the thing. This meant that everything needed to come apart so that I could take off the diff and loosen the plug.
I could see that if I had assemble the rear completely I would have spent the next few days banging my head against the wall for not doing as I had been advised. To anyone who has yet to do this, here's a warning! The last thing I tried tonight was to see how the handbrake cable fitted into the rear drums. Simple enough. I just need a small circlip to secure the brake line inside the drum. I can't recall if the Sierra cable had these or not, so as I need to go to the scrappies this weekend I may just check them out on another car. I picked up the flexible (braided) brake lines today and so the next few days I shall be able to complete the brake line assembly. I still need to make a small bracket to secure the front lines, but this doesn't seem to difficult now and I'll get to use my new rivet gun for the first time!March 3rd
March 8th
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March 30th
March 31st
