Build Day 23

Build time today 4.0 hours - Total build time 71.0 hours.

Man time today 7.0 hours - Total man time 87.5 hours.

Engine installed today.


Firstly moved everything around to allow access to the engine so it could be hoisted into the air.  Then to try and position the car to allow the engine to be installed. 

Ready for first attempt

I remembered reading another blog that said lifting the front of the cars on a couple of blocks of wood helped so I found a couple of ramps I had from my caravanning day. The car was now ready for the first attempt. 

Engine in position for the first time

It proved really difficult to try and angle the gearbox down under the scuttle panel while keeping the front up over the front of the chassis, we decided to lift the front up further to improve the angle of attack. 

To get the engine, with gearbox and gearstick attached requires the gearbox to be pushed down and fed into the transmission tunnel, carefully missing cables etc, while keeping the engine itself away from the chassis and break pipes.  

Gearbox mounting hole marked,
Oli marking up
where plug hole needs to be

Lining up the gearbox with the prop shaft added to the complexity as the spines need to match. Eventually the engine was in position, sitting on its mounts. When checking we could see that the gearbox mounting holes did not line up with the holes in the chassis, there was little movement as the front mounts have little play. 

Gearbox access point in passenger foot well

I remember reading that the plate needs to be drilled so this was what was done, plus we also decided to make a hole in the passengers inner foot well to allow access to the gearbox oil plug. Oli marked up where this was required while I marked the chassis plate. Once done the engine was removed, this was slightly easier than installation as we had a better idea of what was needed.

With the engine out the inner foot well was drilled and the chassis plate remarked to make sure the new holes would be central to the tunnel and 9mm holes drilled.

Back in with the engine, not so bad this time, still not simple but it went quite smoothly. 

Once in place we got the gearbox chassis bolts inserted after a bit of fiddling, there is not a lot of space and the one had to be inserted from below. 

We borrowed the upper steering column nuts and bolts for this as we could not find any others.

Once installed we could see that the hole cut in the foot well looked a little low so I cut a second hole above it to make it oblong, actually I think this will make it easier to use.

Once we got the car back on its wheels we finished for the day, it was New Years Eve after all.

Engine installed

Engine installed