Engine and Gearbox Installation

18 August 2012

Today is another big day in the build of my Cobra. The engine and gearbox are to be put together and fitted into the rolling chassis up at GD.

So another early start, another sunny summer morning, a Range Rover with a trailer and two excited car builders in it and its off to GD to we head.

On arrival, Andy had already fitted the clutch. So we set to work attaching the gearbox.

Clutch Fitted

Pairing Engine & Gearbox

Paired and Ready to Install

Fitting into the chassis was fiddly but not overly troublesome. Some bits and bobs had to be removed off the chassis and with some jiggery pokery we got it in place. The engine mounting bolts look a little on the short side to me and I plan to fit longer bolts there at some point.

Left a bit, right a bit!!!

And in she goes

The gearbox mounting plate needed drilling so we also took advantage of Andy's workshop facilities to do this.

Once everything was in place and bolted securely we loaded the rolling chassis on to my trailer for the long journey home.

Another Pedal Box Update

With the pedal box now mounted in a much better position, I attached the brake and clutch cylinders once again and then started to look at how to fit the various hoses and connect to the inner wing.

Brake & clutch cylinders with associated pipes/hoses

Holes prepared for brake & clutch lines

Brake and clutch lines fitted

Fairly pleased with the end result and feels like I have made some reasonable progress here

Pedal Box Update

After fitting the pedal box in the position advised by GD, I was a little disappointed that the pedals seemed too far off the floor of the car. I checked several other builder's blogs and all appear to fit in roughly the same position as advised by GD so I was still quite apprehensive about making any  changes. However, after much thought and deliberation, I decided that what the hell, I was going to lower the pedal box by about 10-15mm.

Showing bottom of Brake Pedal 215mm from floor 

So first things first, I removed the pedal box and set about filling the holes with P38 filler

Filling holes

Added card to back off bulkhead to stop filler falling through

Next step was to remark, drill and fit. This time i aligned the top of the pedal box casting with the bottom of the ledge on the bulkhead.

The final result appears to be much better - a few mm has made a lot of difference.

Pedal Box

Made a start on fitting the pedal box.

Made a template to match the pedal box bracket and transferred the hole positions to the bulkhead.

Bit of a bind making the holes for the brake and clutch cylinders as I didn't have a hole saw the correct size. Ended up using the nearest I had and opening up with the Dremel.

Having followed the GD fitting instructions, I'm a little disappointed with the final result. The pedals appear to be way too high off the floor pan :( Not quite sure what to do with this yet - do I make a new panel for the bulkhead and reposition or should I make a false floor? Will leave this decision for another day I think