25hrs + 195 = 220hrs
If you read all the things done really fast you might get the impression I work fast – then you’d see this is the first update for 3 months :S Car work has gone on, just a bit more sporadically. After several bouts of ‘I’ll just sell it’ the lovely wife has made me make a couple of hours a week to progress things. That said my lovely little 4 month old (today) is rarely giving me a spare second – but that’s more than fantastic in itself 🙂 look forward to giving him a drive, (or him handing me spanners?) Happy 4 months Joshua…
I will defer to a lot of pictures to show progress, some key things to call out though, in roughly time order…
Engine in, getting this sat in the car was’t too hard with wifes help and an engine hoist, not too much scraping :S
As ever the engine mounts weren’t in the right place, par for the course, and everything takes longer than expected when it comes to drill holes in awkward places.
Nice to get it bolted to the chassis though
Gearbox mounts were okay, stupid thing #1 was not getting the gearbox mount mounting plate on the gearbox while it was out the car, instead I struggled to get the right bolts, threads and location, nothing like making a job for yourself…
either way, not too difficult… the tip from someone around taking a picture from beneath to align holes was a good one, included is a comedy photo I too of myself, I think I had the phone around the wrong way, obviously tired – I look it.
A nice picture of a problem several have had, clutch slave banjos not mating to clutch slaves, this I found was because the after marked clutch slaves are crap. I had two from MX5 parts, one from Autolink, all had the female thread on the cylinder way off parallel to the outer circumstance. After being annoyed at this, I did come around to the though on the MX5 application the hydraulics don’t match with the same type of banjo bolt (straight not off at 90deg). hey ho, a genuine mazda one was the way forward. look after the pennies, suffer major inconvenience.
Once on quite satisfying to have another functional pedal though…
Handbrake was pretty straight forward, it went on and off 20 times to get as little scraping on the chassis rail as poss, some nice captive rivnuts to make it removable. The one PITA was getting a drill and rivnut tool into the chassis tunnel, with the side panels on. In the end I went with cutting a hole in the ali panel to get at it, not nice, and painful to do, but it was the only way, I will patch this after, it did at least mean I could get two riv nuts in the chassis though.#
Prop went off and came back, very good service, I will recall who it was, but ultra efficient, painted, re balanced, the right size with minimal measurement, a great example of service.
gearbox has oil and as does gearstick turret, the gearbox fill bolt was a pain, a square bolt, can be removed with a 16mm socket (imperial equiv). stupid thing #2 was not loosening this with the gearbox out, access is minimal.
Steering rack on, no pain here, quite satisfying again
Currently working on the fan and rad, a little fiddly, but looking positive…
