Project Scimitar MV6

Project Scimitar MV6

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lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Sunday 1st May 2011
quotequote all
There's not much to show for this afternoons efforts, maybe some bolts heads. The mount holes in the body all needed redrilling as they are in different places. It was time consuming finding these without making the holes too big. It seems the whole body is sitting 8mm further forward than it used to, I think this is due to the new trailing arm mounts on the chassis, everything else seems ok with the new location.

A few photos for the sake of it.




Maybe more to come this weekend, not sure!

Comadis

1,731 posts

222 months

Sunday 1st May 2011
quotequote all
trunnion to balljoint is a good idea....but was involved with lots of work...i think this solution would have been adaptable, too:

http://www.canleyclassics.com/?xhtml=xhtml/product...


lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Sunday 1st May 2011
quotequote all
Yeah this looks good, its been discussed at length on the scimitar Forum, I believe its for the spitfire and similar car suspension rather than the TR6 which the Scimitar has more in common with.

Thanks for looking folks

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Monday 2nd May 2011
quotequote all
Mini update (and I think the last one for a while)

Did some fibreglassing in the car today patching up some of the old mount holes and rear seat belt pick up points


And did a few modifications to the Van servo and master to get it to fit the Scimitar


I've been concentrating so much on getting the shell and chassis back together I've put no thought into where to go next. The more I try and find things to do, the more I find that I need to the engine out of the omega before progress can be made.

So I guess when I next have some time to work on it the Scimitar will be out and the omega will be comencing open engine surgery.

Thanks for following so far smile

CNHSS1

942 posts

216 months

Monday 2nd May 2011
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Good work fella

Tomoose85

1,927 posts

170 months

Thursday 5th May 2011
quotequote all
Top work, top thread.

Keep the updates coming smile

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Sunday 15th May 2011
quotequote all
Thanks folks, sorry its been a while, here's another update.

Been working on the back end of the car this weekend.

Its been a case of lots of work with little to show for it, like tidying up the inside bodywork with glass fibre and painting it again. I've finally got a pair of original toyota balljoints for the front to allow the suspension full movement, so that can be fully assembled now (well soon).

I went crazy on the rear loom, stripped it of all the rear wiper stuff and wired in some waterproof connectors, 5 pin for each of the light clusters, a 2 pin connector for the number plate lights, and a 3 pin (using the rear wiper wires) for the lpg connections. There will be no fog lights in the bumper to keep it looking simple, one of the reverse lights will have ared fog bulb in it.


Spent a while fitting the new lights (the ones that has been in slice recently). I'm really pleased with them (still in plastic at the mo)


And finally I spent a while fiddling around trying to arrange a hidden location for the LPG filler. I'm well chuffed with it. The rear left vent has been sealed up and the filler fitted in, so that no gas goes in the car when you remove the filler pipe. It fits neatly inside so the pipe to the tank goes immediatly into the rear light cluster area. and the cover plate has been slotted where the screw holes are, and two springs hold it in place (if you see what mean).





Might not be any more for a couple of weeks till the next holiday. Thanks for looking.

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Tuesday 17th May 2011
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Had 10 mins tonight after preparing for work tomorrow, so put the front calipers on to see what they look like, I think I'm happy with the blue now smile

Can't wait to fit the toyo proxies in a couple of weeks smilesmilesmile




lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Wednesday 18th May 2011
quotequote all
AAAAAAGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH !!!!!!!!

I'm so annoyed!

Wnet down to say hello to the car, span the wheel (the one in the photo) and it is not centred on the hub properly frownfrownfrown

The b***dy engineering company that redrilled the hubs seem to have done it with their eyes closed frown

Its challenging enough as it is, I don't need to be taking the hubs off again, especially as the fronts have news bearings and new grease and the rears are so dam hard to get off frownfrown

there's noone here at the mo to listen to me rant so:

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH frown

rant over

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Sunday 29th May 2011
quotequote all
Got a fews more days holiday to get some more done. I spent the day trying to take the engine out of the Omega, there is so much s**t in that car its unbelievable.

Here are a few piccies

LPG successfully removed and the engine can still run (so I know how to install it when its back on the Scimitar). Worried the vapouriser is a bit small for this installation?


And the engine:



More to come

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Monday 30th May 2011
quotequote all
A little update.

