At Last!. I have started on my car ;-) PART 2

Nice I was wondering how this project is going.
Slowly :)

A few photos showing progress since last posting back in August.

The Lambda sensor had to be swapped with the EGT sensor as it fouled the head, minor design error by exhaust manufacturer. Adaptor allowed the EGT to take its place with no mods.

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Carbon fibre induction system completed.

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Bottom rad pipe made to avoid induction system. A tight fit.

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Great to have you back Steve .Was getting worried thinking that you would never finish the Elan before I dropped off my perch :lol:
 
Steve I'm sure you know paint and bog adds weight :eek: Didn't Mercedes strip them off the silver arrows to reduce weight ?

Just yanking your chain :rofl:
 
Steve I'm sure you know paint and bog adds weight :eek: Didn't Mercedes strip them off the silver arrows to reduce weight ?

Just yanking your chain :rofl:
Agreed, but Mercedes had a lovely aluminium body under the paint. I have crap carbon and fibreglass so it as to be hidden :)
 
The defects on the main bonnet area were far less than I expected. However, still a fair bit of work to do beneath the bumper.

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Whilst the filler was curing I went back to making the mould for the carbon doors. First job was to fill in various holes.

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Well it looks to me that Steve has set a TC post & view count record that I won't see bettered in my lifetime so now all that is left is for the Elan to set a world speed record sometime soon :)
 
If he spend less time clicking and reading his thread 20 times a day, and worked on his car it would be finished by now :lol:
:)

Thread gets read two to three times a day, whilst eating breakfast, lunch and late at night. The time in between is filled with the usual stuff required when maintaining an old house so finding time to get into the garage can be challenging at times. But I will get there, eventually :)
 
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Oh, look, it's lunchtime, better have a look at TC and post something.

Driver's door now ready for gloss coat. I could use it as it is, but a gloss finish helps the mould to release.

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Gosh, what a busy day, I am surprised that I have managed to squeeze in a TC post!
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First coat of gloss highlighted a few defects I will deal with before second coat. This weighs 6.8kg and would be usable as it is. However, a carbon fibre version should be under 2kg, a saving of over 9kg for the pair, not to be sniffed at as it equates to an increase of 11bhp/tonne :) Started on sorting out the driver's door opening area and side splitter/skirt.

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Steve "bog" is the Aussie term for the filler you used on the body panels :) "lightweight" was referring to your obsession re weight reduction.
Just a bit of banter ;)

I thought that was what is was. We call it mud, so similar. Yes, special lightweight aerated filler and most of it ends up on the floor :) I have used a combination of a filler impregnated with glass fibre strands for small gaps and holes, another with tiny carbon fibre strands which I use for indentations and a fine filler for tiny imperfections and as a finishing coat over the other two.
 
Bog is a many factored word
You can get bogged in your car
You can be having a bog
You can be in the bog having a bog
Your car can be bog standard or bog stock
Your car can be getting bogged up filling imperfections with bog
Negotiations can get bogged down as well
 
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After a discussion with the paint vendor I have made another slight change to the paint scheme. I have also ordered some very high quality paint brushes so I can achieve a professional finish.
 
New curing oven is coming along. Build cost of materials virtually nil as I am using the old oven timbers and ply. However I am upgrading the controls. The Mk1 oven used a simple, 12GBP PID temperature controller. It worked as intended but there was no way to control the speed of the temperature rise (ramp) or keep at certain temperature for a time (soak) before continuing with an increase in heat to the desired temp and holding it there before reducing temp to ambient without a lot of personal input. The new PID can be programmed to do this automatically. This will result in a better quality product.

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There is always not enough time , space or money to do all the things we want to accomplish in life so we have to concentrate on the most important one to us and prioritize whatever matters most to you IMO
 
Whilst waiting for the final items to arrive for my new oven I decided experiment on how many layers of carbon I can get a way with on my doors and roof. To that end I made two samples using my small oven using one and two layers of 400gm/m2 prepreg carbon.

400gm/m2 is a little bit of a misnomer as this only refers to the fabric weight, not the resin. To get a more accurate weight you have to add around 41% to allow for the resin content, this equates to 564gm/m2.

As the doors have a surface area of around 1m2 the maths is simple :) the samples were each 0.05675m2 and weighed 36gms and 72gms, which equates to door weights of 635gms and 1270gms. They would be a tad heavier due to localised stiffening.

The single layer, however, was too flimsy and partially see through! I will go with the two layers and swallow the extra weight :) Even with excessive localised stiffening layers the doors should weigh less than 1.5kg each. OEM doors weigh around 6kg each so a 75% reduction. The roof is approx 1.5m2 so this will weigh approx 2kg as opposed to the OEM version being around 7kg. These mods will result in a weight saving of around 14kg.
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