richyb66

To be honest, probably not. It's quite time consuming laying the parts up as I've only got one mould which was hastily made and as it was a bit of an experiment that just happened to turn out OK. The bulk of the time though is trimming out the holes to allow the wishbone to swing without wiping out the moulding which involved a lot of trial fitting and trimming. Given that virtually every car is different (even one side to the other), the trimming probably takes the biggest time. Ideally I'd like to make a new mould, with 4 impressions in it, that also has grooves in it to show where the mouldings need to be (roughly) trimmed for the wishbone holes. This would at least mean that 4 parts could be laid up at a time to speed the process up a bit. I'll see if I can find some spare time to see what's involved.

OK, now I'm finally starting to get things assembled for the last (hopefully) time, this is what my finished covers look like sprayed up and with my suspension bits all powdercoated.

You could use a pulse converter which would halve the pulse output from the coil. I used one for my digital speedo as the sensor output from the gearbox was nowhere near what it needed to be for the dash. Best thing is as it's pretty well infinitely variable, I can adjust it so the speedo reading is bang on for IVA. Got mine from here http://www.picbits.co.uk/catalog/advanced_search_result.php?keywords=pulse&x=13&y=8 The guy who makes them was very helpful, made one up for me and sent it out in a few days, cost around £35. No doubt you can get the tacho modified but I don't know what the cost would be.

The topic of bottom ball joints has been well covered already but I thought I'd just post this information which I thought might be relevant. I'm still in the process of building my 2B and I wanted the wishbones powder coating so I had to remove the balljoint. Knowing how tight they are and not having the proper tool I knew that some damage was inevitable and I ended up chewing up the outside of the joints around the 4 cut-outs, so a pair of replacements were purchased. The two photos below show the old joint on the left and the new one on the right for comparison The new joints arent QH but are made by First Line ( http://www.firstline.co.uk/PAGES/aboutus.html ) and sold as a replacement for the QH QS972S Peugeot 405 type joint. I noticed that the old joints have the ball fitted from the underside of the joint and are retained by a seperate metal disc that is held in by rolling over the bottom of the joint body whereas the new joint has the ball fitted from the top and are retained just by forming over the edge of the hole that the tapered part of the ball comes through. This is more obvious if you remove the rubber covers (which I did) but I'm wondering if the retention of the ball into the body is better on the old type joint as the hole in the main body only needs to be big enough to accomodate the articulation of the tapered part whereas the hole in the new joint must have started big enough to allow the actual ball part to pass through and is made smaller by the forming process. I suspect that the load bearing portion of the nylon cup inside the joint may well be smaller on the newer joint but short of cutting a pair of joints in half, this is something I can't prove - although I may well buy another new joint and do just that out of curiosity. The joint is subjected to loads that it would never see in it's original application and although I'm sure it has a fairly generous safety factor designed in, it can still fail. I've still fitted the new joints (together with some tabs to stop them unscrewing) but when I finally do get on the road I will be keeping a close eye on them and in particular look out for damage to the rubbers that might lead to accelerated wear.

Damp tarmac, rear wheel drive, V8 engine - what could possibly go wrong? Well this could apparently: this was preceeded a few moments earlier by a display of supreme muppetry with arms flailing at the steering wheel while trying to power out of it but the end result was inevitable. Personally I'd have just throttled off, wound on a bit of opposite lock, come to a standstill in the road in front of 200+ onlookers and taken the shame. The car's a TVR of some description and despite up-rooting 2 small road signs, it did drive away - once it had been pulled out of the ditch by a Land Rover that was also at the event together with a short 'chat' with a couple of passing police. Sadly I didn't get a photo of the other side but given the speed of impact I think someone's going to be busy with the P40!!!! This is a good event with a nice variety of stuff to see - it'll be a shame if t!ts like this end up getting it shut down.

Yes http://community.rhocar.org/index.php?showtopic=23666

Assuming it's Ford it could be a replacement for a type 5, used behind the 3 litre Essex in Capris, Granadas etc. These are a short box because they don't have an extension housing on the back for the 5th gear set (being only 4 speed).

