Having given the fibreglass a few days to harden I removed the former, and it has given a nice smooth inside to the lip on the engine bulge, just now a case of tiding up the outside and where the mesh joins the cover..
Also source a pair of Dzus fasteners to hold the cover down with, from what I've heard they can be tricky to fit, we'll see how be it turns out to be.
As it turns out that the thermal fan switch is faulty, I soldered up the hole for it on the radiator, as it only uses a rubber grommet to hold it in place, along with the small connector at the other end. Will have to raid the scrap yard some time, for a boss and screw in thermal switch.
Radiator holes blocked |
As now most other jobs are nearing completion, I broke out the MIG welder and started on the chassis, 8 hours of measuring, cutting, grinding off paint and welding, the drivers side is solid once more. Just a small patch is required on the passengers side and it will be good to go.
Had another fruitful trip to the scrap yard, where Stan's little lair came up with the goods again. A VW Jetta gave up its thermal switch and boss, while another VW Golf gave me a choice of temperatures to switch the fan on, in fact the Jetta is a two stage switch so you could have two speeds available.
First stage in using the dzus fasteners to hold the engine cover, was to fabricate a small triangular bracket to hold the spring part of the fastener.
Managed to get the fist Dzus fastener fitted, wasn't as bad as I had thought, after carefully measuring, I drilled a small hole through both layers then enlarged them to fit.
Out with the propane torch today, and soldered the boss onto the radiator, not a lot of space, but it seems to fit just fine, now got a choice of two switches, think I will go with the single stage one at the moment.
Radiator boss and switch |
Well spent another six hours welding, and now have the bulk done, all that's needed now is to weld the spreaders for the seat belt at the drivers side, and that should be it done.
Whilst browsing the web, I came across the idea of fitting a heat shield under the Weber, this helps with heat soak from the exhaust manifold on non-crossflow heads, like the a series. So I decided to make a prototype up to see how it goes, then fabricate one from Stainless Steel, as this will stay shiny in the engine bay and reflect heat better.
Prototype heat shield |
Well as the prototype seemed to fit, I made one in 2mm Stainless Steel, should be able to get a nice shine on it to reflect the heat. I also will space it away from the bottom of the Weber, using plastic washers, just to give an extra air space. This should reduce the amount of heat being transferred to the bottom of the carburetor where the float bowl is.
Purchased some twin window channel, to replace the rather crusty one on the doors. Once I had the doors off I discovered that they need a little more work to remove some surface rust, that will have to wait until tomorrow, so in the meanwhile I have converted the car to a gullwing model. J
gullwing doors |
