jimmyesh on Sat Jan 10, 2009 11:05 am

Turbo oil feed and oil drain pipes turned up today 🙂

I managed to strip down, refurb and paint the rear brakes yesterday, also made some 20mm handbrake cable spacers and 8mm hub spacers. When I manage to get another "leave pass" off Mrs Esh, I'll be getting her on the ramps and tying up some loose ends 🙂

jimmyesh on Mon Feb 09, 2009 8:57 pm

Hi everyone, just a quick post to say that the project is still very much moving along and I'll have some pics posted up here soon of some new updates 🙂

As I showed a few weeks ago, the Caterham Cosworth inlet plenum was just WAAAY too big to have even the smallest hope of fitting in what's left of my engine bay 😥 . As a result I sold it on ebay for near enough what I paid then set about designing and fabricating a custom compact aluminum plenum that's more suitable for my needs.

There's only about 7.5" room between the face of the head and the rad/slam panel, so I'm aiming to keep the depth of the plenum to 6.5" to allow room for movement etc, also as it's located right at the front of the 'bay it can't protrude too high as the bonnet won't shut! :oooh:

I'm using 4" X 4" section 400mm long aluminium extruded tube for the main plenum body (I cut this to size today) and have already made a throttle body mounting plate for the end, complete with time-sert steel m6 threads. This is housing the standard 2.3 Duratec 65mm throttle body. I've also ordered a twin DCOE/Throttle bodies Duratec inlet manifold from ebay which is going to be TIG welded to my plenum as soon as it arrives! 😀

Still got mock-up where the throttle cable bracket will be welded on and where I'm putting the vacuum take-offs etc but hopefully it'll come together.

Also have some front brakes now in the form of Esc Cos calipers & discs which should work well behind my 15's 🙂

Bye for now, next time I'll have pics - I promise! :bonkers:

jimmyesh on Wed Feb 11, 2009 9:10 pm

Ha cheers for the "advice" chaps but I intend on staying married for a few years thanks! :oooh: 😆

Here's what landed on the doorstep today, I've been waiting for that manifold so that I can get the inlet fabricated - mega happy that it's turned up 🙂

The discs and pads are just standard Escort Cosworth 280mm items to go with the Esc Cos calipers that arrived the other day. I'm not into fancy drilled/grooved stuff as my car is a primarily road-going civilised beast! 😆

jimmyesh on Fri Feb 13, 2009 3:07 pm

Here's how the new plenum's shaping up - not bad for one we knocked up at work! 😆 😛

Still a lot more to do with it yet but it's getting there 🙂

jimmyesh on Sun Feb 15, 2009 1:09 pm

Yeah black looks good too - decisions, decisions 🙂

I'm going to taper the shape of the plenum down from the throttle end to the closed end which is how a lot of custom plenums I've seen are shaped but is mainly due to space constraints at the front of the car! :oooh: I measured the capacity of the plenum and it's more than the CC of the eninge at present so losing some of it won't be a bad thing! :oooh:

I'm also going to buy some alloy trumpets/velocity stacks as used on bike carbs & twin DCOE's etc and install them inside the plenum to ensure pleasant running and good gas flow - might as well do this properly! :Q

I have some -4 and -6 JIC-to-barb fittings that I'm using for my vacuum/boost take-offs (3 vacuum and one larger one for the brake servo pipe), for this I'm using 3 -4 JIC male aluminium weld-on fittings from Earls and one -6 JIC.

I also need a weld-on aluminium 3/8 NPT female boss for the ACT sensor.

Over the next week or 2, things will take shape 😉

jimmyesh on Sun Feb 15, 2009 3:33 pm

Just got these on Ebay for a bragain - a set of CNC-Machined 45mm Velocity Stacks (NOT including those ancient carbs that they're stuck to in the pic! :aaah: ) which I'll be fitting on the inside of the plenum, feeding into each inlet runner :aviator: They're 57mm long, which is about all I can allow for with my inlet being tapered in shape.

