NOVEMBER    2004

This month was supposed to be a concerted effort on the 37 but I had to do some urgent work on the 34.  That's now done and now I concentrate on the little tasks that have been left hanging. Like the heater cock and plumbing, glove box compartment, accelerator pedal and rear seat belts. Well that's the plan, let's see how far I get before another event derails me.  

 

 

 I was given an accelerator pedal from a work colleague that is building a Clubman kit car. He bought a half cut Toyota AE111 with a 20 valve,   4 cylinder engine...That's a lot of valves to fit in each pot. Anyway, he had no use for the pedal, so I snaffled it. I like the idea of the return spring. So after a bit of cutting and heat bending, I got it located in  a suitable position. The final length will have to be determined before I graft the top section back on. At least I have a lot of room above to play with by squeezing it between the kick panel and the battery box. The second pic is the pedal I took out. Looks like a Falcon unit. I could have fixed it up at a pinch but I like the return spring on the Toyota unit.

I don't know exactly the right height. I sort of guessed where the brake pedal will sit. This pic is at floor level to give an idea of the difference between the brake and accelerator. I will also need to figure out why the brake goes off on a tangent instead of in a straight line. I'm guessing the assembly is skew wif on the frame. That shouldn't be too hard to sus out. The second pic is the original handbrake assembly.
This is where it is supposed to sit. It is butt ugly and in the damn way, so its getting the flick. The second pic is the accelerator pedal finished off but held in with self tapper screws. When I'm assembling it again, I'll use acorn nuts.. I also retained the Toyota stopper. That just creates a bit of clearance off the floor to stop the cable binding up in the carpet. I guessed the travel by comparing it to the 34s pedal. I will have to weld up the hole right behind the return spring. That was the original handbrakes route.
This is where I returned to the heater and work out how to plumb the hoses and water cock in. Originally, I had the outlets on the left hand side and tried to run the hoses over the top. Well that was fruitless as everywhere I tried to mount the water cock it got in the way of something. I ended up pulling the heater apart again and turned the core around so the outlets are on the driver's side. I welded up the holes and re painted it ( right hand pic ). The water cock is mounted vertically and the hoses plumb neatly between the heater and battery box. Its very simple to lean under the dash to turn it on.
You can see where the hoses plumb in. I'm still thinking about running some copper pipe down to meet the hoses. There is a fair amount of room to play with. The next pic is a  bulk head plate I made with the intentions of drilling and soldering some copper pipe into it. The problem is the area where the pipes exit is not flat. It drops way a bit so the plate does not lay flush. It  Looked a bit strange. I've now decided to just use grommets and have copper pipe tightly pushed in. I have used conduit to give some idea.
Now the heater is sort of finished, I made some headway on the glove box. I canvassed some ideas on how to construct one and I have decided to make it from sheet tin. I will join with solder and line it with some sort of material. Thin felt most likely. It will have to be made to clear the demister vent. I will use that area directly in front of the vent to create a compartment for my CDs, so its not a total waste. The pics show the cardboard template and MDF I will use to form the sheet tin. That's next weeks job.

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