The clutch cylinder is 21.5mm diameter and the scimitar one that I have seems to be about 16 so using that is out of the question enless I want loads of pedal travel. It seems fitting the omega one will require some butchery; the rod will need extending, and a "thing" making to bolt the odd shaped omega master to the scimitar bulk head.


The scimitar always had lots of throttle travel and I wanted to address that, now if I use the scimitar one with the omega throttle body it'll get worse, so I'll graft the omega pedal onto the scimitar pedal box as it has a pivot much lower giving far less travel.


What on earth of these pipes then?? They go from each side of the engine in the exhaust manifolds and meet at the front in this odd pipe.



And some more of the engine just in case you haven't seen the x30xe enough yet.



More to come

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Tuesday 31st May 2011
quotequote all
The hubs are with a different engineering firm now hopefully they'll get the PCD right, I'm about to spent a frightening amount of a decent set of tires and the engine is looking much more like a V6 now with the ancilaries removed, the only one that'll be going back on is the alternator. I'm wondering if there is a lower amp on that might fit and more importantly might be smaller and lighter.

I couldn't help myself and had to try the manifolds on to see how it'll look smile






More to come

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Tuesday 31st May 2011
quotequote all
Besides the problem with money and not being able to get the car finished maybe even this year, its been a great day, I've not been this happy for ages, I love working on engines. I'm about the swap the sumps, I'll check a main bearing and big end, but looking through the inlets I can see the honing looks perfect, so it looks like I'll be leaving the bottom half alone.

The cam belt lookts pretty recent as you can still see the print on the outside of the belt and the tensioners look very new too. But as its this stripped I should probably change it all, not sure yet? heres a few piccies.

Its amazingly compact with all the ancillaries removed it really is small





More to come

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Wednesday 1st June 2011
quotequote all
Right then, an exciting update. Got the tires fitted, I've never spent so much on tires before, but I wanted to buy a serious road tire so got a set of Toyo Proxies T-1R's. I couldn't resist mocking it up to see how it would look (the hubs are still MIA). I could not be happier with how it looks, I love the Wheels, I love the tires, I love the aspect ratio smilesmilesmilesmilesmile

The gearing is spot on as far as I can see, I think its almost exactly the same as in the omega with this wheel and tire combination ("new gearing " is the new wheels):


And here is my gorgeous car smile






Checked a big end bearing and it looks like new, so I'm going ot leave the bottom end alone now, its all cleaned and seal with the vectra sump and pick up.


With the lightweight flywheel I got for the engine I was told by Courtney (Vauxhall performance company) that I would need to buy one of their uprated clutches as the lightwieght flywheel was for the FWD engines and wouldn't fit the omega clutch. And as such the clutch slave would be extending just a little further and it would be wise to get a new one of those too. But....

Upon inspection today it seems the flywheel is exactly the same dimension as the dual mass beasty, in all the important dimensions, I've checked and checked it really looks identical so as the clutch has loads of meat on it thats £300 saved.

In terms of whether the clutch can handle the extra power...

I called Canems (who I'll be buying a programable ECU from shortly) they were very helpful and think with the MAF sensor replaced with a MAP sensor and the tubular manifolds I should be seeing upwards of 240bhp. To back this up they did a carpi with the MAP sensor mod and a decent exhasut system (but not manifol) and saw 238bhp.

My thinking is the standard clutch should be fine with a 20% increase.

I should start work on the heads soon

More to come

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Thursday 2nd June 2011
quotequote all
Today I've spent far too much time looking at the car with its new wheels in place, I can't get enough, I know it won't be to everyones taste but its exactly what I've wanted for ages.

Anyway on with the important buisness of progress.

Between staring sessions I enlarged the throttle body a bit, not to the point of need bigger butterflies but there were some signifcant chunk of material that would hinder flow, I think its there to make small throttle openings more controllable, I think! In the photo, with the throttle held open, the one on the left is as vauxhall intended it and the right one is getting on for as I intend it to be smile on the bottom side was done at this point.


And I'm going to have a go at making a more compact version of the following, I quite fancy putting the engine back as far as Nath did but without changing the bulkhead. The coilpacks will also need relocating, it seems all the other stuff on the back of the engine is emissions stuff so can all be binned smile


More to come

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Thursday 2nd June 2011
quotequote all
Thanks Max, but in case you hadn't noticed, this is taking me ages and costing a fortune smilesmile

You've got a point about the Clutch, but I think at worst it'll just give gearbox chatter and might be a little harsher on take off and gearchanges. I've no experiance of this before but you can buy paddle clutches with no springs like this:
http://www.burtonpower.com/parts-by-category/trans...

