House move stops play!

Sorry to say that our house move has stopped work on the Cobra build.

Boxes everywhere!

Not only does the house move interfere with the build, but we will be without a house and hence a garage during this process. So we are out of our house with nowhere, apart from the caravan, to move in to from next week!

The Cobra will stay at our old house/garage, at least for a while, thanks to a generous offer from Jayne, our buyer. So the build will grind to a halt for the next few weeks, while the lawyers do their stuff. Hopefully it won't be too long.

Apologies for the break in activity. Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible!

Under tray fixing

The under tray is made of aluminium sheet and fits beneath the radiator and into the lower area of the nose.

I had to make sure that the tray avoided the 'oil cooler air intake'. It locates below this intake on the inside of the nose and is fixed to the lower radiator mounting points. It should be a tight push fit. Two holes were marked on the under tray and drilled to allow the lower radiator mounting bolts to be used. The holes had to be slotted a little to allow the bolts to be fitted. What a faffy job to get the bolts back in place, as my radiator and the mounting holes do not line up perfectly!

Radiator fixing bolts used to secure under tray

Next the two side fixing brackets (bent pieces of aluminium) were marked and four holes drilled in each to take 5mm button head bolts with nylocs. The holes were drilled in the brackets so that two went through to the tray and two through the inner wing. Because I did not want to remove the radiator bolts again, the drilling was an awkward job and required the 90 degree drill attachment, but now it is done I am happy with it.

Bracket used to fix under tray with button head bolts

Steering column

I had the steering column in my boxes, so I thought it was about time I put it on the car.

There are three parts to the column. The lower section that connects to the rack. The middle section, with the rose joint and the upper Vectra section with the rake adjustment, collapsible mechanism and the electrical connections. At this stage all were fitted just hand tight with the nylocs, bolts and washers supplied

First I fitted the lower section. This was simply a case of removing the nut and bolt from the joint, then sliding over the rack splines and re-fitting the nut and bolt. This was required at each joint.

Connecting the lower section to the rack

Next, the middle section rose joint was packed with grease and connected to the lower section. The threaded part of the rose joint was mounted on the chassis bracket. NOTE: See IVA and Post IVA category in the Build Process.

Middle section connected to lower shaft. Rose joint can be seen here.

Finally, I fed the upper section through the bulkhead and the locating U-clamp from the passenger compartment and connected this to the middle section. Not forgetting to put the bulkhead grommet in place. Here I had to file the bolt cut out groove on the upper column shaft a little to accommodate the bolt, as the Vectra column has a smaller groove than required. A round file did the trick here.

Upper column connected to middle section.

Now I found that the column in the drivers compartment stuck out a little too far, so I could not fit the mounting bolts. This was even with the bolts hand tight in the joints. I suspect that it is simply a case to tapping the steering wheel end of the column to move the inner shaft in to the column assembly, but better check first. Advice has now been requested from Andy at GD!

Once the nuts and bolts are tightened up, I will need to make sure that there are no tight spots when turning the steering wheel. If there are the joints will need moving around the splines.