Progress Jan 2024 till Jan 2025
Jan 6 2024 - Remote gear linkage (again)
The remote gear linkage with the Type 7 at remote end turned out to be too heavy so an alternative had to be found . More design and fabrication.
Jan 8 2024 - Oil pickup pipe, baffle and reinforcing block for securing head long bolts
Jan 24 2024 - 2CV clutch conversion progress
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More progress on the clutch conversion, most of this video is informative but please ignore the aluminium adapter (in red) as this turned out to be the dead end part of the design. There was no space for that part. See Terry Griffiths design (and his conversion notes). The main progress hear is the flywheel, clutch plate adapter and diaphragm spring assembly.
Feb 7 2024 - Bodywork progress
The creation of aluminium bodywork is all about having a buck. There were four buck used in this design all derived from the CAD model. Our process was to split the section into manageable parts and weld the panels together and fettle the resulting weld with a body file. The nose took 4 panels and the tail took 5 including a hemisphere purchased from Tanfield Spinners. The Scuttle and bonnet (hood) were one piece formed on an English Wheel. The compound curves panels (Nose, Tail and Scuttle) were all done with the help of Aliblast (Alistair McGill) who is very proficient in this sort of work.
Nose buck drawing
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| Bonnet coming off the jig with plywood ribs showing |
Scuttle buck drawing
Tail buck in use
The tail buck was supported with a slender box section frame still in place. It helps locate the tail section when fitting it.
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| Tanfield Hemisphere |
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| Nose under construction after being removed from the buck |
The rear tail section is still to be started but the rest look good. Many thanks to all who helped.
https://youtu.be/XagZTZvNKt8?si=ae5VHqqPBqZvliQ5
March 7 - 2024 Dashboard
The wiring system is very simple as there are no modern conveniences in this car. However the wiring needs to have a significant amount of essential features like water pump, cooling fan, starter and gauges with sensors.
The wiring is applied on the rear and splits at the dasboard interface with a 11 way connector.
March 27 2024 Wiring
7 April 2024 - Corner weight measurements
The hole point of this exercise it to make a light weight single seater. I therefore decided to have a check on where we are weight wise. The following is with me in the car (75kg) that means the whole car is just over 300 Kg.
Arril 13-17 2024 Gear stick mods
Despite all the revisiting of this design it still presents problems, the stick had to be bent under heat to avoid the X bar.
April 15 - 2024 - Speedo investigation
I was asked why I should need a speedo in a hill climb car, my answer is a) I use it to compare my efforts between runs for sector speed b) I like having a speedo.
I purchased some very nice gauges from ETB and the speedo is electronic needing a very expensive sensor magnetic pickup. I managed to find a general purpose motorcycle sensor from Fleabay that does the job just fine.
April 21 2024 - Speedo Sensor mount
April 22 2024 - More bodywork progress
My estimate of another 2 months work since last update was wofully inacurate. The bodywork is largely finished now but what effort was involved. Note the transmission tunnel nad gearstick leather.
20 July 2024 - Cooling system design
The engine cylinder head is a "Dry Deck" design, in that there is no water exchange directly between the block and the head. In addition there is a "Total Loss" electrical system (no charging system). There is a small pump that runs all the time but careful selection meant it takes less than 12W. There is cooling fan but it is thermostatic controlled and only consumes 12W when on. Hopefully this system will cool adequately.
I have calculated the battery drain and a fully charged battery 20AH should last all day on a hill climb.
July 8 2024 - Engine block side retention brackets
July 10 2024 Water jacket cover plate
July 15 2024 - Exhaust design
The design was conceived by Paul the engine designer/builder. The problem with this design is the pipe sizes are available from very few suppliers. Maniflo is too busy, and Merlin only does the bigger radii. I found a chap called Nigel Swift (troubledoldfar@gmail.com) who supplied all the tight bends and the collector. He custom made the collector from my drawing never having made a collector that way before.
The big advantage of designing an exhaust system using CAD is the cut points of the bends can be predicted with significant accuracy. I had to make a couple of jigs to serve as a fabrication hold downs.
A couple of jigs were necessary to hold the pars in the correct alignment.
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| Exhaust jig |
July 20 - 2024 - Compare and contrast with previous build
I originally built my forst Austin Seven Special over 7 years ago, this will illustrate the difference in the design result.
12 Aug 2024 - Clutch conversion progress - Saucer
20 Aug 2024 - Exhaust progress
16 Aug 2024 - Support work for engine development
2 Oct 2024 - Oil pump shim
The high pressure oil pump feeds into a special end fed nose adapter
on the engine. The oil pump is upgraded from the original Austin part
to have higher pressure. That oil pump engages with the uprated cam
shaft. The meshing of those gears spacing has to be shimmed for
rattle free performance. The shim had a couple of iterations.
2 Oct 2024 - Block to crankcase shim
16 Oct 24 - Oil pan and reinforcing plate
The oil pan is made of thin steel. As the oil pan is the closest thing to the ground I wanted it to be as low profile as possible. The concept was that it only needed to be enlarged to make sure the oil pickup pipe was as low as possible. That concept grew horns and is now an ugly mess. It had to be modified twice as a shim was added to the oil pump raising it's height relative to the sump. This item may be redeveloped in future when I get the engine back.
26 Aug 2024 Mountain Bike wheels for rear
After the project became a rolling chassis I decided to make a video of the car in the driveway. The only problem was the ground clearance was such that it would not come off the ramp and more serious it would not go on or off the trailer. I decided I needed to raise the ground clearance at the rear by a couple of inches. I approached the local bike shop for some redundant 29" mountain bike rims and new tyres, mounted them on plywood inserts drilled to match the hubs. That should cause some ribbing in the paddock.
24 July 2024 - Oil pipes
8 Oct 2024 - Starter Motor
19 Dec 2024 - Windsheild and tool storage
The Brooklands wind shield had to be modified to fit by crating an aluminium base pale to fill in the gap at the bottom. There was a dead space at the scuttle nearside which I put a tool storage facility fabricated out of 1.2mm aluminium.
More to come see 2025 onwards
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