Build Diary
November 2007



Not as much a "build diary", as a "diary"!

What I really need to do is get down to my dads and put things together, but at the moment I am too tired so only have an hour here and there.  Things weighing heavily on my mind are prop-centre-bearing-mount.  I think I know what to do, but things are always easier when the car is 50miles away!

15th November

Put a gearchange lever together using a bit of stainless rod, bit of aluminium, a few stainless bolts, and a block of nylon.  Not very exciting but I had a block of nylon around so this seems to work quite nicely. At present everything is adjustable (actually there is quite a lot of variability over whether the upshift should be backwards or forwards.  I am not sure which way to go with this but the simplest engineering solution may be the one that wins!).  The 'rose' joint will screw into the end of the rod that is on the belcrank attached to the gearbox (see here )



The idea is that big plastic wedge will bolt up into the chassis (rivnuts should be good enough for this job).  Both nylon clamps are adjustable so it should be reasonable.



Also started putting the dash-board together a bit more seriously.  The template that I got with the chassis is standard STM.  I never wanted to use the 4 rectangular button holes, so this was always going to be a template.  I have started bolting it together.  The bodywork already has some rivnuts fitted to it for mounting the dash so I put some holes in this panel to line up with those, the base of the dash is not horizontal in this set-up.  No great worries, aluminium sheet is easy to buy and cut, so .... in the final incarnation of the dash I want to have a GPS speedo as the prominent speed sensing device (not SVA compliant, but most relevant in the real world).  Also I want to round the edges (another SVA requirement).  In the design shown here all the instruments are within the 5inch past the edge of the steering wheel radius where things don't need to be smoothed off.  5inch past a standard Sierra steering wheel is 12.5 inches, which on a Phoenix is more than half of the dashboard.

Here is a photo of my recent hacking (most of my photos look like they were taken by a 4 year-old, this one actually was!).


As you will notice I wimped out on getting an analogue speedo working.  My electronics skills were not up to it, and this bicycle speed cost £6 and reads to 185mph.  Sigma BC506.  The only problem that I see is that the smallest wheel it expects has 1meter circumference.  This isn't a problem for a car which has a ~2m circumference, BUT it means you can't mount the sensor on the prop-shaft as the reduction ratio on the prop means that 1 prop rotation corresponds to < 1m travelled.  The solution (with the Sierra diff and for me) is to put magnet/metal on the driveshaft inner CV's which rotate at the same rate as the rear wheels, but don't move relative to the chassis.  To be done (actually a pair of jubilee clips two 35mm ones can be daisychained to give a 75mm diameter one, this has two "lobes" which activate the sensor, I am not using the standard Sigma sensor which needs a magnet, instead I have a hall effect AECO proximity detector, this presently talks to the BC506 via a relay, but reas up to at least 135mph, I need a better solution instead of the relay as semiconductors are more reliable).  Also note the snazzy warning lights, a rash call to CBS (Car builder solutioins, AKA www.nfauto.co.uk, those guys are so nice you have to give them your money).

I am now not using the Aprilia temperature monitor LCD "computer" thing.  There was no-where nice to put it, so I had to buy another gauge. Greengauges make anything you want, they are reasonably priced, but charge a standard £10 shipping, painful for 1 gauge.  This is now installed..

End of November
Finally got around to sorting out the wiring to the lights.  As I have the bodywork with me here there is no excuse not to sort out all the things that I can.  So I have a separate sub-loom for the front lights and the same for the rear.  This is all done properly, so shouldn't need further fiddling.  It took me ages to work out how to attach the wires to the bodywork.  I didn't want them permanent, and its fibreglass so I couldn't use P-clips or anythign needing a hole.  I ended up bonding (with resin and glass) some tieclip bases on,  then I can tie-wrap the cables to these.  It seemed like overkill, but I couldn't think of another way.  I have extra runs for the front as my sidelights are part of the bonnet.  The nice thing about this solution is that the bonnet and rear shell can be electrically disconnected easily.  I guess this is pointless, but with all my messing around I will no doubt go back and forwards a bit when putting stuff together.

I need to go over these panels again carefully with some fine wet and dry.  I will probably get some primer down, but wont do anything more until the whole car is together.

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