April 2013
After what feels like an eternity, the XR2 is now back on her wheels again. I still need to refill the gearbox with oil and check for leaks around the new potentiometer, but I wanted to get her off the axle stands, as all that weight resting focused on the two stands doesnt really do her much good. I know that the roll cage spreads the load, but I'd rather she sat on her wheels again particularly now the engine and box are installed in the car. Tonight I refitted the top engine steady bar and removed the throttle cable as its showing some wear and tear and needed replacing.
Refitted the exhaust system for the second time, and I've also refitted the passenger side front suspension & brakes. I just need to wire in the gearbox sensor to the ECU before fitting the front wheels and placing the car back on the ground.
Over the weekend I replaced the sensor on the gearbox. It was sealed to the box with silicon, and a careful bit of cutting using the stanley knife blade, helped the old sensor come away. I cleaned the surface of the gearbox with solvent, applied some blue hylomar, and stuck the new sensor on the box. Care has to be taken when aligning the input shaft on the sensor. If you look carefully at the picture with the two sensors side by side, you can see a tiny dimple in the shaft below the slot. So long as the replacement sensor has the shaft in the same orientation so the dimple is on the same side as the one being removed, then there wont be any issues with the pot sweeping through 0V as it rotates. That would be bad for the gear position indicator and the ECU as they'd both be very difficult to calibrate.
In an attempt to speed the website up a bit more, I've now enabled mod_deflate in the .htaccess file. This makes the Apache web server where my site is hosted, compress all the information that is passed across the wire to your computer, which should make the pages load more quickly. Most web browsers automatically de-compress the data received from a web server, so this effectively reduces the bandwidth required to transmit the data in the first place, and makes your PC work a little in having to uncompress the pictures, html etc. Any problems with the loading experience, please tell me.
So the clutch cover has arrived safely at Burton Power today, and they've agreed after a bit of haggling, to refund me the postage costs. I'm hopefully resuming work on the Fiesta tonight, having hurt my back last week fitting the gearbox on to the engine. Its just an age thing. I bought some 75W90 gearbox oil at the weekend, and a new throttle cable, so I now have everything to get her back up and running. Tonights first job is to refit the exhaust system again, and fit the two channel Geartronics gear position potentiometer. The existing sensor looks like its sealed to the gearbox using silicon rubber, so hopefully it'll not prove too difficult to reseal it. Oil has a nack of finding its way out of gearboxes, and I dont need it leaking over the front tyres.
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You know that sinking feeling when you realise you'd not fitted something in the right sequence. I went to refit the lower gearbox steady bracket, that sits underneath the steering rack, and found that of course it cant be fitted when the exhaust manifold is already on the car. So I removed the manifold again, scratched even more paint off the new steering rack, and fitted the bracket, and refitted the manifold again, and ran out of enthusiasm. I'll continue on the car after the weekend. I'm not at all impressed with the paint finish on the Kiley Clinton rack. Its been sprayed with gloss paint. You know the stuff. It flakes off when you go near it, so the slightest knock and the paint comes off. And its one of those spray jobs where they just mask off the rubber boots and spray everything with paint. Not impressed given the cost of the rack.
I've posted the clutch cover back to Burton Power, at a cost of £18 and it should be with them on Monday/Tuesday for full refund, including the cost of the postage.
I fitted the Kiley Clinton steering rack tonight, after fitting a Ruland collar to the offside end of the rack to limit the full left lock (which prevents the tyre from hitting the end of the Quaife box). I now have a centralised steering wheel, and 2 turns lock to lock (one full turn each way) which should make for far more accurate and rapid cornering on the tight and twisty stuff. I also reconnected the gear selector cable, various oil and fuel hoses, and the radiator header tank. The exhaust manifold is also back on and tightened up and on Friday evening I'll refit the remainder of the exhaust system, and the front suspension.
Reconnected the hydraulic clutch, and bled it. Attached the starter motor, and both engine mounts, and I've used new socket head screws to fasten the gearbox mount to the top of the box. I've also used some longer bolts to hold the intermediate driveshaft mount on the rear of the engine, so thats now nice and secure. The alternator is wired in as is the starter motor. And the two remote oil filter lines are also reconnected, though not yet tightened up. Tomorrow I'll get the zorst back on, and the suspension, and hopefully have the car back on its wheels again on Friday evening. I still need to fit the Geartronics dual channel gear position sensor, and as the box is currently empty of oil, now is as good a time as any to do it.
Pictures can be found on my
Zetecinside Motorsport facebook page
The engine and gearbox are back in the car again. I used the new AP 220mm clutch plate with my existing uprated AP cover. I torqued the clutch cover up, fitted the box back on the engine, and hoisted the car high enough again to allow the engine to be slid back underneath the car. I'll get some bolts tomorrow on the way home from work, to replace the three that hold the M-Sport gearbox mount to the top of the box. The ones I'd used were bolts that I'd shortened and I need to replace them with socket heads of the correct length.
Removed the engine and gearbox, and removed the paddle clutch. However the clutch cover that Burton provided, that they said I
had to use with the new clutch plate, is too small for the Duratec flywheel, and I'm not entirely surprised now that I've checked the specification and it says "CVH cover". So I'm retaining my existing CP5905 cover, and using the new 220mm plate (20mmX17T) CP5351-16. Burton are refunding me the cost of the CVH cover. The flywheel and cover have witness marks where you can see that the paddle clutch was catching and thats presumably the source of the judder.
The pump cover has arrived, and its a lovely bit of kit. Comes with the O ring and fasteners, and really looks the part. I've removed the exhaust and the engine is now ready to be lowered out of the car. The clutch is ready for collection from DHL and I'll head on over there this evening to collect it. I intend to lower the engine tonight, and seperate the gearbox so I can get the clutch swapped over.
Just ordered a new AP clutch cover (CP3516) and plate (CP5351) from Burtons. I'm going for an uprated 'Sprint' clutch, and uprated cover. And I'll sell the AP paddle clutch and cover that I'm replacing, to recover the costs. This should cure the judder and improve the manouverability in the paddock. The billet water pump cover is on order from Dunnell Race Engines, and they can also provide the springs and retainers for use with the Cosworth cams.
