Caterham Academy 2012 - Build (Day 8)

Day 8:

So today was supposed to be a good day, but very rapidly turned into a very frustrating one instead....it was bound to happen at some point. Basically I spent all day trying to get the diff in, only to find out that after 6 hours work I need to take it out again due to an error in the build manual!!!!!!

I have a new BMW diff, which is supposed to be much quieter than the old Sierra diff, but proved to be a bit of a pig to fit. I got the diff onto a trolley jack and into position reasonably quickly, but the three retaining bolts that hold it into place didn't want to go in. I could get the bottom two retaining bolts in OK and the spacers between the diff and carrier in with a bit of jiggling, but the top one was an absolute pig. No matter what I seemed to do the diff and the carrier were out of alignment by about 1mm. I went round the loop of tightening, untightening, shifting, lifting, jiggling and generally shouting at the diff three or four times before phoning Caterham, whereupon I was told to encourage the top bolt in with a hammer!

Eventually after much blood and sweat I got the diff in, all of the spacers properly sorted out and the retaining bolts done up, only to look at the paperwork that had been hanging off the rear frame in the plastic bag. I had removed it that morning and not looked at it, instead following the build manual as I had been all along. In it were a set of installation instruction for the diff that were different from those in the build manual and it was at this point that I lost my sense of humour. The new instructions, for the BMW diff rather than the Sierra diff, require the handbrake cable to be installed the opposite way around and for a different set of washers to be used on the retaining bolts, neither of which seem like big things, but they do require the diff to come out again!

I am taking the day off tomorrow for a family event and will come back to it again afresh on Sunday. Hopefully the whole process will be a lot quicker next time around now I know how it all goes together, but it really is not a job I want to do again! Oh well, onwards and upwards.

Caterham Academy 2012 - Build (Day 7)

Day 7:

Today I started late as my little girl was doing a harvest festival performance at school and I wanted to go along and see it. I am burning brownie points with the family quite quickly at the moment, so it was a good way of earning a few back. It was also the cutest thing I have seen for a very long time and quite lovely to watch her up there performing (she is 3 so spent most of the time looking a little confused by it all), so no great hardship and a nice break from the build for the morning.

I got into the garage just after lunchtime and spent a few hours finishing (most of) the wiring and getting (most) of the cooling system done. A few small jobs remain, namely working out where two remaining rogue wires from the main engine loom go, getting the expansion tank fitted when the new bracket arrives and taking the slack out of the throttle cable, but they aren't anything major. Once that is done I will focus on tidying everything up with cable ties and doing a final sweep of the engine bay to make sure it is as good as it can be.

I managed to get the springs from the exhaust primaries to the cat fitted, which were causing me issues yesterday, but this required some gentle persuasion with a hammer to be directed towards the retaining clips before they would go on. I then got the diff out and set about fixing the handbrake and cables into the transmission tunnel before the diff can go on tomorrow.

All being well tomorrow will be full steam ahead on the rear end of the car and the hope is that by the end of the weekend I will have the majority of the mechanical bits on. The hope is that next week I can focus on getting the cage and interior installed before trying to start her up and run final checks. I think the next couple of days should see me break the back of the work and have something more resembling a car than boxes of bits. Here is hoping tomorrow is a productive day!

Caterham Academy 2012 - Build (Day 6)

Day 6:

Having worried endlessly yesterday about the 2mm off-set on the gearbox and how I was going to get it perfectly aligned, one short call to Caterham put my mind at rest....."oh don't worry about it....they all do that". Brilliant. A final check of all the engine mounts and I could move on.

I spent the morning connecting the majority of wires and getting thoroughly confused by the starter motor wiring, which is completely different to that in the build manual as I have a master cut out switch for racing. Still, a couple of hours and a few calls to Caterham later I had the majority of it together and had managed to go back and do a couple of small jobs that I had missed the day before (washer jets, replacing one of the engine mounting bolts etc.). I am scrupulously making notes of everything that I am having to skip because of missing parts and trying to get the jobs finished no later than a couple days later, otherwise I worry that I will forget something and only find out come IVA day, which would be less than ideal!

In the afternoon I moved onto the exhaust primaries, which went in without an issue, but for the life of me I couldn't get enough compression on the springs holding the primaries to the cat, so need to have another look at them in the morning, before I can tighten the primaries up properly and get the rest of the exhaust on. I then spent an hour or so getting the steering column in and aligned properly, before tightening up the rack clamps and getting the steering hub on. In doing these jobs I found a couple of other bits missing, but Caterham have been very good at sending things through promptly, so I hope not to be held up too much.

Finally I moved onto the radiator and associated plumbing which all went together nice and logically. I decided to stop when I got to the expansion bottle and found that the mounting bracket had been welded together incorrectly, requiring another one to be sent through (hopefully here in a couple of days time), otherwise i would probably still be going at it now.......it was a good day in the garage yesterday. I am finding a momentum with the build that I am happy with and am starting to gain more confidence in what I am doing.

Tomorrow I am going to try and finish the wiring, plumbing and exhaust, which will be almost all of the front end of the car complete, before moving on to the prop, rear suspension and the dreaded diff!

Caterham Academy 2012 - Build (Day 5)

Day 5:

The aim of today was to get the engine and gearbox in, which I managed to do....just. I spent the morning sorting out random things such as the engine mounts, horns and other things that are inacessable once the engine and gearbox are in. I then spent some time protecting the sides of the engine bay and transmittion tunnel with cardboard to protect them from any damage when lifting the engine and gearbox in.

