February Update

Dateline - March 8th 2011 - February was full of bits and pieces work focused around fiberglass and wood, plus a couple weeks down sick! First, started by creating the foam bucks for the center vents. I need to pull air out of the main ducts that run alongside the airbox (black plastic in the pictures), so I designed two new ducts in foam that I fiber glassed to create ducting.





I also got parts in for the turn signal based upon 1994 Chevy Astro parts. Of course, nothing fit like it was designed because I am creating something new, from something old. So I had to do a lot of manufacturing, cutting, sanding, drilling, bending and general hacking! But I got it to work. So now I have a modern turn signal that has the windshield wiper, cruse control and dimmer switch all on one turn signal that fits on the steering column and even has automatic return! Okay, sometimes I just have to admit that "I'm good!"







Back to the air ducks. Once I got the bucks done, and the fiber glass, I created aluminum sleeves and then laid up the fiber glass on the bucks. Once dry, I cut and sanded the fiber glass smooth and got ready for the next step.




...But first, I and Matt had some work to do with the birdseye maple. Lots of cutting and sanding gave us enough 1/4 inch pieces to create the entire dashboard. We will have to mirror the pieces, but it is going to look really, really good!






Back to the ducting! I melted out the pink foam with with acetone, cleaned up the residue, then created the aluminum back plate and also the damper value that is used to stop the airflow when the defroster or floor only settings are selected. These will be activated by push rod connected to the vacuum motors that will activate the other air control valves.






And my final work for the month before I was knocked down by a vicious cold, was to fiberglass the center console. I haven't had time to clean this up yet, but the fiber glass came out just like I wanted it too. I'm very pleased.

Slow Progress Forward

Dateline - Jan 24th - It's been a long, slow journey over the last several weeks working on the car. It seems that, after a lot of quick progress, things have ground down a bit. But moving forward is a good thing, no matter how slow!

So, over the last few weeks, I started shaping the fascia for the drivers side dash out of pink foam. I will only be able to do the section from the door to the steering column because of the complexity of the column, turn signal and ignition key. That area I plan to mold in modeling clay on which I will lay up the fiberglass.

I also purchased my new emergency hand brake lever. Since the original hand brake was under the dash, I needed to make some modifications to get this to work. It is going to now be in the center console to the right of the gear shift selector. I would have liked it to be on the left, but there was not enough space there. I made a bracket for the lever out of steel and bolted it into the car. I may weld it in before I'm done. Not quite sure about that yet.






I've also started to think about fiberglass. I bought and read a book on fiberglass techniques, so now I need to buy the fiberglass and resin to start building up the center console and dash fascias. The center console should be pretty easy because I just need to put the fiberglass over the pink foam. The fascias will be a little harder because I can either layup fiberglass over the foam and then melt the foam out with acetone, or I can do a negative mold over the foam and then do a positive from that. Both have advantages. Doing the layup over the pink foam will be quicker, but I will need to embed reinforcements for the glove box, hinges, screws, hangers, etc into the foam as a lay up the fiberglass for the best strength. Plus I will need to make the foam significantly smaller then I want the finished product to be in order to account for the thickness of the fiberglass.

Making the negative mold would make it easier to do the layup because I would be able to put the reinforcements in as I lay up the fiberglass, and I don't have to make the plug smaller because it will be the size I want. The problem is that I will end up doing three times the work making a negative mold then a positive one, since you have to do a lot to make a good negative mold. Plus, since I am only doing this once, a negative mold doesn't provide a lot of extra value. Still moiling this over.










I also started modifying the air circulation system. I knew I needed to make room for the big GPS/Stereo receiver in the dash and the only way to do that was to cut a big section out of the air box. Fortunately, with the A/C evaporator out of there, I have plenty of room. So I marked out the area, cut it out with a saber saw, and then made sheet aluminum pieces to fit. I taped them in with aluminum ducting tape. I think this is going to be waterproof enough and robust enough for this application. If I start having problems, I can always fiberglass it in later.

I'm also working with Matt to come up with a wood dash design. The piece of bird-eye maple that we have available isn't quite wide enough. So we have come up with a plan to mirror the maple along the length of the dash, using a black seam as a divider. Since the steering wheel has a black seam in it also, the may be a really good solution that ties the dash in with the steering wheel. We are also thinking about putting a similar seam into the gear selector knob and maybe the emergency brake handle. Matt has purchased a drill that will cut the maple a little shy of the gauge diameters so that we can in-set the gauges behind the maple. I think this is going to look really cool. Here are some updated renders that I've done with the newer dash ideas. I've also updated the door panels and center console to reflect more of the reality of the interior.






