Engine Lifted

December 29, 2103 -

  I got the oil pressure gauge sender on (although in the picture below you can't see it because it is on the back side of the engine.)  I lifted the engine so that I can get at the oil pan on the bottom and so that I can get the bell housing all the way on.  (The crate was preventing it from meeting all the way up to the engine.)  With no bell housing on here you can see the pressure plate (front bottom dark round part) with the clutch inside of that.

Clutch, Bell Housing, Engine Lift, Transmission Mount

December 20 - 22, 2014 -

  I attached the clutch and pressure plate to the flywheel on the engine and then put on the bell housing over those.  The big gray thing on the engine is the bell housing and the clutch and pressure plate are inside of it.

  Then I attached the mount block onto the transmission.  It is the black rubber block under the left part of the transmission in this picture.

  Lastly I bought an eye loop, chain, and hooks for the engine lift and put that together.

Upper Trunk Floor

December 15, 2013 -

  I got on another large panel.  This was the upper trunk floor with the hole cut out for the drop down battery box.  There was *a lot* of riveting and drilling.  Thanks go to Kara who started out riveting some side patch panels on the trunk sides.  I think I broke four drill bits over the course of just this one panel. So without further adieu....

Fuel Pump & Alternator

December 14, 2013 -

  Today I took the fuel pickup out of the fuel tank and installed the fuel pump.  I managed to do this through a oval hole in the trunk floor panel and not having to take the tank off the frame which was nice.  It took me a while until I pulled out the pump and looked in the tank and saw the rectangular walled section inside the tank which I think is there as a baffle to prevent fuel sloshing around your pump intake.  So the pump needs to fit into that rectangle inside at the bottom of the tank.  (You need to feed the pump in backwards, hook it into the rectangle and then turn it around so the outside line connections face forward.)

  Next I deconstructed the cardboard box and wooden crate the engine came in.  The base of the pallet and crate are still there serving as an engine stand.  Per the Factory Five directions I removed the stock headers on the engine.  I then installed the alternator on the engine.  There is one more pulley I need to put on before I put the belt on and then that will be done.  The alternator is at the front and bottom on the engine in this picture with the smaller black wheel on it.

Fuel Line .... and Hushmat

December 5, 2013 -

  I worked on the fuel line today.  My first bend kinked the line badly.  This meant cutting the kinked part out, putting the end nut on the new end, and then double flaring the newly cut end.  I am not sure my flaring tool had much life left in it.  As you might recall the 3/16" piece in the kit broke the last time I used it.  Fuel lines are 5/16" though.  Well after two more flarings this is what part of the tool looks like now.  (Compare the two wing nuts.)

  But I got one good double flaring out of it and installed the line.  I also installed the flexible line connecting this hard line to the fuel filter.  It is dark under the car so I'm not sure how well this picture will show...

  I'm left with a 5 foot long fuel line that I connect under the car to this one.  Five feet is a lot and will stick way up into the engine bay so it looks like I will have to cut that one.  That means having to do another double flaring....

  I'm a little unsure if the fuel filter will need to move more aft to make clearance for a rising rear tire.  It looks close.  [UPDATE: Move that fuel filter as far back as possible! I had to move it twice!] I'll have to to a load test on the ground and check it out.  Next up, I will be putting in the fuel pump.  This will mean I have to take out the fuel pickup I had already put in per the manual.  I wish someone would have told me that ahead of time.  I think I cut my finger installing that fuel pickup.

  And I forgot to add that I put on the first piece of Hushmat (like Dynamat) which insulates both sound and temperature.

  

Driver Cockpit Quarter Panel & Transmission

December 4, 2013 -

  I got the driver's side cockpit quarter panel in today.  We are having some warmer weather here so that was nice.  It is starting to look like someone could sit in this....

  Yesterday the transmission and a few other engine parts were delivered.  Here is what the transmission looks like.

Passenger Cockpit Quarter Panel

November 30, 2013 -

  I got the passenger cockpit rear quarter panel on today.  Things I learned are: it is supposed to be at least 40 degrees out to apply the silicone sealant which it barely was today, and drilling through cold steel (the frame) seem a lot tougher in the cold.  Then again my cheap 1/8" drill bits I bought in bulk could have just been dull.

Engine!

November 25, 2013 -

  I know I should show a picture of the finished hole I cut in that upper trunk floor panel from the last post... but I'm excited about the engine delivered today.  Here are some pics:

  It made it to the back of my garage.

  And when you take some of the plastic off.....

