Day 21: rear brakes, handbrake, speed sensors

The kit arrived a month ago. I thought it would take me two months to build, but I'm very much at the end of the build now. Despite days wasted due to shortages, things have progressed nicely.

Today was finishing connecting up the rear brakes, handbrake cables and starting on the interior.

The rear brakes are supplied with hydraulic fluid via a brake pipe through the tunnel. Then pressure is delivered via a flexible pipe into the RH rear brake, and connected to the LH brake via another rigid brake pipe, mounted on the live axle.

The rigid brake pipe will need a bit of manipulating. But working along, clipping it into place, it just needed finger-bending and settled into place easily.

LH rear brake. Brake pipe visible going off to the RH rear brake. Speed sensor visible on left of photo

Rigid brake pipe fixed to live axle using small plastic clips

The speed sensors are easily fitted, and a few more cable ties keep them neat (I must have used nearly 100 over the car by now...). 

RH rear wheel from behind. From the bottom, you can see the flexible brake pipe, the rigid brake pipe and the speed sensor 

The two handbrake cables are connected easily into the brake drums, and are then taken into the tunnel, crossing over on the way. It all feels very logical and clear. 

Axle from RHS, with handbrake cable visible lying just clear above the axle

Back of the tunnel, from above. The handbrake cables connect to the T-fitting on the back of the handbrake bracket

 Lastly, most of the above pic was covered up by the tunnel plate, rivetted on. 

Day 20: rear suspension

With the arrival of the bush spacers (spacer bushes?) for the radius arms, this job could be completed.

LATER EDIT: I recommend tightening up the upper radius arm right away, as once you've put the seats in, you can't reach the inside end of the bolt any more.

It's all very straightforward, and by magic the differential/prop shaft rise into the right position (just a few mm away from the chassis strut beneath them, but far enough. As usual, everything was smeared in Coppa Slip.

RHS rear axle, with radius arms in place

LHS rear axle, prior to fitting half shafts

Poor pic, but this is the LH end of the panhard rod, viewed from under LH rear

Fitting the axle oil seal requires a special tool, or something found in the garage that will do, to ensure it is driven in evenly, into its proper place. After a long hunt around, I found the least likely tool for the job - the finial off an old garden parasol! Made from some kind of cheap plastic, it was nevertheless exactly the right diameter, and even had a convenient boss on top to whack with the mallet.

Garden parasol finial (next to axle oil seal). A garage essential

Once in place, the half shafts fitted in nicely on each side, and were bolted and torqued up. 

LHS rear brake in place

Next job , rear brake connections

Day 16: rear axle installation

Having bent my back trying to put the diff inside the rear axle, I was foreman mostly for this job, while my son did the heavy lifting.

The main thing to worry about is scratching things, dinging the axle into panels, and all the many sharp edges on the axle as you put it in place. My advice: cover everything you can with pipelag.

Rear axle from LHS

Once the axle casing is resting on the pipelagging covering the chassis members, then it can be swung up 90deg to the horizontal, and attached to the propshaft. Simple job, though torquing up takes a bit of a root around to find the right socket set extension.

Looking down through the cockpit onto the prop shaft (bottom) and diff/axle casing (top).

The panhard is fitted to the chassis next. Easily done. No clue when the other end should be fitted - apparently it's not mentioned in the Assembly Guide.

Next, the rear dampers are fitted. One major learning - there are two different sizes of bush for these. Both fit into the damper, but the internal diameter differs. Just check the bolt before you fit it in.

We found supporting the rear axle on axle stands was quite useful, and prevented damage to the chassis members

Gently tapping the top of the damper into place, before fixing with bolts

Rear right damper fitted. Without the car sitting on its wheels....

... the axle fittings are worryingly close to the chassis members (to which wiring is attached).
Chassis-end of panhard rod just visible on LHS of photo

Very much a 2-person job, but nothing complicated or confusing. Very satisfying hour or so's work!

The front wheels are now on, and sitting on ramps, to put a bit of stress and weight into the front suspension.

Front wishbones looking much more horizontal now!

Day 15: Handbrake and differential

Having pretty much completed the front of the car (save for the cycle wings and indicator repeaters), it's time to attack the back.

First job was to fit the handbrake. On the face of it, this is easy. But a couple of tips:
- the handbrake is much narrower than the gap between the two brackets. You need to nip up the nuts and bolts so that the gap is drawn together and the handbrake doesn't wobble
- the electrical connections both turn on and off with the switch. Tested with a multimeter
- I put some heatshrink around the lower connector, as it was very close to the chassis (and would have shorted)

Looking at the RHS of the main handbrake, you can see 1) the white connector for the handbrake warning light, below that 2) a bit of heatshrink around the other terminal then below that 3) the red earth connector

Handbrake assembly from above

Second job was to fit the differential into the rear axle casing. This is taken from the Suzuki Jimny, but the rear axle is then comprehensively tweaked, re-welded, etc etc. In doing so, various slots and rebates are cut, to allow the diff in.

Now, that's the theory. In practice, my diff didn't fit at all. There is only one way in: with the ring gear (the biggest gear wheel) dropping into the deeper part of the axle casing. But the rebates had not been cut too well, and it jammed.

So, after a big head-scratch, out came the Dremel, and two small areas were ground back by less than 1mm.

The rebate on the LHS shows where my attempts to fit the diff started to scrape the casing...

So I took the corner off with the Dremel...

On both sides..

Hey presto, the diff dropped in perfectly, and was easily torqued up. The breather feels insubstantial, but is easily fitted.

All fitted together, with gasket leaching out between the two (probably put a bit too much on)