At long last the brake and fuel pipes are complete

It's taken me over two years but I finally got there. To be fair in between there has been a house move and lots of family stuff. But I've also found it quite a tricky task to do, and I've had to order three different sets of brake pipes from Westfield. They come as a set of 6, and can't be bought separately. That means if you mess one up, you have to buy the whole set again. Though at the price of £35 or so each set, it's not a big deal, at least when set against the total cost of the build. I suppose you could go down the route of buying your own pipes, bending and cutting them using one of the many pipe cutting and flanging kits on the market. But if I was competent enough to do that I would have done the job first time round with the original set of pipes.

In the end I ended up with two different pipe bending tools. That's because the brake and fuel pipes are such different diameters I couldn't find one tool which would do both. Still I now feel should I need to do the job again I would be able to do it in a fraction of the time it's taken me to do it so far. And, of course I now have a few spare pipes lying around.

If you read all the build blogs you'll see that no two people route the pipes in exactly the same direction. You can see the routes I've chosen in the accompanying photos.

Onwards and upwards to the wiring loom, which for the past few years I've kept in a cardboard box, and haven't dared look at. Luckily the connections have been labelled.

Pedal assembly complete (the Marina rides again)

After finishing the body panels the next stage is the pedal assemblies. This is mostly straightforward, but as ever there are some gotchas. Firstly the manual gives the wrong size for the set screws needed to secure the clutch and master brake cylinder to the bulkhead. I couldn't find any the right size in the kit, and had to ask Westfiled to send me some. For the record the manual says 25mm but you need 35mm really. In a similar vein the manual gives the wrong size for the double ended bolt needed to secure the clutch pedal. However there is only one in the kit, and it's the right size.

Another point of interest is that the clevis fork for the brake pedal is a billeted item, not a pressed steel one as used for the clutch pedal. Apparently this is because the pressed steel one could fold up when big enough brakes and master cylinder are fitted, as the pressure needed to apply the brakes is so great. I don't think this would be an issue with my Mazda brakes, as they are only single piston floating caliper jobs, but better safe than sorry.

Embarrassingly I couldn't find the clevis forks in the kit, so asked Westfield to send me some with the set screws mentioned earlier. They duly did, only for me to later find they were in the kit all along. Oops, sent the new ones back to Westfield, as the billeted one particularly is obviously quite expensive.

Below are some pictures of the pedal assembly, and fitted master cylinders. Onto the next job of fitting/bending the brake pipes.

The first picture is looking forward at the pedal assembly.

 

The second picture is looking from above at the pedals. Note the billeted clevis fork for the brake pedal.

 

 

and finally as you can see from the packet the pedal rubbers came in, they are the self same items used for many British Leyland cars, all the way back to the Marina!

Bodywork now nearly complete

It's been a long time since the last entry, but in the background I've been beavering away. The two panels which were the wrong shape were replaced by Westfield. I found that even these new panels needed a bit of trimming if they were to not be proud of the chassis in a number of places. After a bit of experimentation, including buying Drapers clone of the Dremel, and using a grinding wheel I found the best way to get the panels to fit was to use a file I had lying around. As I've heard aluminium dust is not good for you I wore a face mask whilst doing all this.

I ordered the optional side panels, which each have approximately 75 holes to be drilled, and the same number of rivets. I found that with my rechargeable drill I could drill about 25 - 30 holes before the battery went flat, and I didn't have a spare battery. This was one of the reasons for the length of time things have taken. The other usual suspects, holidays, family commitments etc. also played their part. Annoyingly right at the end I discovered that using a high speed on the drill actually took longer to drill a hole than using a slow drill speed. A slow speed ensured that the drill bit slipped less too, making smaller tidier holes.

Even more annoyingly I ran out of rivets, and I've had to order some more. I'm not quite certain how that happened as the box claims there are 500, but my sums suggest there were far fewer holes than that. I know I waste a few, dropping them on the floor etc. but I didn't think it was that many.

Below is an image of things as they look now. The next step is the pedal assemblies. I'm hoping this will go smoothly, and there will soon be some more progress to report.

Slow progress

Sincve the last entry I've not made a great deal of progress, After a phone call with Westfield my two inner tunnel pannels have gone back to Westfield, and should be replaced with new slightly longer panels with the holes in the same place. That's the plan they've yet to arrive back and I should really chase this up.