This'll presumably be referring top the Mark 3 Granada not the Mark 2, which has a different back end and wishbone front suspension not struts.

1/4" NPT

All sorted now thanks to my local motor factors. I only popped in for a pair for front wheel bearings (£14 ea +VAT) and thought I'd see if they'd give me a price on a sender. After a quick check in the book to confirm the part number, he pops out the back and returns a few minutes later with the dirtiest, shabbiest box I've ever seen, containing the said sender. He then proceeds to tell me that given the age of the part and the fact that he'll probably never sell it to anyone else, I can have it at cost price. Just over 14 quid. Result.

I've used an umbrella handbrake (Mk1 Cortina) that's mounted to the left of the steering wheel. I can easily reach it with harnesses on but it was a lot of hassle to get it working because I had to incorporate a lever system to get the required pull on the cable up to the rear - the lever ratio is about 7:1 This isn't the best picture but you can see the handbrake just inside the far dash tube and the 7:1 lever which is inside the tunnel above the gearbox. Not exactly the easiest way to do it but it's an alternative to having it on the tunnel. Edit: bit better photo of the lever

Chain type oil filter wrench?

I'm after a Vauxhall oil pressure sender. It's the combined type that does both the oil warning light and the gauge so it's got two terminals on the back of it and is used on astra, cavalier, calibra and 2.0 XE. It will probably look like this http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vie...e=STRK:MEWAX:IT thought probably not quite as shiny. I'm using an Astra digital dash on my pinto and would rather try an old sender unit to check it all works before I splash out on a new one. Ta.

Ok, my pair look like this: For reference the ground diameter is 338mm long and the thread length of the large threaded end is about 48mm. The nut on the smaller threaded end is staked on so I've not disturbed it. PM sent.

Just read this post and I think I might have some shafts spare. As my car is wishbone I'm not 100% familiar with the parts but I'm assuming it's a front strut shaft. I'll look them out tonight and will post a photo and some sizes for comparison.

Yes there is a trick, have a look at this on the NW RH site which shows how to fit the side panels and achieve the curve you're after: http://nw.rhocar.org/side_panels.htm It says that you need two people but I just did it very carefully and managed on my own, plenty of clamps and lots of checking and re-checking. I also wanted the curve of the wheelarch to match the wheel and avoid the off-roader look so I fitted the wheelarch so the front lower edge is level with the bottom of the side panel and the rear lower edge is level with the bottom of the rear panel, then made a curved infill to fill in the front bit. Not the best picture but it looks like this and should be ok with the wing piping fitted.

Right, I now have the very latest copy of ECE43 from VOSA that I got this morning. The text is essentially the same as my earlier copy and it appears that the 5.5.1 marks to indicate the type of glass are a requirement. The minimum requirements of the marking will be as shown in the table below - any other naming or tradenames aren't relevant. For our purposes I think we only need to consider TOUGHENED or LAMINATED screens which will be the first and third markings shown - photos of actual markings are shown in the earlier posts - one is compliant and the other one isn't. Remember that the E4 referred to in the table below could be E1, E2 etc, just as long as it is a country from the list in my earlier post. I have full copies of the regulation that I can e-mail if requested - just pm me your e-mail address.

I'm getting further confirmation of the latest ECE43 regulations at the moment, I should have more information soon. John, you have a pm.

OK, my glass looks like this: E17 - A Glass approved for Finland 43R - Complying to ECE43 00230 - The approval number The key element that appears to be missing is the glass identifier near the approval mark as per section 5.5.1, however as this is just a toughened screen and would therefore be just I or /, I can't see this will be a problem if you get my meaning. In any case if people are planning on submitting screens for IVA then I'd suggest a visit to the test station beforehand with a copy of the ECE43 standard might save on disagreements on the day if they don't have a copy of the standard to hand. I will check over the next few days that I have the latest copy of the standard so that it can be made available to those who want it. What might be helpful would be anyone who has passed IVA with a screen fitted could give details of the markings shown on their screen (in the format above) together with detail of which test centre passed the screen. That way we can get an idea of whether this is a problem at certain test centres.