Upper Trunk Floor Cutting

November 17, 2013 -

  In using the FF Metal dropped battery box (which places the battery below the trunk space) you need to cut a rectangular hole in the upper trunk floor panel.  Cutting this hole so the edges are straight, smooth and square is time consuming.  After placing the panel in and tracing out the hole shape from below, you drill hole(s) to get it started, then snip out a larger hole, then hacksaw closer to your lines.  Then you use a file the rest of the way.  Snipping, hacksawing, and filing take a long time.  This is how far I got after about 3 hours.  Don't get me wrong, I think the dropped battery mod is a cool one and still worth the effort.

Engine & Transmission

November 15, 2013 -

  I put a deposit down on a Coyote engine and a Tremec TKO transmission.  I decided to go with Mike Forte's Parts Connection for a few reasons.  His price was competitive with Summit and Roush but I could tell that he had a lot of experience in helping folks get these into a Factory Five roadster.  (When I called him he was helping someone on the other line with exactly that.)  He said he was very willing to take calls personally if I needed help.  That could be worth a lot to me...

Trunk - Halfway

November 11, 2013 -

  I got the large lower trunk panel on as well as the small inner side triangular panels today.  The large lower trunk panel took a long time because large panels require a lot of drilling and riveting but also because the gas tank strap had to be removed and reattached which wasn't easy.

Underbody Coating

November 11, 2013 -

  With my friend's help I got the body upside down in the driveway in order to paint the wheel wells with some underbody coating.  (Thanks Damon!)  The coating serves two purposes.  One is to protect the body from small rocks kicked up by the tires and the other is to keep down the noise.  I used 3M 08881.  The stuff was like tar or asphalt in a can.  It seemed recommended by several others on the forums so I went with it.  Two coats took all of 4 cans.

Trunk - Beginning

November 8, 2013 -

  I was out of town last weekend through Wednesday on some vacation so it took a little while to have something to show.  I put on the large panels that define the sides of the trunk.  This took a while because big panels require a lot of drilling and riveting.

First Block-Off Plate

October 22, 2013 -

  I got the replacement front flexible brake lines from Wilwood today and put them on. I now just need a hand bleeding the front brakes. I was able to get the switch on the top of the brake pedal to connect to the wiring harness by just cutting the harness's connector in half and putting the individual wire's connectors on the switch's terminals. (It was that or do what they told me which was cut the connector off and put new individual wire connector's on each wire.) Then I got to use the first block-off plate (circular one) on the driver's front footbox panel. The front wiring harness goes through this (and the black rubber grommet in the middle) and connects with the main wiring harness.

Wiring Harness

October 20, 2013 -

  With some help I finished up the rear brakes! It was nice to see them stopping the wheels when applied. Then I installed the electrical wiring harness which comes together in a fuse panel in the pedal box.  The hard part was getting three lines from the harness to fit between two aluminum panels and go into the engine bay. The small opening had to be slowly enlarged to get them all to fit. You can see them in the picture below coming "out of no where" into the engine bay just below those hoses coming from the two brake reservoirs. Thank you Rachel for the extra hand in much of this.

Thank You

October 16, 2013 -

  No successes to report today but I wanted to thank two people for helping me out.  First when I was rolling out the body buck a leg snapped off and trying to fix that while holding up 1/4 of the buck and body is difficult.  (I've already done it once!)  My neighbor Dave saw this and came over to help.  Much appreciated!
  Later I tried to bleed the rear brakes with my dad.  The passenger side rear caliper bubbled and fluid came out and things looked good.  I couldn't get any fluid or bubbles out of the driver's rear caliper though.  I found a small slow drop leak in a hard line junction so maybe that's the issue?  I'm not sure why so much fluid got to the far passenger side and not the driver's side unless maybe there's a clog in the branch going to the driver's caliper or in the three way hard line junction, or the flexible line maybe? Another mystery to be solved, but I wanted to thank my dad for coming over and helping out.
  Oh and you might be wondering, what about the front brakes?  Turns out both flexible lines on the front were defective and leaked like a lawn sprinkler.  After taking them off and examining the fitting Wilwood agreed I did not over torque them and they must be defective.  Wilwood will be sending me replacements.

More Brake Lines

October 14, 2013 -

  I tried to make a big push today to finish up the brake lines.  I almost finished.  Here is a picture of the rear hard brake line.  I opted for the shorter pathway which left some extra line which I used up in a few gratuitous turns...

  Next I started on the front hard brake line.  I needed to do a double flaring and here it is:

  This was much better than my practice attempts which I may or may not have posted.  Those pictures aren't pretty.  With this piece I put in the front brake line (from the master cylinder to the T junction.)

