First Tunnel Panel

The ebay shop replied to my email and accepted shipping to Portugal for a good price. So, last Friday, I received a package at work from Stop4Tools with my spare mandrels. Ordered 5, to be on the safe side.

Tested the new mandrel and applying a rivnut on a scrap of metal. This practice made me understand a lot better how much force to apply and how it works. This is what I should have done in the first place.

With that knowledge, I covered the tunnel chassis beams with tape, placed the panel on top, held it with clamps and marked on the tape all the holes that the panel had drilled. Then took the panel out and drilled all the marked holes with a 6mm drillbit. Last step was to put the rivnuts on the holes. Fitted the panel for the picture and then had to pack up.

It was not perfect, though... The rivnuts that came with the tool were OK. The ones I bought here were more fragile. Twice I applied a bit too much pressure and the mandrel sheared slightly the hole.
Another problem was that, although I was careful marking the drilling spots, a couple of holes were made a mm or two off-centred and now I'll have to enlarge the ally holes to be able to bolt on those holes.

Poor Man's Rivnut Tool

Went on the net looking for videos showing how to properly use a rivnut tool, to see where I went wrong. A vid's title makes me look for home made tools... And I end up with a recipe for a home made rivnut tool. What I saw was this forum post but ended up doing a mix between that and this how-to.

So, I grabbed a bolt, a nut, a washer and a rivnut. Inserted the lot on a hole in some plate, tried to hold down the nut while spinning the bolt.

It didn't work out for a couple of reasons. The first was that the nut was 7 and the wrench was 8. I only had 8 or 6... Also, the bolt had a rounded head with a Philips cut, not the best to put pressure on.

Found a different bolt with an hexa head, a bit longer. With the dremmel and a grinding disk, "converted" my 6 wrench into a 7. Another try, this time holding down the bolt and rotating the nut...

Success! It probably is not perfect, but looks good enough. It takes a lot longer than using a rivnut tool but at least I don't have to spend more money nor grieve over the fact that shops don't ship here or prices are abnormal. And I don't have to wait!

Riveting Pains

Since today I was going to start closing the transmission tunnel, the first job was to attach again the gear shifting linkage that I removed in order to fit the prop catcher. This was quick to get done and made the car once again drivable. Although I should fit the silencer and bolt down the seats before actually doing it...

So I made my first hole on the chassis to fit a rivnut. That will allow me to remove the panels to access the tunnel insides for any task needed (specially useful since I don't have a ramp or lift). Drilled, unpacked my brand new rivnut tool I ordered from the UK because here they cost 2,5 times more and... Snapped the mandrel while putting the first rivnut in.

I'm starting to believe that rivets and rivnut tools have something against me...

At least the rivnut was well inserted. And the shape of the broken mandrel tip allowed me to extract it relatively easily.

OK... I should add that I used the tool without watching some online videos. Just read the instructions on the back of the package. And in retrospective, I may have not used the tool in it's designed form and forced it too much. That's why I want to give it a second chance.

Now I have to see about buying spare mandrels. It would be easy if I lived in the UK. Most places don't ship the replacements, one that does charges 5 times it's regular price and the one that sells it cheaply charges more for shipping than the tool cost me. Waiting on an eBay shop's reply, but with my luck regarding this... And since I had to create an eBay account to email the seller, I have no reputation. Wonderful...

Spent the rest of my car time breaking the remaining wood from the car crate into smaller chunks to be burned this winter... At least vented some of my frustration.

Speedo Sensor, Loom Riveting and Santa Claus

Last weekend didn't get car time and this one it was a bit shy of two hours, since I had to swap plates on the tintop. But, and despite the interruption, I accomplished two tasks!

First one was getting my hand-crafted speed-holder in place and the speedo sensor attached to it. All went well (better than I actually expected!) and so I mixed some Araldite and glued the two magnets on the prop-shaft. Instructions stated that magnets should go with "dimple side down". That required some homework (probably because I'm not an native English speaker) but turns out it means the small orifice on one side of the magnet surface should face down.
Held the speed sensor cable down against the prop-catcher with a couple of cable ties and connected it to the loom. I'm pretty sure it will give wrong readings when I get the car going again, but it will work! Wrong readings because I believe I fed the Digidash with incorrect gear ratios, but I'll look into that again later.

Started my second task: riveting the P-clips that hold the electrical loom down on the tunnel. Was interrupted by Santa Claus, that came for a drive on the race car. But Santa drives too fast!!!

After Santa left, I finished the riveting. The tunnel is now ready to be drilled to receive the rivnuts and get the panels placed! Next weekend, I hope...

I need to speed up the car build, get the panels in place. I need to vacate the spare room where I'm storing some parts ;)