Friday 24 January 2014

Finishing up on the wiring.

There have been many discussions on the fog lights and what / how / when etc they need to be switch on, and with what lights.....It's not that clear in the IVa manual, but my initial wiring allowed them to come on with the dip bean ONLY. I have come to the realisation that to play it safe they should also be able to be used with the main beam...this was a pain in the wotsit, and required some though on how to integrate this into the previous loom....The solution came with the cunning use of a couple of 12v Diodes, but I now think I'm covered for IVA.

The light looms are being designed to be quick release in the event the front or rear clam shells need removing.....so I'm splicing in a good quality waterproof ford connector.

Also recently finished off was the pedal box cover (Carbon of course)....a few holes were needed to allow for the steering column and the brake light switch. It was actually a difficult panel to fabricate as the pedal box is...umm...well....sort of wrong..in that I mean not square, and a bit of an odd shape. You can also see in the pic below the addition of the brake fluid warning signs..again, an IVA requirement.
The main switch panel is also complete and sits in a panel in the drivers pod. It releases via 3 m4 bolts for ease of access if required, and the aux fuse box is located under the switches.
The main Fuse and relay box is in the passenger side pod (towards the rear).

Cover on:
 Cover off:

For most of the wiring, I've used the slit convoluted tube to offer a level of protection, and where required some loom tape. The drivers side pod also has a small loom which takes the speedo, temp, oil signals from the engine. This comes together with the throttle cable on exit from the main chassis:
Finally, a few other pics of other areas of wiring:


Sunday 12 January 2014

Shafted!.....

.......in a good way of course.

Drive shafts..........ah yes, drive shafts.

Unfortunately, the puma drive shafts are a little too long for the J15. There are two viable options...shorten the existing shafts from a Puma / Fiesta or get some new ones made up. My first thoughts were to shorten. I had a few quotes from to do this ranging from £280 to £500, which to me seemed way too high. I ended up using a small engineering firm (and by small, I think it's one chap with a Lathe), said gentleman has been making drive shafts for many years, so I sent him up a shaft from the Puma, and he copied it exactly, all be it being 40mm shorter for the drivers side and 37mm for the passenger side. The shafts made from EN24T, and on assembly fitted perfectly...So, I'm a happy chap, as technically speaking the car could now potentially move under it's own steam.





Another recent purchase were the seatbelts. From experience with my Westfield, they had to be 3inch, so I called Titon in Poole who offer a custom service and can tailor the belts to your requirements. For this build short belts are needed, with snap hooks on the shoulder straps, and eye fixings for the lap straps with the lap adjustments that pull down from the buckle  rather than up from the fixing. Anyway, fantastic service from Titon who are a pleasure to deal with, and some very nice quality belts and a good price...can't ask for more than that.....