Tag: transmission

Sprocket to me

It’s another of those three steps forward, two back posts. Actually, I don’t know how many back it is really.

First, though, the forward bits. Most importantly, the chassis is now back home again. As you can see, I took the trailer off back up to Soham and collected it. To be honest it isn’t a fantastic job, but it’s good enough. It’s not quite the shade of grey that I was after either, but that’s no big deal. Mind you, I wonder if I want to make the roll cage a different colour from this? In which case, I wonder if it’s possible to paint on top of powder coating? Seems possible that it’s not.

Continue reading “Sprocket to me”

All on my ownsome…

There’s still no chassis here, so I’ve been getting on with other things. i did phone up the powder coating company on Friday afternoon when it became apparent that I might be able to get over to Soham. However, there was no answer so I guess they’d gone home early. Either that or they’ve gone out of business taking my chassis with them… 🙁

Here’s something though, in that I’ve finally finished the rear brakes. The new taps I ordered arrived and I was able to properly  cut the threads. I did have an experiment using helicoils but, for some reason, I didn’t feel confident about it. All the same, I’ll keep the helicoiled part as a spare.

Continue reading “All on my ownsome…”

It’s a topsy-turvy world

Of course, with it being Christmas and all, it’d be nice to think that I could make some good progress on the car. Admittedly, I do have some work to do, not the least trying to get some shape into what’s going to be in my PhD thesis which I’m supposed to write next year. I wonder what I’ll write about?

In between worrying about that, I did manage to get something done. Starting with the driveshafts I bought some skinnier tubing for sleeving the shafts and, coupled with moving the diff slightly, it does seem as though I might be alright at avoiding the chassis. Of course, the proper driveshafts should be skinnier again than these ones. So, I’ll press on at the moment.

Continue reading “It’s a topsy-turvy world”

Interference, shaft-wise

cageI’ve got the cage completed now, after a welding frenzy last week. Here’s a photo of the completed thing. It isn’t pretty, but from past experience it will look less awful with the bodywork on, as the bodywork goes rather higher than the raw chassis. I must admit that I’ve had a couple of ideas how to make it look a bit better, but they involve a degree of measuring and drawing that just isn’t feasible at the moment. As it is, though, it’s a all a bit of a maze of tubes.

Continue reading “Interference, shaft-wise”

Weekending

diff_trial_positioningI’ve managed to spend a bit of time on the car this weekend. First of all, I wanted to be really sure that the diff was going to fit properly. So, I cut out some supports for it, following the CAD model that I showed you a short while ago. However, in an advance on the normal materials technology I used hardboard rather than aluminium for the diff support plates. It’s much easier to cut out, so it’s bound to be a better choice.

Continue reading “Weekending”

1920–2009

reverser_mounted_01That’s an even odder title than usual, but it’s a hat-tip, as they say in blogging circles, to my Dad who died last week after a long illness. In many ways I got my start in mechanical things from him as I grew up in a house where it was normal for people to do mechanical things for themselves. He also built a car once too, a JAP engined Morgan three-wheeler that was assembled from a box full of bits shortly after WWII.

He liked to tell other people a story about a 17-year old me disassembling the gearbox of my car. This was a Morris Minor, and the gearbox had failed in such a manner that you got 3rd gear in addition to whatever other gear you’d selected. I was performing the delicate disassembly in the middle of the back garden and Dad thought the gearbox was clearly going to be toast but was surprised to see it running fine a few days later. If you’re wondering what the problem was, a baulk ring had shattered into umpteen pieces, doubtless pulled to bits by the mighty torque from the 803cc A-series engine. (0-60 in 52.5 seconds, I’ll have you know.)

Continue reading “1920–2009”

Differenced engine

chain_diffI’ve pressing on with the engine/gearbox mountings. Well, “pressing” is clearly a metaphor for something rather different. However, I have made some progress.

First of all, I’ve changed my mind how to do the diff mounting, as I realised that the original idea wasn’t going to work very well when it came to changing the sprockets and chain. Continue reading “Differenced engine”

14 steps forward, 52 back

rear_mounts_02I’ve been pressing on with the engine mounts and, after a minor false start, got the rear side of the engine set up as in this photo. The false start can been seen if you look really hard at the bottom right of the photo where you can see the first set of mountings for this transverse assembly. This is at a slightly jaunty angle. This all worked fine but it dawned on me that it was going to be impossible to actually fit the engine like that as it couldn’t move around the top mounts without requiring huge compliance of the rear mounts. It might have worked when I replaced the metal top hat washers with the eventual rubber bushes but I didn’t really want to risk it.

Continue reading “14 steps forward, 52 back”

Preparations…

clean_garage_01It’d be nice to get going, but of course I need to wait for things to be manufactured. In the meantime I’ve been getting the Fury ready for its next outing, and starting to organise myself for the Spectre build.

Apart from starting to make a big list of things to buy, do and design, I started out with clearing out the garage. I’m going to have to try and build the car with the Fury tucked in the corner of the garage, unless I can find some other convenient way of storing the Fury. In the meantime, I know this will work as I originally built the Fury while the Dax was still in the garage, and I think that was wider than the Fury is, even though it was a se7en-like car.

Continue reading “Preparations…”