Wiring started

I got a fair amount done this week, although I did lose a couple of very nice weather days thinking that I was missing 2 parts that were really there all along.

The first step was to drill a couple of holes in the firewall for the wires to pass through and to install grommets in the holes to protect the wires. I could not find the grommets. All I did find were 2 very small things labeled grommets that were not on my inventory sheet or covered in the manual, that I could tell. I went to a couple of autoparts stores looking to buy what I needed, but they did not have grommets that big. I posted a question on the Hurricane owners forums and eventually came to believe the grommets I have are for the sidepipe installation that comes much later.

I decided to flip through some old paper catalogs I have from some mail order autoparts stores and came across a picture of a wiring harness, similar to mine, that seemed to show the kind of grommets I would be needing. So I decided to look through my wiring harness kit again and found the grommets I needed all along in a bag with some electrical relays and switches. I felt stupid for overlooking them, but thrilled to be able to get back to working again.

The grommets proved to be just a little bit tricky and I did not have a hole saw or drill bit that was 1 3/8". I had 1 1/4 or 1 1/2. Rather than fiddle around with drilling it small and hand-widening it, I went to Sears and spent a few bucks for a new bit. The other problem was that the slit in the grommets was very small, so it only went around the aluminum sheets attached to the fiberglass on the firewall. So that meant I needed to cut the fiberglass hole about a 1/4" bigger than the aluminum. I did that with some die grinder trickery and now things seem to fit nicely.





Next I unpacked the wiring harness and stared at all of the wires trying to figure out what goes where. The instructions are okay, but there was no wiring diagram included with the harness by the manufacturer. A previous builder had done a beautiful 30"x36" PDF of it though, and Jerry was kind enough to print one out for me on his big plotter.








The next steps are pulling with wires together and through to their various locations. I also had to install some wire clamps to hold the plastic split looms that the wire runs in. Packing the wire into those was more time-consuming than you would think. It is a pretty tight fit. The first branch to be done is the one going to the front of the car for the headlights, bright and dim, turn signal lights, parking lights, and ground. There was also some cutting and splicing which it turns out I am not very good at.

Body is off

I did manage to get some help this week and get the body taken off of the Cobra. Now I can get on to the wiring work. There really wasn't anything too picture-worthy, but next week should be a good one. I also bought a new soldering iron for $3.99 at Harbor Freight. Wish me luck that it works; I just couldn't see spending 4 or 5 times that for one from Sears.

Still no work

Sorry, but still no work is getting done on the Cobra.

Another workless week

It is hard to see how I am ever going to make progress without actually ever working on the car. I did nothing this week again. I had a lot of bowling league end-of-year work to do, divying up over $14,000. Maybe this week, assuming Dan Dog gets feeling better.

Still busy with real life

I put in less than half an hour on the car this week. I did a little test fitting of the wiper system and filed down the two bushings that come with the wipers. They needed to cut to about 45 degrees, but out of the package were only about 20 degrees. I am still leery about making all of the wiper trim pieces and such fit properly, but for now, I need to move on to other parts of the car. And for that I will need to recruit some helpers to remove the body.

No work

Sorry folks, I did not work on the car this week. Quite a few real life things I need to get done right now.

Wiper infrastructure done

This week saw me complete the windshield wiper setup, but not complete the final installation which occurs later. To do this required mounting the body and for that I recruited the most wonderful family members for some badly needed help.

On Saturday, Elaine, Abby and Neo came by to help move the body off of the buck and onto the frame. Here is Abby.

It was light and went fairly smoothly, although the instructions in the manual were pretty sparse. Eventually we got it into place. Then we tried to re-install the windshield that was assembled 3 years ago with very little luck. Eventually, I determined that Phil, Nathan and I had made something of a mistake back when we drilled the holes into the frame to hold the windshield legs.

In looking back over some old pictures and my work spreadsheet, I figured that we started out drilling the holes right, but had so much trouble with my underpowered drill that we switched to drilling the holes with the body off. We must have miscalculated where the legs of the windshield would go. We got them at the proper angle and basic location, but there was just no way to get them to go through the slots cut in the body.

On Sunday, Nathan came over and I jogged his memory from when we originally did the windshield support holes and how to best fix everything. We decided that only 2 things could possibly have been done wrong--either the body/cockpit mounting was wrong, or the original hole drilling was wrong. We decided to completely fit the body with all mounting points in place to make 100% certain that we would be good to proceed safe in the knowledge that the body was right. So we installed a rollbar, the front body mount pieces and the front and rear quick jacks. The bottom line, was that the body/cockpit were fine. (The sidepipe cutouts may be an issue later, but that is pretty common on these cars). Here are some pics...

Rollbar...



Rear quick jacks...


Front body mounts...


Confident that the body/cockpit was fine, Nathan and I next had to decide what to do about the windshield not being mountable as the holes did not line up. We could have re-drilled new holes, but that is very tough at this stage and the sweep angle of the windshield would only have been about 29 or 30 degrees instead of the desired 37. We could have modified the frame and winshield legs to make it work, but that could have slightly reduced their holding strength and that seemed like a bad idea. So we decided to elongate the slots that were cut in the fiberglass where the legs go through the body to tie into the frame. We filed out about 3/8 of an inch or so. Some previous builders had to do this too. If you look at the first picture in this post with Abby, you can see the windshield leg going through the slot at the wrong angle and not lining up with our holes. Now the old pre-drilled holes are very close to lining up perfectly and we have an exact 37 degree sweep. A little more embiggening (Nate said he learned that word in Engineering School) of the holes will make things fit very well.

So at this point, we knew the windshield was very very close to its proper permanent location and we could proceed to drill the 2 holes in the body to accomodate the wiper arm mounts that I assembled last week. The holes had to be 20 inches apart at a 45 degree angle, and according to many previous builders, the manual is wrong about how close to drill the holes to the windshield. The instructions said 3 inches from the engine bay opening, but everybody agrees that they need to be much closes to the windshield itself. After measuring twice we drilled the 2 holes. You can see one in this picture...


Here are a couple of pics showing the body in place, the windshield at the right angle and the wiper arm holes drilled. We test-fit the wiper assembly and it seems fine.



All of this was painfully done knowing that the wipers are unlikely ever to be used! It is an open car not meant to ever be driven in the rain! But the state of Missouri requires them on all cars, so on they go. And from reading the other builders' posts about these wipers, there may be future troubles with the motor sort of shaking the arms too much and not working well. I doubt that the state inspector will even test them, frankly. Anyway, now the body can come off again and I can start the wiring.