Finally, I've been in conversation with a company in Belgium that specializes in classic car carpets. I think I've narrowed down the color that I want that matches my interior, and they have really good prices. Since these carpets are designed around the restoration market, I know they will fit, and I will not have to spend time myself trying to make my own. Dollars well spent! Now I just need the Euro to weaken so that I can get a better price.



So, I guess I'm making better headway then I thought! Now, I need to purchase a used heavy duty sewing machine, matching vinyl, fiberglass and resin, the GM turn signal and handle, two vacuum motors for the air circulation system, the power door switch, new fuse blocks and lots of wire to move the fuses from the center of the dash to under the drivers side dash. Everything but the sewing machine and vinyl have been sourced, I just need to make a purchase.

Stay tuned for more...

Actualizing the Plan

Dateline - Dec 28 - It's been a busy weekend. I had four days off from work, so I decided to take advantage and put some serious time into the car. Friday I started actualizing the interior, but I wanted to make sure everything would work, so I reinstalled the steering column and slipped on the wheel to make sure everything worked ergonomically. Boy does it ever! It felt really good to sit in the car as if it were running. Everything was placed perfectly!

With that out of the way, I started on the center console. This is the center focus of the car, and I wanted to start laying it out so that I can get the overall look. I'm using the original console as the base so I had to get it in shape. I had pulled all the old vinyl and foam backing off, but there was still a lot of residue, so I spent some time rubbing it off. I thought of using acetone to remove the foam, but I didn't know how this would affect the rubberized paper that the console is made out of. So I just rubbed it off instead! Then I had to deal with rust. Yes, even the center console has rust! Anything made of metal in this car has rust of some kind!

I also had to work on the left and right foot well heater outlets which had some serious rust on them, partially because they were covered with vinyl, which held in the water, and partially...well...because they are metal and rust! Once I had everything sanded, I painted it with my rust encapsulating paint. Here are some pictures of the heater outlets before, during and after:







Because I'm extending the console up the dash, I had to create a steal framework and attach it to the console, using pop rivets. Once that was done, I cut out sections of one inch pink insulation foam and epoxied it to the frame, after which I sanded it into shape. I'm not completely happy with how straight-edge everything is right now. I think I will end up adding some more curves to the frame, but at least I know how it will look.










I also did a job that I've been wanting to do for some time. I welded in some blind nuts for the shifter quadrant. It was such a pain trying to reach between the transmission and the tunnel to get washers and nuts on the bolts for the quadrant (see previous post http://leapingv8s.blogspot.com/2009/06/steering-wheel-shifter-and-tunes-plus.html). Since I had everything out, I decided that now was the time to weld in some blind nuts so that I will not need to struggle with that again!

Saturday (Christmas) I took the day off and went and visited my friends Matt and Karen, who sold me the car in the first place (Yes, they are still my friends =). I've asked Matt, who is an accomplished wood worker, to build my wood dash for me. He showed me a piece of "birds-eye" maple that he had in his shop to see if it would do for my dash. It's a grand piece of wood! I hope we can make it work.

Sunday, back to the car! Since I couldn't do too much more on the center console at the moment, I decided to start the buck for the right side dash fascia. The Jags (like most British cars of the time), did not have a fascia below the dash. Instead, they had a black plastic edging that went around the bottom of the dash and a tray below to hold sundries. Since I'm building a custom interior, I've decided to add a fascia that will also incorporate a glove box. To do this, I need to create a fiberglass panel in the correct shape, which I will then reinforce to handle the glove box, and then cover in vinyl like the rest of the interior. To create the fiberglass panel, I first need a "buck" to lay the fiberglass upon.


The buck started out one inch pink foam. I cut each piece out individually and epoxied together. Once the epoxy set up, I took my sanding block and started sanding it down to the correct shape. I'll tell you, all those years of building scale model R/C aircraft really paid off here! It gave me the skills I needed to do this work. Here are some pictures of the process:











Monday was a day to work on more mock-ups. I needed to figure out how the kick panels that will run from the center console into the foot wells would work, especially with the heater air outlets. So, I broke out the good old construction paper and blue tape and figure out how they will fit. I will probably make these out of light gauge aluminum. I could make them out of fiberglass, but it will be just as easy and less time consuming to make them out of sheet aluminum. They will be covered in vinyl anyway, so that should work well.

I also started mocking up the door panels. The first thing I noticed was that my original renderings were not really to scale! Once I got a chance to see what was really in the car, I realized that I would have to change my plans a bit. But not to worry. I'm going to be able to keep my original idea of carbon composite insets with Jaguar Leapers in silver leaf! And with the narrower seats, I have more room for armrests and door pockets. I'm even going to be able to move the speakers out, making them more directional. Sadly, it looks like I'm going to loose that wood door trim that I wanted, but c'est la vie. Oops! That's French! This is a British car! Let's try the immortal words of John Cleese in "A Fish Called Wanda", "Right! Well! That's it then!"

