Build Diary 3

Build Diary Page 3

• Brake and fuel pipes.

The brake and fuel pipes are attached to the chassis with plastic clips which simply push into the pre-cut holes. The brake pipe is easily bent by hand, but the fuel pipe is a bigger diameter and tends to kink if your not careful. A pipe bender is probably better for the fuel pipes.

• Suspension and steering

The wiring loom should have been the next thing to go in but unfortunately there was a delay in supplying the loom, so I moved on to the suspension. The first job to do is to fit the bushes to the wishbones. There is a mix of rubber and nylon bushes. The nylon bushes are easily pressed in using a bench vice and a little grease. The rubber bushes are a bit more difficult, because if you try to press them in, they tend to bulge at the top and get stuck. I found the best way to insert the bushes was to pull them in, instead of pushing. A jig was made up consisting of two pieces of tube with an inside diameter that allowed the rubber bush to be pressed inside by hand, and a screwed rod. A piece of tube was placed each side of the wishbone tube, effectively making one long tube. This would stop the rubber expanding while it was pulled into the wishbone. The bush was inserted into one tube with plenty of grease (silicon or Teflon based is good) then the whole thing is tightened up. The bush is then slowly pulled through by tightening the nut.

After fitting the bushes I fitted the steering rack and column. The steering rack has to be fitted with limiters to stop the tyres fouling on the wishbones. An aluminium limiter is fitted to each side of the steering rack, and held in place by two rivets.

The steering column was then fitted. The column was left loose as it needs to be moved at a later stage, to get the correct distance from the dashboard.