Hard at it

After quite a bit of planning, re-planning and swearing, I think I have broken the back of my wiring. The original fuse box has gone, replaced with a multi fuse and relay box. Looks a lot neater now, though I can still see myself re-wiring it again when I change the dash.

In progress















Almost done

Plodding on

The rear half of the wiring loom, from the fuse box back, has been re-covered with the original specification tape after any redundant wires had been removed and any poor quality joints had been re-made. So this section has now been re-threaded into the car and a new twelve way connector has been fitted at the fuse box end to aid quick and easy connection to the rest of the system.
The front interior section of the wiring loom has now been fitted back in the car to check for fit and give me some idea of what length the wire to the additional switches needed to be.

Some thought has gone into the location of the combined fuse and relay box, originally it was going to be fitted in approximately the same place as the original, in the battery box. I have gone off this idea as it puts the relays, fuses and connections in a more harsh environment and would male removal harder. Instead, the box will be mounted on the side of the passenger tray, still perhaps not ideal, but it ought to make routing of wire easier.



As the fuse and relay holders are modular in a carrier, a hole was cut in the side of the parcel tray to accept the holder, with a strengthening plate also fitted around the cutout as the tray is somewhat flimsy even before cutting chunks out of it.






There was a added and unwanted job that appeared over the weekend was that I was longer able to shut the rear hatch.
It had been a bit of a pain to shut and made some grinding noises when moving it, I guessed it was just down to lack of lubrication, so I ended up leaving it down but not latched into position overnight, but it seemed to have moved, with the latch being approx 1/2" out of alignment.
After trying to get it to lign up by slackening off the mounting bolts, I replaced the spring and hinge unit from that side and now is shuts much better than it ever has done before in my ownership. Will have to find some more paint now as I now have one green hinge and one magenta.

As long as no other jobs come up on the car, the next step will be to wire in the fuse and relay box, then see about getting power from the battery to the box, via the starter.

The re-wire - part 2

Another few hours spent on the wiring loom has the majority of the modifications made to the wiring loom. The original layout of the loom used the ignition barrel to switch and pass power to the many circuits in the car, it has now been altered such that the ignition barrel will now only switch power, via a relay, to the rest of the fuse box and switch the stater solenoid when required. This way the ignition barrel does not have to switch and pass through such a high current as before with the added advantage that by removing the main relay the car will be a lot harder to start, an added anti-theft device.

Additional wires have been put in the loom for switching the fuel pump relays, tacho and screen washer pump, the new bottle had one included so I may as well use it. While many other wires have been re-routed to take power and switch from the central fuse and relay box.
To give myself a bit more space on the dash area, the old rocker style hazard light switch with separate dash warning light has been replaced with a combined switch and repeater taken from my long rotted away Dolomite - at least the spares are sill coming in handy.

Upon the suggestion of others, the loom will go back in with extra multiway inline connectors to make removal of the loom or assemblies such as the steering column much easier, as at the moment there is nine connections to be made when re-fitting the steering column, not always an easy job to get right in such a cramped and at times dark area.

Just got to wait on the next delivery from VWP, sure I can find something else to get on with though.

The re-wire - part 1

Part 1, yes I do think it is going to take a bit to get right. Earlier on in the week I had my delivery from VWP, including a stack of different coloured and rating wires and the combined fuse and relay box. Just as I thought would happen, I forgot to order a length of spiral wrap when I placed the order, but managed to pick some up locally.
Having removed much of the original self amalgamating tape, which the loom was covered in, I had planned to replace it only with the afore mentioned spiral wrap, but seeing how it goes on, I have decided in my next order to VWP to get a few rolls of tape to cover it again.
At present, the GT6 wiring loom is in two parts, joined together behind the existing fuse box, the second half supplying switching and power to lights, etc.. in the rear of the car. Both half of the loom are out of my car now, to make it easier to trace, replace and add wires as necessary.

I was a bit daunted by the whole thing when I first contemplated all of these wiring modifications, but now I am getting into it I am quite enjoying it.
The next thing will be to work out what I need in my next order to VWP, self amalgamating tape, switches, inline connectors and anything else I can think of.

Just planning

Have not done that_much since getting the GT6 back, appart from re-fitting some components to get them out of the way and give me some idea of how to fit and link every thing together.

There are three main areas I want to concentrate on, the cooling system, fuel system and electrical systems. I believe the best place for the header tank for the cooling system would be in the battery tray, which of course means the battery will have to be re-located. The logical new site for the battery is in the boot area either behind the driver or next to the fuel tank, both sites will require the battery to be securely mounted and sealed.

As power is also required to get the fuel system fully functional, I have decided to concentrate on the electrical system first.

The current system uses only three fuses and two solenoids, the new system, which I have been musing over for a few hours now, will have space for 26 fuses and nine relays. The reasoning behind this is to make the electrical system safer, any faults easier to find, capable of supplying the extra power now required and up to modern standards.

The big bulkhead mounted solenoid will be redundant, replaced by the solenoid on the Nippon Denso starter and the horn relay and flasher units will be replaced with modern type electronic units all fitted in a combined fuse and relay box.

A bigger stud

After having a couple of wheel studs fail on my old Dolomite and then seeing the condition of the wheel nuts that came with my Revolutions wheels, I have not been too happy with the original 3/8" wheel studs. Fortunately this issue has come up in discussion forums in the past and a suitable alternative has already been identified. The upgrade is to use M12 X 1.5 wheel studs from a Land Rover Freelander, these just happen to have the same diameter of splinded area, so the hubs do not have to be altered to accept these new ones. The advantage of these is the much larger diameter and length of studs and the availability of alternative wheel nuts, as it looked at one time I was going to have great difficulty in finding replacement wheel nuts for my Revolution wheels.




























I seem to have amassed a collection of Lucas electric high pressure fuel pumps for the PI system, so I decided to go through them and check the condition of the pump units and the electric motors. The pump which I had put aside with the intention of using in my car had one of the best pump units, showing very little ware on the pump body from the gears. The electric motor part was blown out to remove dust and the armature was cleaned off, removing any high spots. Should at least get me started I hope.

GT6 fuel injection pump musings.

One of the complaints of the Lucas mechanical fuel injection system is the high pressure fuel pump. These pumps are directly driven via a electric motor sat on top of the pump. The main problem with this pump is it's habit of overheating and causing cavitation in the fuel pump. A common conversion is to replace the Lucas pump with a Bosch version.

In a search of another alternative, I have managed to get hold of a belt driven version of the Lucas fuel pump. These were supplied by Cosworth to work with the injection system used on BDG, DFV or YBB based engines.
With these pumps the engine is started using the old electric fuel pump, but once started, the electric pump is turned off and the belt driven pump takes over, delivering fuel at a rate proportional to the the engine revs and hence requirements. The system is designed such that excess fuel is always being fed to the metering unit and returned to the fuel tank, so it does not matter if too much fuel, up to a point, is sent to the metering unit.

For now this pump will be put aside until the GT6 is on the road, though I have started considering how to integrate it into the existing system. Once the car is running, fuel will have to bypass the electric pump to the belt pump, so this could be done by taking a second fuel line from the fuel tank to the belt pump or by having some sort of bypass for the electric pump with a one way valve.
Another alternative idea I had this afternoon was to replace the original electric pump with the new belt driven pump, driven from a different electric pump instead on the engine. The advantage of this setup would be that the electric motor is distanced from the pump, keeping the temperature down and it would cut out the need for extra fuel lines around the engine bay.