Made Great Progress on Interior

Dateline - 08/06/2016 - Worked two days this weekend to get the dash and center console in.  The center console was tricky, but because I had fitted everything so much before hand, everything fit pretty well.  The tricky part was re-figuring out how the vacuum connections needed to go together to get the climate controls to work.  But after about five hours, I had everything in and working!  Climate controls, air flow, heat, fans, switches and radio.

On Sunday I worked on the driver side dash.  I needed to rewire the information center because I had changed how the lights worked and which ones did what.  It took some figuring, but fortunately, I had a diagram I had put together originally that stated which wires did what, so it was a matter of transcribing the old and new and soldering the wires back together.  Once that was done, I was able to mount the dash.

After mounting the dash, I tried the lights and everything worked until I tried the dimmer. I noticed that the center gauges did not dim.  It was then that I realized the I had screwed up!  The dimmer that I am using for the lights needs to have both the hot and ground go to the dimmer switch.  When I wired the gauges, I ganged all the grounds together back to chassis ground.  So I had to take the gauges out again and rewire them so that the ground ran back to dimmer.  This meant that I had to pull the driver side dash out one more time.   After an hour of rewiring and refitting, I had everything in the car and it's all working correctly now.

I still have some work to do on the center console to get the gear selector lights working, but that should be a minor amount of work.  I'm also sewing new shifter and parking brake boots out of the tan vinyl to get rid of some of the overwhelming black center console.

Here are pictures:

Center console installed sans shifter and e-brake boots

Complete dash

Another car had my Attention

Dateline - 07/31/2016 - This weekend I worked on the Team Odin Race Car in preparation for the upcoming race on August 27/28 at The Ridge.  This is a LeMons race, and my first in this series.

After the engine replacement during the April race, we had a very bad vibration in the car.  We didn't know if it was the engine or something connected to it.  So Chris and Derek put the car up on the stand and we removed the transmission and started it to see if we could feel the vibration.  It was there.  So we removed the clutch and pressure plate and ran it.  Still there.  So then we started swapping flywheels.  We found that a Rover flywheel had the least amount of vibration through the entire range.  Of course, the rover flywheel would not match the clutch we had, but Chris had a low miles rover clutch in house, so we put everything back together and it felt very good.  So the car is ready for race day!

As for the Jag, I did do some work.  I drew up and etched yet a third circuit board that took out the load resisters and depended upon the 12 volt diodes I originally used.  I'm waiting for a couple of diodes to come in that I ordered to finish that.

I also worked on carbon center console.  I finished sanding and put four coats of lacquer clear on it.  After a good wet sanding, polishing compound, Cleaner wax and final waxing, it looks really good.  Not perfect, but hay, it's all done by hand, not machine!  I put all the components into it last night (Radio, switches, lighters, air vents, cup holder) so now it is ready to mount in the center console!  This is a big deal!  I've done a lot of work to get this part done, and I'm happy to be at the point that I can install it.

I've only a few things left to do inside the car.  We are planning on hanging panels in two weeks, so it is getting down to the wire!  Very, very cool.

Light Work This Weekend

Dateline - 07/24/2016 - Did light work on the car this weekend.  I spent some time working on the circuit board for the information center.  I'm not really happy how it is turning out and am probably going to do it one more time.  I'm going to change back to using 12 volt diodes and remove the load resistors.  It's a pretty tight squeeze to get everything on the board and I really am not happy with the results.

I also spent some time painting the trunk and resetting the fuel delivery system.  I didn't take pictures but I'll post some later.

That's it for now.

UPDATE: pictures:

Trunk after painting and installation of new fuel system

Close up of new fuel system.  Note fuel filters on each tank to keep dirt from getting into the valve system.

Took a Break This Weekend

Dateline - 07/16/2016 - Took a little break from the car this weekend.  I was invited to go to Crescent Lake on the Olympic Peninsula for the weekend.  What a fantastic place!

I did do some work on the car though.  I finished rubbing out the steering wheel, which came out really nice!  I also sanded and smoothed with Acetone the Information Center housing.  And I worked on he circuit board.  I hand drilled all the holes for the components, and test installed them to see how they fit.  It's close quarters, but everything will work.  It helps that the resistors are installed on the back side of the board.  I'll have pictures when I finish soldering everything together.

Fuel Leaks, Stripping Paint and Odds and Ends

Dateline - 07/02/2016 - 07/04/2016 - The week started off a bit rocky when I found out that the wonderful relay system that I had installed in the trunk to control flow from the two tanks leaked, badly!  Gas had been flowing down into the spare tire area and basically stripped the paint!  Here is a picture of the damage.

Paint damage done by gas leak in trunk.

So I went on line and purchased an actual auxiliary tank control valve that is a replacement for exiting valves for Ford and GM trucks and installed that.  This is actually a better solution because it is a three way valve so I only need to power it when I have gas coming from the right hand tank.  With no power, gas flows from the left tank.  I did loose the ability to shut gas off completely when the power is off, but that is a small price to pay to know that it is not going to leak!

