Update 49 - Woodstock steering and rear end

Woodstock had a cam and peg steering box, its age and wear was showing - loose off dead center and overly tight in the center. This is quite common with old cam and peg steering boxes and there are fixes available (GEE for instance can do a lot) however for me the steering was never going to be as good as the Gemmer steering box in the Blue and White car.

I managed to pick up one of the only available new Gemmer steering boxes from MMC (possibly even the last one they have). The nice thing with these steering boxes is that the swap is pretty easy - unbolt one and swap for the other - all the steering components being pretty much interchangeable.



You can see we had a helper for the day - a Swanmog member who is an ex spanner man came over to help get things sorted... "play" for the day. He did a great job!!



Now the new steering box was in place it was given a quick four wheel alignment and set-up.



Next up getting that back end sorted out - you saw in earlier pictures we test fitted some of the rear light plinths and spare wheel cover just to get an idea of the color contrast... interesting.

We whipped the rear end parts back off and fitted the new gaskets on and popped it all back together - we also need to sort out the rear end valance and numberplate light. In the pic below you can see the rear end in situ with the ali rear valance panel in prep.





We had cleaned up the inner wheel-arch and again used windscreen sealant to final fit the rear wings.... using the M8 Stainless Steel bolt headed screws. The black beading providing a nice framing effect between the yellow and grey... with the wheels on it shows how striking its going to be.



You can get an idea of what the back end is going to look like below...





Another weekend and the rear lights are all wired in - also the long standing delivery from Burton's of the LeMans fillers arrived and these were fitted to both cars - again our Swanmog helper did a great job getting these fitted.



Moving forwards - more trimming work progressed, along with fitting the roof bright-work.



Final fit of some carpet along the back behind the harness bar, getting the harness bar fitted - you can also get a glimpse into the color of the leather we will be using - a slightly lighter grey. The combo is striking and good looking in real life - the pictures don't quite do it justice.... the extra work Dad's cousin put into the body of woodstock to get all the panels straightened up means that the paint job really stands out.



Under the dash the fabricated battery tray (featuring S1 Aero battery) and fuel filter are fitted. Inside the ECU and wiring loom are fitted ready to be loomed into the car.





That's all for now folks - more soon - including the Rolling Road result having come back from being set-up today!!