I roped my stepfather John into helping me with the lift itself, which was a jolly good idea as it is very definatley a two person job when you do it for the first time. We took three or four attempts to get the angle of the engine and gearbox right, the axle stands in a position that wouldn't get in the way of the legs of the hoist and the garage door in a position that it wouldn't catch on the arm of the hoist! We took our time as this really isn't a job to be rushed, but by angling the car down and getting the engine and gearbox at approximatley 30 degrees we got it in.....only for me to realise that I hadn't put the gearbox mounting bracket on first! Luckily there was enough wiggle room for us to pull the engine forward, put the bracket on the gearbox and then slide it all back 6 inches.

We then put the engine mounting brackets on and set about fixing everything in position, which is where it all started to get interesting. With the gearbox positioned exactly right I torqued up all of the bolts for the engine mounts, only to find that it had pulled the gearbox 2 - 3mm off centre. We had 3 goes at getting this right, but it kept moving just away from centre, which is very annoying. I am going to have one more go tomorrow, but if it repeats itself then I will phone Caterham and see what they suggest. I don't think it will cause any issues as the prop has a CV joint in it and the gearbox is clear of all obstructions in the tunnel, but I want to satisfy myself that it will all be OK.

I then completed a final few jobs, putting the gearstick on and the reverse light switch in. I then started on some of the engine wiring before calling it a day tired but satisfied. Today was a good day, with real visible progress made and the old girl starting to look like a car rather than a collection of boxes.

Tomorrow I hope to get everything in the engine wired up, before moving onto the rear suspension and diff.....which I think will be great fun if all of the stories I have read are to be believed!

Caterham Academy 2012 - Build (Day 4)

Day 4:

I had a bit of a late start today, but did manage to use the morning to go and pick up an engine hoist from a very kind Caterham 7 Club member not too far away, so I don't feel too guilty about the limited progress made today!

I managed to get a few hours in the garage in the afternoon and started by removing and re-assembling the front ARB, which I wasn't quite happy with. I was worried that one of the balls wasn't quite sitting correctly in the cup on the front of the upper wishbone. It was a good job I did check because it had shattered and needed replacing, which was a relativity straightforward job.

I then moved on to the bellhousing, which attached to the gearbox pretty easily. Having phoned Caterham in the morning to tell them I couldn't find the kit to mount the gearbox I realised it was in the one box I hadn't opened! Now there is a valid reason for this....it is because the box was marked starter motor! Apparently they remove the starter motor and put on the engine, then re-use the box for the bellhousing/gearbox kit. With a bit of fiddling the gearbox and bellhousing went onto the engine without any great challenge. The bolts that attach the starter to the block were the main challenge, but weren't too bad.

Finally I completed a few of the small jobs required before the engine and gearbox can be installed in the engine, such as fitting the washer bottle and connecting up the coolant hoses at the back of the engine. I still need to do the horns and a couple of other small things, but they should only take me an hour or so before I look to get the engine in.

I hope to make an early start tomorrow and get a good 10 hours in. I would really like to get the engine and gearbox into the chassis, so I can then start work on the rear suspension the following day. The thing I find really hard at the moment is knowing how well I am progressing. Having never done anything like this before it is hard to know if I am on track to complete by the end of next week or not, but it is great fun, even if it is frustrating at times. Tomorrow should be a good day and help me to see a big difference in the build process and boost confidence further, but for now I am contenting myself with getting things done properly!

Caterham Academy 2012 - Build (Day 3)

Today was all about finishing off the steering, front suspension and brakes. I spent the first hour or so checking over the jobs I had done the day before and making sure that I had torqued all of the crucial bolts up correctly. It was a good job I did check because I found I had missed a spring washer from the top damper mount. I am not sure how crucial it is, but feel better for checking, even if it did take me 30 mins or so to take the damper off and put it back on again.

Once satisfied that everything was OK from yesterday, I went on to fit the ant-roll bar, front callipers, brake lines and then sort out the front lights and indicators. I was hoping to then get the gearbox mounted to the engine, but discovered that I don't have the CRB or mounting kit for the bellhousing, which is irritating. I will phone Caterham first thing in the morning and sort out delivery, which will also give me time to locate an engine hoist.

It feels good to have the majority of the front of the car sorted and it felt like quite a productive day, even if I did spend an hour or so searching for parts that ultimately weren’t there! Still, I am now looking forward to moving onto the engine and gearbox and may make a start on the rear suspension whilst I wait for the other parts to arrive.

Caterham Academy 2012 - Build (Day 2)

Day 2:

Today was my first proper day with the car and I spent the first hour or so sorting out the various boxes and trying to find out where things were. Once I had worked out what was in each of the boxes and started unpacking the steering and front suspension I had a good 4 hours on thefront of the car.

The steering rack was straightforward to fit, but I had a couple of attempts at the wishbones before I got them right...I didn't get the number of spacing washers quite right first time, but once I had worked that out they went on easily enough. The dampers went on fine, but the uprights gave me grief for an hour or so. The problem was I didn't read far enough through the manual, so was struggling to get the locknuts on the top mounts done up, eventually working out that you need to do them up and get them located with a sacrificial plain nut, then taking it off and fixing it with the locknut. That will teach me!

The manual is OK, but at times it isn't particularly clear and you end up re-reading the passage 3 or 4 times before working out what they are trying to say. It means that you are always wondering if you have got it quite right or not....there is lots of scope for getting it wrong! As a result I didn't manage to get quite as much done as I wanted to, but I have made a good start and am pleased with the result so far. It has been a very satisfying day, but my back is suffering already...being an office dweller day in day out means I have some toughening up to do! Still, there is two weeks to go!

Tomorrow should see the front suspension complete if all goes to plan!