Tuesday 19 March 2013

Drive shafts, rear brakes, fuel tank, pedal box, & throttle bodies

Had to brave the cold weather today, falling behind with the build, so along with a good friend time to get stuck in. Over the past 3 weeks I have picked up some essential parts from GBS, these have been waiting mainly for powder coating, or suppliers finally delivering parts.

Simon arrived early, and after the customary bacon sarnie we started with the drive shafts, hub carriers, brake calliper carriers, brake callipers, and disc brakes. Fairly straight forward with just a little head scratching.

The drive shafts are the "push-in" type, and they are left and right handed. One is longer than the other and the diff is off-set so its easily seen which goes where, also the left hand side has a left hand thread... a second clue. So drive shafts pushed home. Brake calliper carriers placed over the shafts then a bit of grease around the end of the shafts and the hub carriers slipped on.

Next small problem... not got a socket big enough to fit the nut on the end of the drive shafts ? A trip out to the local tool shop for a 41mm socket. While out looking for this odd size, Simon started to tighten all the wishbone nuts and bolts which I had left from earlier in the build, just in case they needed to come off for some reason.





How much !! £23 for the 41mm socket tool ? and 5 tool shops later arrived back to fit just 2 nuts !




 Some modification required to some bolts holding the callipers on, these where a good 8mm too long, easily touching the disc brake. trimmed down by 8mm was the only way to go. Next little issue was that the callipers did not sit right with the discs, so a little grinding down of the calliper bracket was needed, the powder coating was very thick, and to be frank the bracket was also about 1.5mm to long as well.



Hand brake cables fitted and secured, brake disc now freely moves within the calliper with the brake pads installed.

All this was repeated for the left hand side, which to be honest was much quicker, mainly due to we now know what to do ( just needed to remember the left hand thread and switching the ratchet tool the other way ! ) 

Had to put a wheel on to see how it was looking...



We then noticed the rear lower wishbone bolt was quite long, and only had a gap of 2mm from the inside of the rim. Time for a trim, we took about 5mm of the bolt, still leaving 3 to 4 threads past the Ny-lock nut.


Picture shows bolt after trimming.

Before the fuel tank is fitted, its easier to fill the diff with oil, with that done, time to bond in the fuel tank. As its still freezing cold I warmed up the bond by placing it in front of the fan heater for a few minutes before using. Fuel tank is bonded in centrally, then with a couple of ratchet straps to hold it tight overnight.




With still a couple of hours before we need to stop for the day, we started on the pedal box. Setting the clutch and brake pedals. It looked like the brake pedal may foul the steering column, so we put in the column, bit of jiggling about, and removal of a large spring and it fitted. The spring was part of the height adjuster mechanism and we didn't think it was needed as the column was to be set to the highest possible point for leg/knee access. And yes the brake pedal just touched the steering column ?
Made a small spacer from one of the extra bushes supplied, ground it down on the bench grinder. With the spacer installed the brake lever is still in line with the master cylinder...all good.





Followed the instruction on cutting/fitting the brake lever to master cylinder rod, and all seems good and working. Had to re-route the brake pipes around the steering column and added a bit of spare fuel line as a protective cover for the brake lines as seen in the photo above and below.




Last hour...

While I was marking out/drilling/fitting the battery tray, Simon was itching to fit the throttle bodies !
A big smile came on his face when he got them out of the box, and I'm sure I could hear "broom broom" in the background ?
I know he enjoyed fitting them, quality bit of kit.

Many thanks Simon for all your help today. :-)

So the day ends after 8 hours x 2

Fitting all of the above... 16 hours

Last 2 blogs build time... 4 hours

Total build time now... 99 hours.


Monday 18 March 2013

Quick shift

Just a quick post this morning, freezing in the garage again so just an hours work. Even though I have carpet on the floor the cold gets to my feet within minutes ! ... when is spring going to arrive ?

Picked up the "Quick shift" kit from GBS on Friday, the weekend was taken up with a trip to a spa, very relaxing, so ready to do some more work on the Zero this week... if it warms up !

I had only temporarily fixed one of the side transmission tunnel, easily removed to allow extra room to fit the quick shift, although GBS had said it could be fitted with both panels on, it was easier to fit with it off, with my elbow being stiff today it made sense.

Only 4 bolts and a pin it was a joy to fit, the only problem is that I dropped a bolt ! spent half an hour looking for it, the little thing had rolled to the corner of the garage, not where I had thought it had gone ?




Today's build time 1 hour (of which 30 Min's was spent looking for a bolt !)




Saturday 16 March 2013

Bob the builder and snow... Again !

Disaster has struck ! not with the Zero build but with a blocked drain from the house, so the Zero build is on hold until the drain is sorted.

I have a good mate who can help, "Bob the builder", yes his name is Bob and he is a builder !




The main drain from the kitchen is completely blocked and is flooding the patio in the back garden with sink waste, soap suds from the washing machine, and other stuff from the dishwasher. To add to the mess its freezing in the cold weather and has become a skating rink ! this only became apparent when the recent snow we have had melted to reveal the state of the situation.

So after several attempts to rod out the drain, it looked like the patio had to come up for further investigation...



Problem found... the drain had cracked and collapsed. luckily it was only the "U" bend, so only that part, and a small length of pipe to replace.




Now the "U" bend has been replaced and connected back up to the main drain, covered back over with hardcore, ready for the patio to be replaced.




Job Done !, just need to jet wash the slabs in a couple of days after the mortar has gone off.

So the next blog will be back on the Zero build, managed to get a few more parts for the build so hopefully work will progress a little quicker next week.

Many thanks to Bob for fixing the drain.

Saturday 2 March 2013

Infill panels

First job this weekend is to fit the infill panels. Simple job of riveting 3/4 of the panel and then a bead of the black sticky stuff on the top tube and clamp.





While having a good look around the Zero, checking the bonding of the side panels, I noticed a section where the bond hadn't bonded very well for some reason ? It was the very front section which would sit behind the radiator. Thinking back to last week did I clamp it ? did I put enough bond on that bit ? or is it the cold weather ? So more black bond applied and plenty of clamps this time.




Just enough time to temporary fix the passenger side of the transmission tunnel. Not going to rivet this panel just yet, will need to take it off again when I get the "Quick shift" gear assembly so I have access from the side.




Got an Archery tournament tomorrow, its only a small club shoot, but we'll see how my arm/elbow does, and if I'm fit afterwards to do any more this weekend.

Next job is to rivet the side panels to the underside of the chassis, the rivets will be out of sight and it will also stop the panels from rattling while driving.

Total time today 3 hrs.