My "building a cobra" thread

My "building a cobra" thread

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996Type

874 posts

160 months

Sunday 14th April
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Biggy Stardust

Original Poster:

7,068 posts

52 months

Sunday 14th April
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Too late for that now- sill sections are bolted, glued & tekscrewed into place. I just used copious quantities of galv spray into anywhere I could access.

Biggy Stardust

Original Poster:

7,068 posts

52 months

Thursday 25th April
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Today involved replacing the crappy gearknob with a much nicer one & replacing the indicator relay with a modified version suitable for LED lights. I also chopped my way into the indicator wiring, hooked up the indicators & checked they work.
Hardly worthy of photos.

There'll now be a bit of a hiatus until I can get a friend to give me a hand fitting the rear clamshell.

Biggy Stardust

Original Poster:

7,068 posts

52 months

Friday 26th April
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The work for today was at the back of the car. I chopped into the wiring, identified & marked the various wires & put them into chocolate block connectors for testing prior to putting the permanent connectors on.

With the help of a friend I offered up the rear clamshell to see what fits & what doesn't- areas needing sanding were identified and were sanded back ready for another trial fitting. This is a long & tedious process involving noise & massive boredom so I'll keep it to hour-long sessions at most & wear gloves/earplugs & maybe a dustmask. It's an exciting life........................

dxg

8,822 posts

268 months

Friday 26th April
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Maybe look at wago connectors. Much more reliable than chocolate blocks...

Error_404_Username_not_found

2,802 posts

59 months

Friday 26th April
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dxg said:
Maybe look at wago connectors. Much more reliable than chocolate blocks...
That was my initial thought but to his credit the OP did say that the choc-block is there for temporary testing purposes.
To be replaced with proper connectors.
Quite right too; I never use choc-block for anything other than testing. I've seen enough horrors!
Agree with you about Wagos. Never had an issue with them.

Biggy Stardust

Original Poster:

7,068 posts

52 months

Friday 26th April
quotequote all
Error_404_Username_not_found said:
That was my initial thought but to his credit the OP did say that the choc-block is there for temporary testing purposes.
To be replaced with proper connectors.
Quite right too; I never use choc-block for anything other than testing. I've seen enough horrors!
Agree with you about Wagos. Never had an issue with them.
Exactly- they're temporary for testing. I'll have to disassemble the electrics for paintwork so these were never intended to be permanent.

I have some connectors in a similar style to Wago which I'll be using for the foglights & reversing lights. The stop, tail, reg light & indicators will be using proprietary connectors the same as on my previous cobra build. When assembling it I have to choose connectors which will pass through the holes in the fibreglass.

I should add- all suggestions very welcome, thanks.

Edited by Biggy Stardust on Friday 26th April 20:20

996Type

874 posts

160 months

Friday 26th April
quotequote all
Looking good!

There are also modules if needed on Car Builder Solutions website (or similar) if needed for aux electrics, relay bases and DIY blade fuse systems etc…

Biggy Stardust

Original Poster:

7,068 posts

52 months

Friday 26th April
quotequote all
996Type said:
Looking good!

There are also modules if needed on Car Builder Solutions website (or similar) if needed for aux electrics, relay bases and DIY blade fuse systems etc…
Thanks but this is my second cobra build & I've got all the bits I need- lessons learned from the first build.

Biggy Stardust

Original Poster:

7,068 posts

52 months

Monday 20th May
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Things have been a bit quiet on the build front. Various fittings of the rear clamshell & endless filing/sanding to try & make it fit. Whilst I've had the sander out I've given the bodywork a general go-over to remove a few imperfections.

All this is dull so I decided to do a little job for light relief.

I'd previously identified & marked the wires for the various rear lights but one omission was the boot light. As the switch & wiring in the original boot lid are now gone I needed an alternative. I found the wires to the light & ran them to a little switch I fitted in the trim. As I didn't want to run the risk of accidentally leaving it on with the boot closed I decided to power it from the rear lights. The reg plate lights have 2 separate feeds/earths so one of those powers the boot light & the other powers the reg plate light. Everything is LED so there's zero issue with power requirements.



It's not a massive job but it all helps move the project forward.

Biggy Stardust

Original Poster:

7,068 posts

52 months

Tuesday 21st May
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Today's little job was to fit the windsceen washer jets. I wanted to keep the Z3's heated washer function but the donor car's jets were unsuitable as they were too low. The part from an X5 was chosen as it is raised up from the bonnet & has the same electrical connections.

The hole required in the bonnet was 10mm x 25mm so this was measured & marked.



I cut with the baby dremel but this was too much like sending a boy to do a man's job so the big rotary cutter came out to play. Once I'd cut the lines as best I could a 10mm drilbit removed the bulk of the material to be trimmed out. Then file the edges & test fit, repeating many times.



Eventually voila- I had a decent fairly tight fit.


The other side was exactly the same as the first, all the connections for water & power were just plug & play.



Although the little overcut lines are covered by the washer jets I'll fill them when I do the rest of the bodywork preparation prior to paintwork.

Edited by Biggy Stardust on Tuesday 21st May 14:06

Starm

85 posts

162 months

Saturday 19th October
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Hi, any progress updates on the build? Looking forward to see the results

FNG

4,412 posts

232 months

Sunday 20th October
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OP hasn’t posted for a few months, I suspect he’s been banned as used to be a prolific poster in NP&E and it can be pretty punchy in there.