Pictures from Sunday

Sunday
here are some picture before our drive to Sierraville. Had the top on as it looked like rain (but didn’t).

Going for a drive in anticipation of rain

Roof on

Bound for Sierraville with Alex

Out in the rain

Tuesday
Had to run an errand into town this morning & its raining. But, first, I adjusted the speedo sensor again. The soft-top kept the rain out and the wipers worked well. Speedo appears to be working OK after the adjustment – we’ll see how long it lasts. Its very tricky getting in & out & then sealing the sidescreens into the soft-top. Much more of a struggle to get into the full harness seat belt with the top on.

Back in the saddle

Saturday
got home from Beijing on Saturday afternoon. Emma came for a visit. Took her for a ride in the 7 up to Donner summit. Speedo was giving problems again.

Ready to go

Emma’s the passenger

Emma ready to go

On Donner Pass road near the hospital

Here we are…..

Here’s  the video………  Old Hwy 40 in a Lotus 7

Sunday
adjusted the speedo sensor about 1/6 turn. Looks to be working OK.
Later, Alex & I drove to Sierraville (25miles). Speedo was good on the outbound, but erratic on the return journey.

Pictures

Wednesday
Here are some pictures. The pollen dust is hard to keep off, especially on the BRG.

DMV temporary permit

CHP…..check.

Tuesday 9am
I had an appointment at CHP (California Highway Patrol) to get the VIN checked. Friendly guys & they liked the car. They said they’d prefer not to spoil the bodywork by attaching a visible VIN. So they called somewhere & got approval for the 2 existing VINs under the hood. They gave me the approvel form.

That leaves just the smog exemption to get through. Tried to make an appointment, but they only do a week in advance & next week I’ll be in Beijing. So I’ll have to call back. The inspection is in Sacramento, that about 95 miles, I80 freeway most of the way.

Got the speedo & toe-out taken care of

Monday, 1pm.
I had an appointment at Stone’s tires to get the wheel alignment. I knew I had some toe-out, it came to marginally short of 1 degree. Got that adjusted to 0.27 degrees toe-in (vs 0.33+-0.17 spec). The other measurements came out per the picture below. Jon at Caterham said the alignment was pretty good and advised not to adjust anything else for a few hundred miles.

7:30pm.
Jon gave some advice on the speedo sensor, so I tried it. I adjusted back to led permanently on, then added 1/6 turn (some blinking but not consistent all the way round), then added another 1/6 turn – this time it was consistently blinking for a full revolution (every serration produced a blink), then tightened. The gap between the serrated wheel and the sensor is about 1.1mm. I just did not have it close enough last time.

Dot & I drove into town on the freeway, got up to 75 and the speedo was working fine.

Speedometer sensor setup

Thursday
I took a closer look at the ‘cooked’ alternator cable, the heat insulation was hiding a burnt inner plastic insulator. So I made a new cable and fitted it to the alternator in a direction opposite to the headers and leading between the alternator and the block.

Friday
Went to DMV with the brake & light inspection certificate. They gave me an extended permit through the end of August.
CHP called back – set up appointment for Tuesday morning.
Set up an appointment at Stone’s tires for Monday afternoon to do the wheel alignment.
Took Alex for a ride when it started cooling down (~6pm).

Alex on the way to Cisco Grove

Drove up donner pass on old highway 40. Must say this duratec engine has good low-end torque, 50mph in 4th all the way up. As expected the car sticks to the road like glue through the corners. We drove out to the end of highway 40 at Cisco grove, did a u-turn and came home. During the drive the speedometer started out regstering up to 50mph and being intermittant/failing above that, then got steadily worse until it could not register above 20mph.

Saturday
The speedo sensor was not centered on the toothed wheel (see photo).

Put in one washer, which gave better alignment. Adjusted the gap and tried the speedo, several times with different gaps, best was at 2.3mm where it would go up to 40mph, but started flickering over 50mph. Other gaps gave less performance.

Sunday
While adjusting, with the ignition on, the sensor has an led to help set up. I noticed that with the gap around 2.6mm, that most of the circumference the led blinked as I turned the hub, but about a 1/4 turn it was intermittant. Decided that it was best to exactly center the sensor, so added a second washer & set the gap at 1.8mm.

Took it for a test drive & the speedo was good through 55mph, then intermittant above.

I made static adjustments noting the led, at 1mm the led is on all the time while turning the hub. At 1.5mm, the led is mostly on with it blinking off when rotating. At 2.3mm the led is mostly off with it blinking on when rotating. Tried driving with these gaps:
1.8mm good up to 55 mph, intermittant above.
2.3mm good up to 20mph, intermittant above.
1.5mm good up to 55mph, intermittant above.
1.9mm good up to 58 mph, intermittant above.
I couldn’t get any better results

Progress

Monday
Still having insurance woes. Farmer’s couldn’t do it. I went to AAA, which looked promising as the advertise that they insure kit cars – but as soon as they found out that I built it myself they didn’t want to take the risk ( go figure? kit cars are for owners to build).
Finally I tried online with Geico and I had to select options from list boxes, the closest description I could get was a Lotus ‘other’. It took my VIN number without complaint and so now I have insurance.

Thursday
I got an appointment for Light & Brake check for 9am Thursday morning. So, Dot & I took the 7 for the ~20 mile drive to the mechanic in Tahoe City. The first road drive. Stopped at the gas station to fill up and got the first question, “So what is it?”. I must have heard the same question 5 times before the day was out. The mechanic checked the lights, ok, then the handbrake, ok, then asked me to drive at 20mph and stop when I got to a roadsign, he had a tape measure to get the stopping distance. So I drove towards the roadsign & hit the brakes, he laughed, put his tape measure away & said, ” I think we’ll call that 5 feet”. We went back inside & he gave me my 2 certificates (brakes & lights) & I paid the required $75 each.
We came home via Kings Beach & Brockway summit, and now I have ~50 miles on the odometer.
Lunchtime & Dot suggested we drive over to Togo for a sandwich. I went to the 7, turned on the battery switch, and a cloud of smoke started coming out of the engine bay – off with the switch.
Turns out that the alternator is very close to the cylinder 1 header, so the first 1″ of the alternator cable was resting against the alternator body and the insulation had slowly melted thus causing a short.
After everything had gotten cool, I made a fix to the end of the cable. Not too happy with it ‘cos the same problem is likely to happen again.

I made a heat shield out of a piece of aluminum, don’t know if this will be effective.
I’m also concerned about heat on the alternator itself. I’ll ask Caterham for a recommendation.

Insurance, helmets & electrics

Friday
Struggling with my insurance agent to get the 7 covered. He’s trying to do it as a secondary car, but because we have 2 primary cars (the chevy truck and VW Passat) and there are 3 of us in the household (me, Dot & Alex), therfore one of us does not have a primary car. To insure the 7 as a primary car he needs the car ID, I gave him the VIN, but the VIN does not have the correct check character.
Hope he gets it sorted by Monday, I have a 9am appointment with the Brake & Light inspection.

Saturday
We bought a couple of helmets for freeway driving. I look like the stig!

Connected a couple of 12v outlets in the 7 so I can run the GPS & charge my phone. The wiring diagram in the assembly manual is not accurate, but at least it gives you an idea. Eg: the car is supposed to have 15 fuses & 5 relays – its actually got 18 fuses & 6 relays. I wonder what the other 3 circuits are for? Connected into one of the fused circuits – it has a purple/red wire (but I don’t know what circuit it is). Plugged in the GPS, it works (apparantly a circuit not switched with the ignition).

Aligned the headlights and went for a short drive up the road, they look good. Dipped beam is low enough.