Original Car Pics
Right this week’s been a busy week on the Sprint Car front:
During the week the guy’s managed to:
Change the Oil, Timing Belt, filter and generally service the engine.
Attached the front tow eye
Fit EBC Green Stuff front pads
Swap the front dampers to the AVO units…….
Unfortunately once fitted it became apparent that one of the dampers was suffering from a pretty bad leak., with oil dripping from the bottom of the unit from the adjustment valve. I’ll be calling the supplier for a replacement unit.
The major success of the week was the installation of the Roll-bar. What seems initially like a straightforward job once the Morgan factor is included never is.. (we’ll see more examples of this in action later
)
Having stripped out the seats, interior carpets we found that the original seatbelts needed removing (sounds simple ah?) well the seatbelts come off ok.. however the brackets which also need removing run from the top of the wheel-arch across and down the inside.. but underneath the leather… which essentially means removing all the leather from the inside of the wheel-arch to get it off.
After much gnashing of teeth the roll-over bar is successfully and neatly installed… fantastic.
On Saturday, we knew we had all weekend to work on the car so we identified what jobs we really needed to get done.
The most complex thing we wanted to get done was install the drivers seat… we’re still waiting for the delivery of the back-order items from GP Direct at Silverstone which includes the second set of seat brackets so the drivers seat is where it’s at.
In preparation we measured up the chassis cross-members under where the seat would go, and removed the partially disintegrated original tool-box.
We nipped up to Meakes’s forge and metal workers at Lane End where we picked up the steel strips we would need to make the seat anchor plates to blue book spec. Also we picked up a stock of skid plates which the business uses to fit to lowered trad cars to protect them from grounding on speed-bumps or obstructions. Also whilst we were there they knocked up a ali plate to fit to the top of the bulkhead lipped up at the back to sit where the tool-box was.
Once back we piled up some magazines to investigate where the seat needs to be position both laterally and vertically. New MSA regs indicate that the roll-bar should be 50mm above the top of the drivers helmet. It turned out that I basically needed to be sat on the rear cross-member.
Having got one of the seats out of the box we dummied it into the space to see what major issues we would face. Essentially the front lips of the seats fouled the transmission tunnel at the front (we knew this would need trimming from the other racers we had spoken to).
We attached the brackets in the settings we though would be ideal… however these were not going to work.
The brackets were not shaped to fit the seat (although they are the correct ones), they also do not quite line up correctly with the rake setting we needed and finally could not be attached to the lowest setting due to the manufactured bend in the bracket. ( I can only imagine the worse problems given these were the best ones from the ones available).
In the end we used our 30ton press to bend the vertical front support of the 5mm ali plate to align it with the seat. Also we cut away the excess of the rear bracket section which was fouling the waist belt hole and plastic liner so the bracket would not fit flush.
The height issue went away due to the height of the rear cross-member.
In the end we compromised and set the seat up on the maximum rake and trimmed the lips of both leading edges of the seat. Again dummied it in (believe me this all took several hours!!).
We found that the seat was just TOO close. There is no way you could realistically drive in that position.
In the end we cut several inches out of the back of the seat bracket so the very rear section of the bracket went over the rear cross-member gave plenty of space for the driver as well as leaving plenty of support for the seat.
We were really glad at this point we had not gone for the other brackets… as we would have basically needed to throw them away.
After about 5 hours we had re-trimmed the seat with the brackets on and managed to get the drivers seat in the car.
We marked where the hole’s went and bolted the seat in using the plates to secure the seat under the car… (the plates will eventually be welded to the 2 cross members as well)
For the next activity we fitted the rear harness bar, which using a leather hole punch was pretty simple to get a clean installation.
To finish off the seat work we installed the crutch eye bolts to secure the crutch straps.
Finally, we removed the door furniture and drew on the roundels the door shape and cut a template. By the end of the day we installed the drivers side door roundel.
On Sunday we drilled out the passengers side door using a template from the drivers side door to install the new matching mirror. We again used the template for the driver side roundel to make one for the passengers side.
We fabricated brackets for the new stainless steel number plate mount and attached it to the front inner cowel mount.
At the same time we cut out the stickers needed to identify the location of the front tow bracket and attached them just to the left of the cowel.
For the last job of the day we taped out the position for the driver’s names and flags ensuring both sides were symmetrical. Once deciding the lateral location attached the passengers side then the drivers ensuring they were in the correct position.
Once finished… put the car in the sun for some pics…..
Still to do:
Complete rear suspension replacement
Front Brake reaction bars
NSF Damper replacement
exhaust wrap on the manifold
High Level rear brake light installation
Spare wheel cover fabrication and installation
Re-attach exhaust
put padding on roll-bar
Re-shape the roof hoops
Install scuttle roll bar
install saftey cut off switch
Swap power cable from battery with fuel lines (ie. inside for outside)
Install passengers seat
Paint floor
Install throttle pedal
Screw in floor mats
......
And anything else that comes up from now until we finish!!