  

  The line comes across left to right under the black bar and then down to the T junction.  The engine stuff you see is a motorcycle in the background.  One more double flaring and I can attach the first brake line I bent and it'll be time to fill with brake fluid and bleed the lines!

Brake Lines

October 10, 2013

  Got some new tools in today. A 36mm socket and a 5/8" drill bit. They were harder to find than you'd think so I had to turn to the internet. The socket was to tighten down the rear spindle nut so not much to see there. The drill bit made holes in the driver's footbox inner panel for the brake reservoir lines to go to the master cylinders. Check it out:

  Now I'm into bending the hard brake lines. Once those are done, I can fill the system with fluid and bleed the air out. Then it's time for the engine and transmission...

Passenger Panels

September 26, 2013 -

  Nothing too exciting new to show. I put in some of the floor panels for the passenger side of the cockpit.  This is in part to move the process along but also to get the panels out of the way of moving around the garage.  The truth is that the panels for the cockpit can be put in later than the manual states.  I will wait to do some as I think the extra access could be helpful when installing the transmission and drive axle.

Front Flexible Brake Line Mount

September 16, 2013 -

  I had to undo the front flexible brake line mount that I had previously done the way the manual states because the lines were touching the front tires when they turned completely.  I remounted them so the brake line comes in vertically and that took up a little more slack in the lines so they no longer touch the tire.  In order to do this I had to file out a corner from the rounded curve in the F-panels.  This might be because I have somewhat large tires on the front.  They are 17 inch 275 width Nitto's.  To fill the holes left by the previous mounting I put some silicone on a 3/16" rivet and riveted the holes.

Passenger Footbox and Wheel

September 10, 2013 -

  I siliconed and riveted up the passenger footbox:

  And here is a shot of the actual wheel:

Battery Box and Wheels

September 8, 2013 -

  I topped off the fluid in the IRS center section (rear differential) and then installed the new battery box I got from FF Metal. I had to trim about 1/4 of an inch off the support bar but otherwise it fit in great! It was also nice having a second hand around to hold it to line up all those pre-drilled holes. (Thanks Rachel!)

  Next I thought I would check the ride height by putting the wheels on. The frame rail by the doors are 9 inches off the ground but the large frame tubes dip a little lower and I would imagine this all lowers some with the engine and transmission installed.  I also think the fiber glass body will wrap down below the frame a little getting still closer to the ground.  Wheels on made for nice pictures below but also let me check for flexible brake line rubbing / interference in turning the wheels which is something I'm going to have to think about.  I found that so far, turning the wheels on the ground without power steering is easy.

  For some perspective on how low and small this car is, I put myself in one shot. I'm no giant...

Brakes

September 5, 2013 -

  It has been a while since I posted but a few things have been done. I got the front and rear flexible brake lines attached.  Pictured below is the rear:

 
  Next up were the brake reservoirs.  I have two and would advise anyone doing this project to spend the extra money for the second.  Having two will keep the front and rear brake line systems completely separate so that if a line were to leak and brakes go out (front for example), you should have the other (rear) still functional.  I deviated from the manual on placing the reservoirs for a few reasons. The manual puts the one reservoir on the driver's front foot box panel.  That was a crowded area.  The second reservoir would have had to go too far outboard and would be left under the body, making a tough compromise between being low enough to get the cap off and high enough to make sure the fluid flowed down to the master cylinder. So here they are on the nice thick firewall I got from FF Metal.

  Lastly, I thought my front wheels (rotors) were toe'd outward too much. The only way to really fix that was to take off the steering tie rod and screw it in further.  This is a little time consuming but gave me the chance to access the grease nipple on the tie rod end to put grease in there which I didn't do before initially installing.  Tip for getting the tie rod off- loosen the bracket it attaches to from the spindle, then use both a hammer and a rubber mallet by hitting the bolt downward with the mallet and the bracket upward with the hammer simultaneously.  It sounds crazy but if you do them both at the same time you really don't have to hit either one that hard. In this picture you can also see I temporarily mounted the steering wheel to check that the front flexible brake lines didn't get in the way of steering or suspension when turning the wheels lock to lock.

Gas Tank

August 15, 2013 -

  I got the gas tank in place.  It was tough, in some part because the flanges around the tank's welded edge were bent up in places but I think needed to be flattened in order to fit.  This wasn't stated in the manual but after I asked someone at Factory Five they confirmed it.  The passenger side strap isn't all the way together tight but they say not to do that yet as it may need loosening or removing later to put some aluminum panels on.

