March 24th - Build Day 3 - Engine Goes In

A brilliant day today. Glorious sunshine as summer came early and the engine installation went according to plan.

Yesterday my £139 engine crane arrived in bits. An hour later it was ready to use. Bit of an eBay bargain.

Today kicked of with son Dan and I moving the engine and gearbox out of the garage so we could rest the front of the car a bit lower on the axle stands (because the roof of the garage is quite low). With the gearbox/bell housing on the workbench and the engine rolled up to it and the help of my next door neighbour we kicked off with joining the engine to the gearbox - which went very smoothly.

With the two fitted together they hung a the desired 30 degrees. After lunch joined by another volunteer - Mark -  we then moved the engine/ gearbox over to the car and lowered the crane as we walked the engine into the car. It was as easy as that (we had removed the engine mounts before attempting fitting). Once we had the engine in position we bolted the gearbox mounting bolts on first and the fitted the front mounts loosely. Fitting the mounting bolts was a bit harder - we had to unbolt the rubber mounts in order to get the big bolts to fit. Then we attached the mounts to the chassis rails.

After releasing the crane we worked to centralise the gearbox in the tunnel. Then it was a question of torquing up all the bolts and hey presto in a little more than an hour the engine was in.

We did remove the gearbox filler plug before fitting the engine gearbox. Looking at the space available to access, fill the gearbox and replace the plug, that's going to be a tough challenge.

Overall observations - a straightforward operation if you work methodically (and have a couple of friends to help you along the way).

16th & 17th March - Day 5&6 - odds & ends and Gearbox/Engine prep.

Spent Friday evening and Saturday finding off some of the small jobs. 

After receiving another box off missing parts I could now fit the front brake pipes.

Also fitted horns, washer bottle and jet and the engine mounts (removed some of the paint underneath the LHS mount to get a good earth).  Heater went in without much of a problem - removed battery and the eased the front of the heater panel - containing the vents - behind the dashboard wiring.

Connected the bell housing to the gearbox and fitted the clutch release gubbins, loosened the filler plug. Fitted the U-shaped hose on the back of the engine - after trimming a couple of inches off each end of the pipe. So with lots of pipe insulation protecting the chassis I'm nearly ready for the engine install next weekend.

15th March - Build Day 4 - Fitting Heat Shield Material

Spent a couple of hours this evening fitting heat shield material around both foot wells and the transmission tunnel.  I was keen not to get hot feet or legs as there's no carpet on the transmission tunnel of a my car.  Made up a lot of paper templates and then transferred them to the heat shield material.  I bought a metre square from Woolies Trim for under £30.  Fiddly bit came when applying the contact glue to both surfaces and then trying to get the pieces in the right position - because as soon as the glue touches it's stuck - so you can't really adjust it.  Pretty happy with the finished result.

I was considering having the header pipes ceramic coated (Camcoat or Zircotec) but Sean has advised my that shield will be enough.  Can't say I took much persuading as it was going to cost £250 (and I can always wrap them if it turns out to still be hot in the foot well.).

On the trail of the missing parts - Sean continues to live up to his reputation of being very helpful. A box of missing parts is on it's way for the weekend.  A set of photographs of the engine bay he sent me will also come in useful when it comes to installing the engine in a week or two.

I remain pleasantly surprised that the build is going so smoothly (touch wood). If only Caterham could do a better job of picking the parts when they put the kits together (and included a list of what's not included) the experince would be almost perfect. Can it be that difficult?  What would Caterham F1 say if on unpacking for qualifying they found that they'd only packed one set of wheels?

14th March - Build Day 3 - Front Calipers and Front Anti Roll Bar

After a couple of busy days at work just did a few things this evening.  Calipers went on very easily following Ian's tip to fit a washer between caliper and hub (no mention in the AG which I guess assumes the calipers come attached to the upright unit).  Pads very simple to fit. Tried fitting the front brake pipes but they're too short (Sean subsequently told me there's been a spate of the wrong pipes being included in wide front track ca kits (Ian's having the same problem with his Supersport build).

Teenage son Dan had his first go with the sockets fitting the anti roll bar.  It was a lot more straightforward than I expected - maybe that's because it's a blue coded roll bar.

Checking out some of the other boxes I discovered that I'm short of a number of hoses and have some duplicates.  A call to Sean to follow up a late night email will hopefully sort....

11th March - Build Day 2 - Finish fitting shocks and uprights.

Parenting duties meant only a couple of hours today. Finished fitting the LHS shock - a bit of a pain getting the bolt to fit through the shock  due to the proximity of the bodywork. 

It's amazing how much of a mess you can make with coppaslip - latex gloves are a must.  Fitted cycle stays and uprights.  the sacrificial nut to locate the top ball joint makes life easier here. Made my first cock-up when I fitted the cycle stays as a replaced the washer when I should have left it off.  Too late in the day to sort (and I'll need to replace the nyloc nuts). 

I'm already seeing the wisdom of taking plenty of time and stopping doing a task when it gets frustrating. Next task to fit brake pipe/calipers. Should I fit the anti roll bar next? Some debate today on BC as to whether or not torque the wishbones now (as per the Assembly Guide) or when it's on its wheels - have gone with the manual because if it needs to be done later then I can release and re tighten but if it's not possible to reach the nuts then at least I know they're tightened.

10th March 2012 - Build Day 1 - Front Suspension

Having checked through all the boxes and found a few things missing - 3 calipers, speed sensor, steering wheel and crutch straps I contacted Sean (my new friend at Caterham) who promised to have the missing parts with me by Saturday.  In the meantime I created a couple of small alloy plates to seal the gap between the foot well and the side skin (a potential grot trap). 

Polished paintwork twice using Auto Glym Lifeshine - £15 from ebay (should protect the paintwork). Then covered the front half in masking tape/cardboard.

Sprayed Dinitrol in the gap and stuck the plate on with silicone sealant. Also sprayed Dinitrol on the inside of skin esp where the ali wraps around the chassis rail as that looks like it will fill with water/mud.

To avoid any problems with heat from the manifold (close to my feet)  I plan to stick heat shield material to the foot well and tunnel.

Already got lots of hints/tips from the Lotus 7 Club via its Forum Blatchat.  Also contacted by Ian in Poole who got his Supersport kit this week - so we can swap stories as we work through our builds.

Fitted rack and wishbones but struggled to fit both top mountings of the shocks - had to file the hole on LHS to get the bolts to fit through cleanly.

Had a concern that the upper rear wishbone mount bolt was very close to the shocker - but a post on BC confirmed that when on its wheels the shock would be further away from the bolt head.

So far so good...

2nd March 2012 - Kit Arrives (almost)

After a five month wait my Caterham Supersport kit arrived today. Well the chassis, wheels and engine did. Unfortunately the boxes didn't belong with my kit. Driver promised to deliver the missing boxes on 4th March when he was delivering another Supersport to Ian in Poole.

Options included: FIA Roll Bar, Heater, Weather Gear, Lowered Floors.