After a slow day (fixing a friends mower in the morning frown ) I've had a productive evening.

I smashed the ali box thing up that bolts to the back of the block to get a better idea of what it was. Its just full of baffles and a non return valve thats so stiff it clearly wasn't doing anything so I've made a replacement part with a baffle in it and all the vacuum take offs to give the correct PCV or positive crankcase ventilation into the inlet manifold. The most important thing you'll notice is that its now much smaller and should give more room to get the engine up against the bulkhead.

There's a thin vacuum line to the downstream side of the throttles (i.e. inside the plenum) for PCV at idle and light load, then at full load when there's more blowby gas in the crank case there are two bigger pipes that take the gas to just upstream of the throttle. I've tried to keep this system as close as pos to how it's intended to be, and a partial vacuum in the crankcase is great for stopping oil leaks past the oil seals and reduces sludge biuld up.

Anyway pics tell a thousand words so I'll shut up



Looks like a little boat


All the welding warped the hell out of it so I span up the lathe and flattened it down again


This is where it'll live



You can see its much slimmer


I'm tryign to get my head round the cooling system, any ideas when the two little electric coolant pumps are used anyone, I want to bin them see.

More to come

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Friday 3rd June 2011
quotequote all
After making that PCV thing smaller I had a look at the coolant hose that goes round the back of the block, thats a real pain that is frown

I've done my best to make it smaller but its still big enough not to warrent making the PCV thingy smile

Here's some piccies of the original and the new hose arrangement

As was



And the new one



Might start making the swirl pot now as the SS has arrived

More to come

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Friday 3rd June 2011
quotequote all
Here's a couple of better photos of the new pipe outlet




This is will be mounted on the side of the swirl pot as a sight glass just to show everything is working fine (hopefully)
First I took a glass filter


Then gutted it


The trimmed down the float from the Omegas fuel tank to fit inside, this should hopefully spend its life at the top of the sight glass


Just researching what size the swirl pot should be

More to come

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Friday 3rd June 2011
quotequote all
frownfrownfrownfrown

I love welding when it works but today was a s**t welding day for me,

Its pretty much sealed up now, but it just looks a mess frown


Inside the top


And the finished item, complete with bird poo welds


Maybe more to come but that might be it for a while

lozzzzzz

Original Poster:

339 posts

156 months

Tuesday 7th June 2011
quotequote all
Thanks TeeinChina I would have to learn to weld properly before I could call myself anything smile

I got a couple of hours free again last night and managed to mess the tank up a bit, but overall progress has been made
The swirl pot is now a bit shinier but still covered in weld


Got some pumps to keep it full, got a second one as a) I've heard they're not the most reliable and b) the second one could be switched on when the tank is getting low.

I had thought about using another injecion pump as they're a lot more reliable, but I'm worried that the pressue in the swirl pot might just edge too high and start effecting the pressure at the fuel rail (downstream of the actual high pressure pump), so I'm sticking with these Facet jobs.

I know I'm going a bit OTT for the omega engine but I'm thinking of the future (LS1) so I welding up the tanks 8mm tails and welded in some 10mm ones instead. The return was easy but the feed obviously needs to be fairly near the bottom of the tank so I got it all right, then lowered the tank to the floor to weld it. Turns out the pipe must have been knocked and I ended up welding it up 2 inches from the bottom of the tank frownfrownfrown

So I cut it out and welded the patch on it that you see, then put another feed tail in the side as you can see int he photo.

I've cut the tank open as the baffle inside had come loose. Turns out its not stainless where the rest of the tank is so would have suffered with bimetalic corrosion when the ethanol content goes up as ethanol is an electrolite.

So that'll be replaced with a stainless baffle next time I'm down the garage and sealed up again. I did fancy reducing the size of the tank as its so big and will mainly be run on LPG, but sealing a tank with a MIG welder is a mightmare so I'm going to leave it as is I think, just means I'll not often get the pleasure of seeing the fuel guage on full.

Here's a photo of the abomination I did a couple of years back, viewed from below (its in the rafters). The idea was to put a sump on it to negate the need for a swirl pot. It took FOREVER to get it sealed up. And, as I used mild welding wire the problem of bimetalic corrosion would have still been there.


I'd love to own a business modernising classic cars, that would be ace smile (pipe dream)

More to come

Edited by lozzzzzz on Tuesday 7th June 19:14