2011 Almost Here And The Clock Is Counting

Dateline - Dec 15, 2010 - Well, the clock is counting down to June to get the car done. I have a lot of work to do and need to focus as much as possible. I've stopped body work for a while, since it is way to cold in my garage to bondo, sand and paint. So I'm working on the interior. In my last post I reported that my gauges have come in. Since then, I've put a good portion of the dash back together by putting the air box back in. I wanted to removed the A/C Coils from the air box first, so I spend several hours drilling out pop rivets and prying things apart with a screwdriver. Of course, I did have a slip and managed to tear some skin off my finger with the screwdriver!

After I got the air box in the car, I started mocking up the dash using the gauges and foam core poster board. I was concerned about having enough space behind the dash for the new gauges, since they are significantly thicker then the stock versions. The good news is that without the a/c coils, I can reduce the size of the air box significantly. This will make it much easier to mount the five center gauges, and the GPS/Radio! I was pretty happy about that.

Also, I'd like to report that I got my new racing seats in! They look really nice in this car! They came with sliders already, but I needed to make brackets because the seat is about five inches narrower then the originals. Of course, just a piece of metal would not do the trick! I had to make brackets the lowered the seats about an inch so that I have enough head room. Here are the brackets:




And here are the seats in the car:





I thought that I could possibly put race seats in the back too, but I tried to fit them and there just is not enough room. So I'm going to need to source a new back seat, or custom make one. I have some ideas there...

After getting the seats in, I started mocking up the center console. I started with the original console with the vinyl removed, then stared added construction paper until I had the idea roughed out.






Then I cut the center sections out of mat board and taped construction paper cutouts of the different items like air vents, switches, heater controls and GPS/Stereo. I also added a section of the bottom fairing so that I could get an idea of how it would look:



Now I need to wait for some components before I can move forward. I've ordered my climate control box and heater control value, one of the new air vents. I order and received one of the aircraft switches that I plan to use which helped in determining that I can not do my original idea of having four pairs of switches on the dash. I will need to put the switches together in a row, very similiar to the original Series I layout.

I still have to source 1) Carbon fiber for the door panels and the center console, 2) Vinyl of the same color and texture as the seats for the interior, 3) a used heavy duty sewing machine, 4) emergency brake handle and 5) Carpets. But things are starting to go well. Still lots of work, but I really feel like I'm moving forward.

Thanksgiving and Gauges

Dateline - 25 November 2010 - HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!

The car is moving forward! I now have all the doors hung, the front driver's fender on, and the filler done on the driver's side back fender. The driver's side front door needed to be moved back to give a better seam line, so I made some steel shims and installed them. Much better panel lines now!

Also, I ordered my gauges from eGauges.com and they arrived this week! I ordered AutoMeter Arctic White gauges that have white faces, red pointers, chrome bezels and slightly domed lenses. I also ordered green LED bulbs to make the faces brighter.

The gauges I ordered are: Electric Speedometer with sender, electric tach, electric oil pressure, electric water temperature, volt meter, gas gauge and clock. Yes, a clock! Don't all high end cars have a clock? Here is the picture:



Now, I need to get some card stock and foam core and start mocking up the dash! FUN!

Sitting But Not Forgotten - One Year on Jackstands

Well, the Jag has been sitting since July. The summer saw a lot of other interests of mine come into play, including road bicycling (got a really cool Felt road bike this year ), and other things. Now that the winter is starting to set in, and the car has officially sat on Jack stands in the garage for a year, it is time to start going again.

Over the last couple of weeks, I've done some new virtual renderings of the interior of the car using my 3D rendering software "Blender" (http://www.blender.org). I've added a GPS system, removed a lot of the extra gauges and changed the ones that I kept to white faces, and found these really cool aircraft switches that I'll be able to use for the interior to make it look uniform. I've also added two new air vents in the dash to help increase circulation in the car. This has been a real problem in the Series 1 cars. Here is the results thus far








Also, this weekend I started working on the car again. I've hung both the front and back left side doors, and added the metal around the headlight on the left fender for the headlight surround. I'm still stripping paint, but I should have that done soon and can hang the front fender. The drivers side of the car is in a lot better shape then the passenger, and I think I will be able to get a lot more done quickly.

The plan now is to get everything done on the inside and outside of the car accept the paint. I will get all the interior built, rewire done, etc. and then pull it out, truck the car to the painter in the spring, have them do their magic and then bring the car back, install the interior and drive it! I've decide to not try to spray the car in the garage. Just too much hassle and I have a much better chance of getting a good job done by having a pro do it.