I bought a FRST ISCV today as well which is more simple to fit due to the bypass having a simple pipe connection going past the throttle body instead of me having to do loads of intricate fabrication to allow the Duratec ISCV to be fitted :rolleyes:

Also managed to buy a Focus throttle cable which fits my throttle body, once that arrives I can get the mount sorted for that on the plenum.

Will be phoning Earls tomorrow and ordering the weld-on fittings for all the vacuum take-offs and ACT sensor boss, bye for now 😉

jimmyesh on Tue Feb 17, 2009 12:47 pm

Some Aluminium bits from those nice chaps at Earls Performance Hoses arrived today - the weld-on fitting for the A.C.T Sensor, along with the -4 & -6 fittings that my vacuum/boost fittings are connecting to 🙂 Also, the FRST ISCV turned up too 🙂

I cut the plenum along its length yesterday so that it tapers in from the throttle end, just waiting on the Ally velocity stacks + throttle cable so Mick and I can get this thing put together.

Did make a start on fitting my front brakes this morning but my little girl has a puking bug so I had to leave work to get her from the childminders - I dunno, you pay £600+ a month for child care but as soon as your kid's sick YOU have to sack work to look after them! :rolleyes: 😆

jimmyesh on Sat Feb 21, 2009 9:28 am

Bit of an update readers! 😀

Here's how the inlet plenum is taking shape - in the pic the inlet is upside-down as all the vacuum/boost take-offs, ACT sensor and ISCV will be mounted on the underside for a clean, un-cluttered look. The main reason though is clearance for closing the bonnet! :aaah: As you can see the velocity stacks arrived but as the first pic shows, they were a bit too tall for my compact plenum :rolleyes: A bit of a tickle in the metalsmith's workshop later and they're now a decent size.

On Monday, Mick the TIG welding guru is back so he's going to crack on with finishing the plenum 🙂

I fitted a Focus 1.6 throttle cable too which is just perfect - it goes through the original fiesta bulkhead grommet and has a ring-fitting on the end which is the exact size of the Duratec throttle mechanism arm fitting. Once the plenum's done I'll sort a cable bracket.

Escort Cosworth front brakes now installed, a nice well-proven budget brake upgrade and perfect for my car as it's staying on 15's (NOT the hideous TSW Stealths that it's wearing now! :aaah: ).

Also removed these shabby bits of scrap metal from the back end...

...and replaced them with these :Q

For now I've reverted back to a conventional single coil ignition setup as I just want to get this thing up and running for the least outlay and hassle for now - I'm keeping the individual coils stored in case I get adventurous at a later date 🙂

Also fitted the Pro-Alloy rad, firstly so I could check that the plenum will fit, but also so I could gauge the route my coolant hoses will take.

Here's a view of the turbo oil return to the sump and also the one from the oil catch tank.

As is normally the case with project cars, I rushed something when I was tired on a previous spannering session (that night when I fitted the engine) and as usual, it all needed ripping out and doing properly with a fresh mind and body! 😆 :rolleyes: I'm referring to the rear "torque-link" mount that stops the whole powertrain from swinging fore and aft as you take up drive - I got both the main top-mounts spot on but when I fitted the torque link it wasn't 100% straight and also the engine was "canted" slighly (swung on its axis so that the front was higher than it should be and the rear was lower), meaning that driveshaft alignment wouldn't be acceptable. As the torqe link just bolts through welded on mounts on the lower cross member, I ground off my original ones and started again with the engine held in the position for perfect driveshaft alignment.

It's better just to crack on now and rectify any problems than just bodge it and suffer massive failures once it runs! :aaah: 😆

Here's the pics of how it sits now

 
Engine totally straight (not swung on its axis). The best bit is that now the actuator and turbo are totally clear of the brake linkage bar. Also it means that I have slightly more room height-wise for the plenum at the front :Q

Those that have followed this thread will have seen how close the oil filter housing was to the front panel originally :oooh: As you can see, with the revised rear mount there's plenty more room 🙂

After all that messing around I managed to get the O/S driveshaft fitted, looks straight to me :aviator:

One last pic of the car before I collapsed in the bath at home :bonkers:

Bye for now 😉