Rear Brakes, Steering Rack, Pedal Box

August 14, 2013 -

  It's been a little while since I posted. Sorry, but things have been getting done. I got the rear brake rotors and calipers mounted.

  After that I got the steering rack and shaft in.

  Lastly, I put together the pedal box and installed it into the driver's foot box.  The brake pedal is in with two master cylinders connected (two metal cylinders on top with yellow caps on them.) You can also see the clutch cable coming over the clutch quadrant in the lower left part of the picture. The hardest part of the pedal box was using cheap snap ring pliers to get the snap rings off and on.  What I eventually realized was that the holes in the snap rings were just a little too small for the points I had on my snap ring plier attachments. (Yeah it's the kind with multiple attaching heads so you can imagine how good that grip is.) But since they were cheap I didn't care about taking a file to the points and filing them down to a smaller diameter which would fit in the holes in the snap rings.

Rear Spindle with Upper Control Arm

August 6, 2013 -

I got the upper control arm into the frame with its spacers around the heim joint and the other end onto the rear spindles. Soap helped slide things together (Thanks Damon!) Also, Joe at Factory Five suggested using the handle of a hammer to try and spread the frame mount tabs apart a little to get things to fit easier. While this helped a little with the lower control arms it helped a lot with the upper control arm since those mounts stick out from the frame further so you have more leverage on them. That tip probably would've helped with the front shocks where I had to file down the spacers to get them to fit.

Rear End

August 5, 2013 -

  As I was waiting for the IRS center section I thought I could skip ahead and assemble the e-brake (or parking brake) handle assembly. It was cool putting something together that I'd be touching as a driver. Pushing the spring pin (it looks like a small cylinder with a cut running up the side) into the ratchet mount plates and ratchet tooth took a little finagling but none of it was too hard.

  And then wouldn't you know it, at the very end of the day the UPS man came and dropped of my IRS center section and rear spindles. That IRS center section was heavy and really hard to push up from under the frame into where it needed to go. This was a great way to see how it needed to go in. (In the video his weighs 15 lbs because its empty. Mine came full of everything except gear oil and was probably 80 lbs.) To get it seated correctly I called Damon over and had a second set of hands. He stuck around to help put in the lower control arms, shocks, and CV axles. We tried to fit in the rear spindles but it was too tight a fit. I know now, to stop when things aren't going easy and you are tired. Go to the internet for answers and come back another day. Thanks for all the help Damon!

The bright stuff up front is just plastic covering the end of the CV axle keeping dirt and dust off a greasy end. The big aluminum thing towards the back is the IRS center section. 

Driver Front Footbox

August 4, 2013 -

  I have been waiting for a while now on the independent rear suspension (IRS) center section to work on the rear axle, shocks, spindles, etc.  As that is still on back order, I skipped ahead in the manual to put on the driver's front footbox panel. The cool parts were more riveting with the pneumatic riveter and I got to use the new Cleco fasteners I got for my birthday. (Thanks Meredith!) The Clecos are the copper colored things sticking out below the big hole in the panel. (There are two of them used in this picture.)

Front Wilwood Brakes

July 19, 2013 -
 
  Since I wasn't sure I used the *exact* right thread locker on the small bolts that hold the two pieces of the front brake rotor together, I followed a friend's advice and ran safety wire through these dozen bolts on each front rotor.  I looked just about everywhere but no local stores had safety wire.  After looking online for 5 seconds I found it as well as the concept of safety wire pliers which make twisting the wire faster and prettier.  I bought the wire online with some cheap safety wire pliers. First, unless you've done safety wiring before, you will cut your hands or fingers at least once learning.  Second, your first one (or two) won't look so great so you'll probably just pull it out.  Lastly, my cheap pliers worked just about until the end.  Right as I was doing the last two, the clip that slides back to hold the pliers clamped down on the wires started bending in a way that let the pliers mouth pop open and not stay clamped on the wires.  I don't think I'll have to safety wire anything else so I can see both arguments for good tools that cost more, and a cheap tool that lasts just as long as you need it.  Here's one of the rotors with safety wiring.  The safety wire pliers are above and next to them are some needle nose pliers which came in handy too.

  Once that was done I could put in the front Wilwood 6 piston calipers.

Front Spindle-Hub

July 14, 2013 -

Got the front spindles and hubs on. Thanks to Dave for the 36mm socket!

Some Time Off

July 13, 2013 -

Had to take some time off this past week to practice for a golf tournament with my Dad. It paid off though as we won the low net in the 2013 Westwood Member-Member golf tournament. Way to go Dad!