Since the paint is pretty much destroyed in the trunk, I decided to strip it and paint the trunk with POR15, which is a very tough, solvent resistant primer.  This should seal the bottom well and be a good base for the new paint.

Another item I ordered was a replacement for the radiator filler.  The one I had was leaking badly from the overflow tube.  I purchased an aluminum replacement part that fits in the same place in the upper radiator hose.  So, while I was waiting for the paint stripper in the trunk to work, I got the engine running and hot enough to try out the electric radiator cooling fan.  Took some time to get it to come on around at 180 degrees, but I finally got it to cycle correctly.  It is good to know the fan is work correctly.  I have the manual override in the car also, but I definitely wanted these to work correctly via the thermostat mounted in the radiator.

While the engine was running, I noticed that I had a transmission fluid leak from the radiator.  One of the new lines I created did not seat correctly, so I had to put some more turns on the fitting.  I'm keeping an eye on that to make sure it is fixed.

I also worked on the Information Center circuit board.  I had to etch a new board so that the brake and oil warning lights would work correctly.  I also read that I should put load resisters in place to make sure I don't burn out the diodes, so I created a new board design with the correct changes, printed out on the laser printer, and etched a new board (see prior posts on the process here
http://leapingv8s.blogspot.com/2013/03/odds-and-ends-and-odds.html
http://leapingv8s.blogspot.com/2013/03/feels-like-slow-weekend.html and http://leapingv8s.blogspot.com/2013/01/not-feeling-well-but-work-goes-on_28.html).  I'm still waiting for the diodes and resisters to come from Amazon.  Here is the new board layout:

New circuit board for Information Center that has load resisters and positive power to brake and oil warning lights

I also worked on the plastic surround for the information center.  I did a 3D print a long time ago in PLA plastic, but wanted to do one in ABS because I can get a much smoother finish.  The problem is that I lost the original model I used to do the print, so I had to take one that I had modified and reshape it to the correct size and shape.  That took about four hours, but I did get one printed out finally.

Taking care of some other odds and ends, I sand blasted and painted the outside headlight bucked, painted a defroster vent I bought on ebay to replace the one I had that had a broken frame.  I also finish sanding the steering wheel which I had stripped and filled last summer, and put five coats of clear lacquer on it.  And I mounted the rear deck panel and rear speakers.  I didn't get around to mounting the center brake light yet.  I want to wait until I get the window glass in place to make sure it fits correctly.

Now I have to paint the trunk bottom again and reinstall the new gas flow system.  I also need to finish the center console fascia, but the list is getting really short now! I'm starting to run out of things to do on the car that don't require having the body panels installed.  That's a really cool thing!

Rewire is DONE!

Dateline - 06/26/2016 - Spent Friday, early Saturday and most of the day Sunday finishing up the wiring.  Surprisingly few problems after moving the relays.  Once I got everything hooked up correctly, it all work.  Go figure!

Here are before and after pictures.

Relays prior to wire cleanup

Before wire cleanup - Driver side

Before wire cleanup

After wire cleanup

Relays with temp labels

After wire cleanup - Driver side

After wire cleanup

After I got the wiring done, I reinstalled the center console and the right hand dash.  I can't installed the driver side until I get the new information center made.  Once that is done, all I have left to do is finish the center console fascia and the the dash will be done!

New Car and Rewire

Dateline - 06/18-2016 - This weekend saw the XK-8 leave my stable.  I had a lot of fun with that car, but was starting to have more and more problems and I was getting tired of having two project cars.  112K miles was a good haul, but now it's time for someone else to deal with it. 

In it's place is a brand new 2017 Subaru WRX.  Let me tell you, this thing is scary fast and I've been taking it easy to break in the engine!  Wow!  What a different car than the Jag!

Here are some pictures:

2017 Subaru WRX in WR Blue Pearl

As for the XJ-6, I sent a full day Sunday working on a rewire of all the relays.  I first marked each wire and cut then so that I had a matching number on each end.  Then I pulled the two banks 6of relays out and started mounting them under the dash pad.  I have a good area to mount them, so I started with the heater relays, moved to the two wiper relays, then the side-markers, headlights, transmission lockout, rear window defroster and auxiliary.  Two good things came of this rewire.  All but one relay are under the dash pad, and I removed a hole much of splices that could have worked lose and caused a failure.  I even ended up removing a great deal of extra wire because it no longer had to run down to the switches, but just up to a relay.

The last part of the day I spent rewiring the switches into the system.  I didn't finish it yesterday because I was getting tired and my back started to hurt.  So I called it a day with just the fuel select switch to wire and some grounds/hot from ignition to figure out.  After those are done, I need to retest everything, but if it works, then I can button everything back up and call it good.