Tuesday 22 September 2009

Exhaust - trial fitting

Tried the exhaust. It was about 25mm off at the rear end. I was able to pull it round but there is more strain on the rubber bushing than I'd like. I'll either have to make a longer spacer bracket at the rear or try to end the joining pipe from the exhaust manifold to the stock exhaust.


Monday 21 September 2009

Washer bottle - bracket

The bottom of the washer bottle was located in a hole in the chassis of the MX-5. On the Westfield it fixes to the front passenger panel. To make it more secure I fabricated a small bracket for the bottom:


and here it is on the bottle:

Brake & Clutch fluid

Bleeding the brakes is a 2 person job so as Mike was up for the day I took the opportunity.

After reading discussions on various forums I decided to use standard DOT4 brake and clutch fluid (rather than going for synthetic DOT5).

We tightened up all the brake connections and rolled the car onto a large plastic sheet to catch any drips/spills. We used an Eezibleed kit to help. Not a lot to show in pictures, if you look carefully you can see the master cylinder has fluid in it:


After making sure all the air was out we tested the brakes by rolling the car down the drive. I was really pleased with the feel of the brakes.

We also tested the clutch by putting in 5th gear, rolling with the clutch pressed then de-clutching. The engine turned over a couple of times which was nice to see.

Oxygen sensor - fitting

After cleaning off some sort of resign around the plug I tried using mole grips to unscrew the plug. Surprisingly it started to come out:


and it came on coming out. It was ridiculously long:


one removed the oxygen sensor screwed in place:

Monday 14 September 2009

How it looks now...

Front Loom

Ah, the joys of wiring!

Although the loom needs to be fitted in conjunction with the bodywork, I'm modifying it now and will make sure everything is working.

I removed all the tape covering the loom(s) then laid out onto the car. Then I gradually removed all the wires not required. For some areas like the dashboard this is a huge proportion: radio; speakers; heating controls (only the main power wire for the new heated windscreen is required); electric windows and mirrors (although my donor didn't have these, the wiring was still in place); interior lighting, etc. etc. all went:


There's much less to remove from the front. The main thing was the wiring to the pop-up headlight motors:


The wire to the power steering could go as well!


I still want to trace all the wires/relays and record them to help future modificatins/problem solving.

Fitting Harnesses

I had a problem fitting the harnesses. The thread on one of the eye bolts provided seemed to be a bit small. When I was tightening it (not that hard!) it jumped the thread in the hole. The thread is 7/16" so I tried a spare bolt from the suspension. It seemed to be fine so I got Westfield to send me a new eye bolt (see "IVA bits from Westfield" post). That seemed to fit fine:



There are a couple of possible bolt holes at the bottom. I fitted to the rear most hole. I assume the one further forward is for some other type of belt, e.g. inersia reel:

High Level Brake Light - wiring prep

In the future I might want to fit a high level break light. I'll take the feed from the rear light and run the cable up the diagonal chassis strut. Before fitting the fuel tank I riveted some cable grip points as afterwards you won't be able to get the drill in:

Fuel Pump - connecting to fuel tank

Finished connecting up the fuel pump:

Fitting Fuel Tank

Fitted the fuel tank. Westfield provide self adhesive padding that goes on the chassis and the fixing straps. One of the straps needed a bit of adjustment as it didn't go round the tank with the padding so I had to re-bend it slightly:


With the new IVA bar in place the fuel tank sits slightly back from where it would have been. This meant I had to re-bend the last part of the straps where they fit to the chassis:

You can see I've connected up the return fuel hose. I've left the vent off for now as I want to know where it goes with the bodywork/boot box in place.

Wednesday 9 September 2009

Fuel tank protection bar (new IVA regulations)

The fuel tank protection bar fits onto the upper suspension bolts. In the event of a rear shunt, it stops the suspension bolts from puncturing the fuel tank as well as preventing the fuel tank from "wrapping around" the chassis member:


IVA bits from Westfield...

I got another package from Westfield containing various bits:


The main items were 2 things due to new IVA regulations:
- a sticker for the brake cylinder
- a bar to protect the fuel tank

The other items were:
- another eye bolts for the harnesses, one of the ones provided seemed to have a slightly small thread so didn't tighten up properly
- spacers for the bottom of the fan mounting (I'd made my own but now I have the "official" ones)
- Velcro for fixing the ECU. The manual shown a strap but speaking to parts at Westfield they don't provide and have used Velcro on their own cars. Although I have a roll of Velcro for the carpets, they sent me some more.

Oxygen Sensor - found where it went...

I thought I'd got rid of the MX-5 exhaust parts but I found the front section loitering at the back of the garage. It seems the oxygen sensor was mounted there rather than on the exhaust manifold:


Now I need to decide if I will try to remove the plug from the exhaust manifold or drill/thread a new hole in the Westfield joining section (so effectively it would be in the same place as it was on the MX-5).