However I have found the time to paint the differential with two shades of Hammerite Direct To Rust. The differential will never be seen, but will still be attacked by rust, so this is effectively resetting the rust clock on it. It also gives me a chance to experiment with methods of preparation to give the best results. Because it will be used on parts that are on view. I'm thinking of the front uprights specifically. Here is a picture of how the finished article looks, you can compare this to the earlier picture of it in the Preparations post on this blog.

I've also been able to attach the LHS footwell panel, and the scuttle panel. Here's the current

 

state of play.

Re-arranging things and starting on the panelling

I spent some time re-arranging things in the garage to give myself more room to work. The big question was where was I going to put the main piece of bodywork, the tub, so it didn't get in my way. The answer was to suspend it from the ceiling. Westfield give you some pieces of wood with which to brace the tub, otherwise it apparently has a tendency to distort itself. After putting these on I hoisted the whole package up to the ceiling, suspending from the rafters. It took some effort to get it there, but it's now out of the way, and there was really no other place to put it.

With that done I started to think about putting on the aluminium panels. I started by laying them out on the chassis. This led to some interesting discoveries. Chief amongst these is that Westfield have cheekily added an extra piece of bracing to the chassis, which is not there in the build manual, and I haven't seen talked about in other build diaries. It's probably a good thing, but it does mean that seat back panel needs some material cut out of it to fit. The offending bracing is shown circled in the picture below.

 

I'm also pretty sure that Westfield didn't include the seat pans, and the GRP piece for the drivers side panel. I can feel a phone call coming on to the factory. I'm also wondering about how best to fit the main panels on the inside of the chassis. You are supposed to put a return fold, but this means the pre-drilled holes at the front are in the wrong place. It could be a long phone call.

But on a positive note I was able to split the wishbones from the uprights, as shown in the picture below.

With the aid of this little beastie:-

It's a ball joint splitter, and was recommended by the ever helpful chaps at the Westfield Sports Car Club

The kit is fetched

On a cold Saturday morning in early February I made my way to local van hire centre to pick up a Luton van. I was pretty much there as the place opened at 8.00 a.m. After the formalities I set off on the two and a bit hour drive to Kingswinford, home of the Westfield factory. I skimmed the paperwork, but did notice there was a £2,000 excess for damaging the roof of the van, which somehow hadn't appeared on the web site. I can only hope the Westfield when it is finished is more fun to drive than the van. I could almost see the fuel gauge going down as I drove, and I wasn't exactly racing. In the end it cost me as much to put diesel in the thing as it did to hire it.

I arrived at the factory, feeling relieved not to have encountered any low bridges, where a helpful employee went through the contents of the kit with me, and helped me load it onto the van, with suitable wrapping and padding to avoid any chance of damage in transit. I had been due to go the previous weekend, but the factory had been snowed in. Westfield kindly agreed to open just for me this day, and there was only me and my helper at the factory.

Loaded up I set off back to London, pausing only to fill up with diesel and a sandwich. I made it back early afternoon, and with my wife's helped unloaded the kit into the garage. This took some time, as I had to assemble the chassis stands, before putting the chassis on top of them. Hiring a Luton with a tail lift was definitely an inspired choice. With that out of the way I returned the van.

Upon returning a further hour or two was spent re-arranging things in the garage, including sending to landfill some things I would otherwise would have kept. Any how here are a couple of shots of the beast in the garage.

Preparations

Before the arrival of the kit I sorted the contents of the palettes and stored them as neatly in the garage as I could to make way for the chassis. Basically I took as much as I could off the pallets and with the help of my brother manhandled the pallet with the engine to one corner.

It can seen in the image above. This was taken after the kit arrived, as you can see. Another thing I did was to further dismantle the parts of the donor which needed it. The first thing I tackled was the differential which was still attached to the Mx5 sub frame. I found that the socket set I had wasn't sufficient to free the old bolts, after some research on the Internet I discovered Plus gas and breaker bars. With a bit of brute force I was then able to free it. Once free I began the process of preparing it to have a coat of Hammerite direct to rust paint. That is still ongoing.

Below; parners in crime, the breaker bar, and a jar of plus gas.

There are still the uprights that need to be separated from the wishbones of the donor, but more of that later.