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gm's unhealthy obsession with mx5s - unlowering the green machine


gm

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to say I'm impressed is the understatement of the year - I'm absolutely thrilled to have got it running, without much in the way of faffing about.  It sounds angry as fuck with no exhaust but in the interests of neighbourhood harmony, I fitted* a "silencer"

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and it still sounds good and angry :) 

can't wait to get it out on the road and kick it's arse round the twisties, there's still a fair bit of work to go before the man from the ministry casts his beadies over it. I should probably fit some brakes too !

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  • gm changed the title to gm's unhealthy obsession with mx5s - ***UPDATE*** will it start ? tune in for another exciting episode of project EXO

Yay happy to see the engine and electrical stuff all still works in its new home :) 

im very impressed to see how quickly this has progressed! and its been quite interesting, as I have never followed someones journey on building a kit car before :) 

keep up the good work, hopefully wont be too long at this rate! :) 

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2 hours ago, LightBulbFun said:

Yay happy to see the engine and electrical stuff all still works in its new home :) 

im very impressed to see how quicly this has progressed! and its been quite interesting, as I have never followed someones journey on building a kit car before :) 

keep up the good work, hopefully wont be too long at this rate! :) 

Yeah, I'm impressed too, I built a Robin Hood and it took bloody years!

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I'm really enjoying the experience and have learned a huge amount.

 a couple of weeks back, I read this thread back from the start and could barely believe how much progress I'd made. Still a way to go but it's edging ever closer :) 

that wiring harness is thinning down nicely (and it does still run)

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2 hours ago, bunglebus said:

Feel free to tell me I don't know what I'm on about but earlier you mentioned fitting a fuel filter under the glovebox (i.e. above the passenger's feet)? Can't help but think a potential failure point in the fuel line might be better elsewhere like near the fuel tank.

You’ve got the wrong end of the stick - I’ve used the bracket that came off the glove box when I stripped the car and modified it to hold the fuel filter in place by the tank. The only thing I might put in the passenger side is a footrest and a sick bag :) 

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c u l8r mr immobiliser (was quite a messy install and only had one fob, I'll probably replace later on)

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The pile of scrap wires has grown

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and the pile of manky old black tape is sizeable too

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but there's still a way to go with this lot - I should probably get a wiring diagram before going much further

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Remarkably, it does still run :) 

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I've got a week off work coming up, my mission is to make this

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look a bit more like this

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I thought I'd buggered it up this morning, there was no sign of life when I turned the key :( I did a bit of poking around and discovered the ground connection to the starter had come off - big sigh of relief when it fired up first time.

 

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Today's mission was to get that wiring sorted out. Still lacking a wiring diagram, I very carefully chopped away more redundant sections and got fairly close to the bare minimum needed.

I bought the wiring tray with the kit but it needed a fair bit of fettling to make fit, I'll need to take it out to cut holes for the loom but for now, it's looking pretty good.

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but what about all that shit hanging down next to it ?

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job's a good 'un ! 

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just don't look under that handy piece of Perspex I had lying around :)

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oh my, that still needs work 

but still, it's coming together nicely

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but does it still run ?

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yes, it flipping well does :) 

like a bag of shite :( 

the idle was all over the place and look at the nick of that oil pressure 

 

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bearing in mind this engine barely been run in the best part of a year (previous owner had it sorn for six months before I got my hands on it), it might respond to a bit of a service 

I whipped the plugs out to find they were all sooted up, a tickle with a wire brush and they looked much better, fired up again and normal service has been resumed :) nice steady idle, oil pressure about right for a cold engine and revving smoothly. I'll get it up to temp tomorrow and set the cam timing properly, it's currently a guesstimate which won't be helping.

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One more thing to check, are the lights working ?

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great, super, smashing. 

i bunged the battery on charged and tucked it away for the night

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in theory, all I need is brakes and this could be driven (illegally) up and down the street.

might not be the best idea as I have a serving and a retired traffic cop as neighbours ! 

 

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not much been happening, exo-wise, this week (it was my birthday and the lure of cake and beer proved too strong :) )

but I got back in the garage today and had a go at this horror show

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i'd been mulling over how best to approach this whole wiring thing, various build threads talk about having a good wiring diagram - the ones I managed to download made no sense whatsoever so an alternative approach was needed

i started off labelling the wires I did 'know'

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then the postie dropped off a tiny air filter so I enjoyed a nice easy job instead :) 

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back to that wiring - I dug out an old wardrobe door which fitted over the wiring tray, this proved an ideal base to fix the various components to while I figured out what goes where

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as the wires gave away their secrets, I wrote it down on the base

I'd picked up some earth blocks from screwfix which came in very handy

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slowly I unpicked that mess of wires and got them into some semblance of order

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the dashboard binnacle was particularly satisfying

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so tomorrow, I'll be doing a whole load of soldering, testing and (hopefully) wrapping it all up in tape

observed from above, there's not really much left

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so now I know what all some a small number of those wires do

does it still work ? 

fuktifino ! i guess we'll find out tomorrow :) 

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  • gm changed the title to gm's unhealthy obsession with mx5s - ***UPDATE*** bloody wiring :(

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