My pedals look a bit high too but I don't think it'll be a problem when I've got my driving shoes on:

I've been having a look at the ECE43 regulation for the approval of safety glazing because we've got the regs here at work. For IVA purposes the relevant sections are 4 and 5 (just a couple of pages) which is good as it's a 146 page document. Section 4 deals with the marking of the glass, specifically: From Section 4.1 - "Every safety glass pane, including the samples and test pieces submitted for approval, shall bear the trade name of mark of the manufacturer. The marking shall be clearly legible and indelible." Section 5 deals with the actual approval - what's shown on the glass which is additional to the markings described in section 4: From Section 5.4 - "There shall be affixed conspicuously to every safety glass pane and double glazed unit conforming to the type approval under this regulation, in addition to the marking prescribed in paragraph 4.1, an international approval mark This approval mark shall consist of: 5.4.1 a circle surrounding the letter "E" followed by the distinguishing number of the country which has granted approval (see note 1 below) 5.4.2. the number of this Regulation, followed by the letter "R", a dash and the approval number to the right of the circle prescribed in paragraph 5.4.1. 5.5. The following additional symbols shall be affixed near the above approval mark: 5.5.1. in the case of a windscreen : I. for toughened glass (I/P if faced) II. for ordinary laminated glass (II/P if faced) III. for treated laminated glass (III/P if faced) IV. for glass-plastics glazing. 5.6. The approval mark and symbol shall be clearly legible and be indelible. Note 1: The distinguishing numbers for the country of approval are as follows: 1/ 1 for the Federal Republic Germany, 2 for France, 3 for Italy, 4 for the Netherlands, 5 for Sweden, 6 for Belgium, 7 for Hungary, 8 for Czechoslovakia , 9 for Spain, 10 for Yugoslavia, 11 for the United Kingdom, 12 for Austria, 13 for Luxembourg, 14 for Switzerland, 15 for the German Democratic Republic, 16 for Norway, 17 for Finland, 18 for Denmark, 19 for Romania, 20 for Poland, 21 for Portugal, 22 for the Russian Federation, 23 for Greece, 24 for Ireland, 25 for Croatia, 26 for Slovenia, 27 for Slovakia, 28 for Belarus, 29 for Estonia, 30 (vacant), 31 for Bosnia and Herzegovina, 32 for Latvia, 33-36 (vacant), 37 for Turkey,38-39 (vacant), 40 for The former ugoslav Republic of Macedonia, 41 (vacant), 42 for the European Community (Approvals are granted by its Member States their respective ECE symbol) and 43 for Japan. Subsequent numbers shall be assigned to other countries in the chronological order in which they ratify. So Steve's glass marked as above would read as: E1 - A glass approved for the federal republic of Germany // - Ordinary laminated glass 43R - complying to ECE43 001664 - the approval number So according to the regulation this glass is OK. There does seem to be some confusion here where glass is marked E17, the letter and number marked in the circle doesn't have to say E43 to be compliant with ECE43. This affects me too as my glass does have E17 marked on it but I'm not sure what other marking is shown on the glass in addition to this. Now that I've had the chance to read through the regulation I'll look at my screen tonight and get a photo of the marking on here so we can get a comparison as I know my glass is toughened, not laminated like Steve's, and see whether it would still comply.

Model identification here: http://nw.rhocar.org/identification.htm

That'll be Power Torque Engineering www.powertorque.co.uk Herald Way, Binley, Coventry CV3 2RQ United Kingdom Telephone: Head Office: 024 7663 5757

If it's 2 fuse boxes with 4 fuses in each it could be a Premier Loom. Send me your e-mail address via pm and I'll e-mail you the wiring sheets (there's no diagram as such)

Listing now removed from Ebay so a step in the right direction.